The Mod 1 Slalom: Cones Technique and Drills

#The slalom layout

Five cones in a straight line, spaced 4.5 metres apart, painted in the standard MPTC layout. You enter at one end, weave through the cones (right, left, right, left, right) and exit at the other end. There is no time limit and no speed gun on this manoeuvre. The job is purely accuracy.

Speed should be around 15 to 20 km/h. Slow enough to control, fast enough to commit to a lean. At 20 km/h the bike will tip naturally into each turn, which is exactly what you want. Below 12 km/h the bike is harder to balance and you will be fighting it.

#The line through the cones

The cones mark fixed points. Your line bends around each cone with the deepest part of the curve almost adjacent to the cone, then the bike straightens for a brief moment before bending the other way around the next one. The shape is a gentle wave, not a series of sharp zig-zags.

A common fault is to start the wave too late, so you arrive at each cone too straight and have to turn sharply to clear it. The fix is to begin your turn before the cone, not at it. Think of the line as ahead of the cone, not at the cone.

#Body position

On the slalom, body position is more important than for the figure of eight because you are moving faster and the cones come at you in quick succession. The classic technique is to keep the upper body relaxed and let the bike swing under you while the head and torso point at the next gap, not the cone.

Look two cones ahead. As you pass cone one, your eyes are on cone three. As you pass cone two, your eyes are on cone four. By the time you reach cone five, your eyes are at the exit point.

#Throttle, clutch and brake on the slalom

You do not slip the clutch on the slalom in the way you do on the figure of eight. Speed is high enough that the clutch should be fully out and the bike running on a steady throttle, around 2500 rpm in second gear on most A2/A test bikes. A1 candidates on a 125 will be in first or second.

Light rear brake can help if the bike feels twitchy, but most riders are smoother without it on the slalom. The throttle is the main control: a steady, even input through the whole sequence. Snapping the throttle on or off mid-cone causes the bike to pitch and you to lose line.

#Common faults

Three faults dominate slalom failures.

• Hitting a cone: usually because the rider is looking at the current cone, not the next gap
• Wide line: usually because the rider started the turn too late and could not tighten enough
• Stalling: usually because the rider rolled off the throttle mid-sequence and the bike dropped below the speed it could balance at
• Foot down: rare on the slalom, but can happen if the rider runs out of speed and tries to dab to recover
• Wrong direction: occasional candidates start the wrong way around the first cone and lose marks for entering the layout incorrectly

#Drills to fix the slalom

A typical training school will run you through this sequence over one or two sessions:

• Single-lane riding at 15 km/h with deliberate head turns left and right every two seconds
• Three-cone slalom at 15 km/h to lock in the wave shape
• Five-cone slalom at 15 km/h, then at 20 km/h
• Five-cone slalom looking only at the exit line, not at any individual cone
• Five clean repeats in a row before moving on to the next manoeuvre

#When you should ride faster or slower

Smaller bikes (125cc A1 test bikes) like a slightly slower slalom, around 15 km/h, because they are lighter and tip into turns more quickly. Larger A2/A bikes are happier at 18 to 20 km/h because the extra mass gives the bike more momentum and stability through the turns.

On test day you should know the speed that suits your bike. Pick one number, drill it, and stick to it. Examiners are not looking for speed, they are looking for control and consistency.

#After the slalom

The slalom flows directly into the figure of eight on most MPTC layouts. As you exit the last slalom cone, you have a short straight before the figure of eight cones come up. Use that straight to recover your line and slow to figure-of-eight speed (around 10 km/h). The transition is part of the test, so do not coast through it.

For the rest of the test sequence and the wider context, the Mod 1 manoeuvres guide and the test day guide cover what comes next.