I never quite understood why it is so much easier to keep a bike balanced while riding at a certain speed, compared to riding it really slow, or while standing…
In: 540
In simple terms, your steering input has a more immediate effect on the relationships that apply balancing forces to the bike if you are moving faster.
The general solution is actually a hard one to eli5! It’s complex area of dynamics, partially with regard to self-stabilisation of a bicycle in motion. If you are really interested in investing effort in understanding it [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicycle_and_motorcycle_dynamics?wprov=sfti1) is as a good a starting point as always.
Without considering self stabilisation, and answering the very specific question of why it’s easier to balance at speed, it’s largely because any given input (with the corresponding change to geometry of the system) will result in a more rapid displacement of the center of mass versus the points of contact with the ground around which the bike ‘pivots’ when the longitudinal displacement of the system per unit time is higher. This means you can more quickly apply a correcting moment to the bike with your inputs when it starts to topple.
(Some of the responses in this thread are bananas !)
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