Some observations on human control of a bicycle

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to identify human control actions in normal bicycling. The task under study is the stabilization of the mostly unstable lateral motion of the bicycle-rider system. This is done by visual observation of the rider and measuring the vehicle motions. The observations show that very little upper-body lean occurs and that stabilization is done by steering control actions only. However, at very low forward speed a second control is introduced to the system: knee movement. Moreover, all control actions are performed at the pedaling frequency, whilst the amplitude of the steering motion increases rapidly with decreasing forward speed.