Why do I keep going down?

'But straightening the bike up is key.'

YES. I would rather lose a slight amount of braking distance straightening up than brake in a lean. Why you build in added distance. You will be a dead duck in rain not doing it. I consciously straighten up before any braking action I ever do in rain.

You get away with leaning a bike because you add tire friction with weight multiplied by speed and inertia but when you brake you cut that back hugely and then you fall into the turned wheel. it's a matter of grasping the physics there.

When you get good at balance you can even run up to a stop sign and balance well enough to completely stop and balance for a second to then barely release clutch and gas up lightly to re-achieve decaying balance and never touch a foot to the ground at all. I can balance as long as two seconds doing it with no thought of it at all. Do NOT do it at a motorcycle license test though as many police do not consider a balance stop as a full stop even if the bike wheels have stopped rolling, a complete stop is one with at least one foot on the ground legally. BTDT and failed the test over it because I drove with no license for several years and was good at it. When the policemen told me I was surprised as I could have easily done the foot down thing if I knew it was wanted, of course the driver training book did not say one word about it. So I had to test again after waiting 30 days and passed that one perfectly.

If one previously drove a bicycle it comes much easier. The left/right/left/right due to pedaling is a slight both way out of balance condition one learns to work under pretty quick.

Something else many do not know but food to chew on. When say you are creeping bike just before taking off and you have to turn it say left what do you do? You turn the handlebar slightly left of course. However, once you are at high enough speed to be balanced then something weird happens but most don't see it. To get the bike to begin to fall to the same left you have to push the handlebar a slight imperceptible amount to the RIGHT first, it is what decays your balance to fall to the left to begin to run on the side of the tire to then go to the left. So, to go left you slightly go right first then left if needed to turn tighter. The opposite move throws you off balance to then fall to the side you want to ride to cut that one way. If you had paint on the tires you would even see that slight move to the opposite side before you then swing to the side you want, all bikes do it but the opposite move is very hard to see. That's if you keep your body dead straight with the bike, if you lean body to the turn side then that opposite move is not needed as your body weight does the same thing.

'No such thing as a legal requirement to put your foot on the ground when you stop a motorcycle.'

I can personally attest to the fact that if one challenges a Texas cop and even worse a state one with an absolute non-changing belief structure like that it is likely going to be a very bad day. When you are with one the law often becomes fluid and things can change like lightning. like with lawyers now many police take law as plastic and molded at the moment to what they say and argument can and WILL put you in jail if you do not play their little game.

BTDT, and over 30 tickets by age 25 and somewhere I pulled my head out to then stop getting them at all. Most of all it requires you to keep your mouth shut. Here simply arguing can get you jail instantly as a flight risk if you do not concur. BTDT too and one ticket turned into five instantly. NEVER issue an absolute to a cop; they will prove you wrong right on the spot and laugh about it.

I've been within seconds of being shot by police at least 3 times and all three doing absolutely nothing wrong, the guns were out and I had to play the game correctly to not have things go much worse.

Way more than one policeman told me the put foot down thing. Not arguing, rather pointing out that insistence otherwise can easily get you worse, here the police will put you in jail instantly just to make you jump through the hoops. You'll pay tow charges, the fine and court fees up front before they let you out of jail and THEN get around to court date setting. And there is NO either you stopped or didn't, there being a wide array of nuances applied to what is commonly an IMPROPER stop charge, which covers anything the cop can dream up. Like one of the five charges above, I stopped the bike with front tire breaking the line by maybe an inch and he went for it. I've also gotten a no stop ticket for skidding the vehicle in the rain but maybe only the last foot of the stop. Losing control of vehicle he called it and improper stop ticket issued again.

Some of you will remember the young woman of color who got arrested in south Texas while the whole time loudly protesting and then ended up in jail and later 'committed suicide' a bizarre example of how things can go if you decide to get all up in a policeman's face, yes, you may be very right but you may be very dead as well.

I used to argue with them and mostly why the tickets but at some point only a dumb-tt doesn't grasp it can get much worse. I say that after having been physically lifted off the ground by my shirt collar to choke me right on the front steps of the police station for all of town to see.

I still back the law but it can bite both ways.