HOW-TO: Learn to wheelie

Doug Domokos, the undisputed “Wheelie King,” died in an ultralight aircraft accident on November 26, 2000. Doug started his career performing at intermission shows during Friday-night races at his home track in Red Bud, Michigan. His incredible sense of balance and throttle control helped make him the most well-known motorcycle stuntman throughout the ’80s and ’90s. Doug once rode a wheelie for 145 continuous miles to garner a Guinness World Record, and ATVs were always part of his act.

The ability to wheelie a machine at will is a skill we all desired at one point in our childhood. Some of us figured it out at a young age, some struggled with it for a while and many gave up without ever really mastering this important skill. Wheelieing is not only a cool stunt you can use to impress your friends, it can also be advantageous on the track or trail when you need to lift the front end over an obstacle. Doug had it mastered, and with a little practice and instruction, you can too.

When it comes to learning to wheelie an ATV, the first thing to tackle is the setup. A stock quad is perfect for novice-to-advanced wheelie skills. If you are looking for stuntman-quality wheelies or just a little help mastering that first one, you should start by lowering the air pressure in your tires. Significantly lower air pressure will cause your tires to squish more during a wheelie. This squish will give you a larger contact patch between your rear tires and the ground. Imagine standing on a flat surface or standing on a football. Be sure that your rear tires have equal pressure in them so that the ATV will travel in a straight line on flat ground.
One other setup or maintenance tip to watch is your drive-chain adjustment. Be sure to keep your chain adjusted to the manufacturer’s spec. If your chain is too loose, you will have to use extra throttle control to make up for chain slop. Make sure that your throttle cable does not have any unwanted slop in it, either.

TYPES OF WHEELIES
There are two basic types of wheelies that you will want to master: sitting and standing. The sitting wheelie is good, because stress on your body is minimal, and with proper balance, you can do this for miles without getting tired. To do a seated wheelie, your backside will be rearward on the seat with your hands on the controls and feet on the pegs. The all-important throttle, clutch, brake and shifter are all easily within reach. The tough part of a sit-down wheelie is committing to getting the front end high enough to hit the balance point. Another problem for beginners is that if they forget about the back brake, it can be hard to dismount before the bike comes over on them.

The stand-up wheelie is done with hands on the controls and feet on the pegs. It’s a little easier to master because you can see what’s ahead of you, and the front end of the quad does not seem as high when you reach the balance point. The standing wheelie is easier to step off of in a tip-over. The downside to stand-up wheelies is that the brake and shifter can be trickier to reach when you need them. Another factor is that your legs and arms can get tired from holding on while riding for long periods.

WHEELIE BASICS
You will need to use extra throttle to get your ATV to the balance point and then smoothly control the throttle to hold the ATV at that point. The balance point can be described as the point where your ATV requires no more acceleration to keep the front end in the air. This point is lower when you are going faster and higher when you are going slower. Once you find it, you will know. Smooth throttle operation is the key to maintaining the balance point.

Getting the front end up can be done a few different ways. To power the front end into a wheelie, find the powerband point, let off slightly and then pop the throttle while pulling up on the handlebars. You should be pulling on the handlebars at the same time the power comes on. Clutching the bike into a wheelie is similar to powering it into one. Using the clutch will help bring the front end up smoothly, and slipping the clutch can help you get the front end up on a quad that is underpowered while in a higher gear. You can use the clutch method to lift the quad from a dead stop and perform a much slower wheelie.

USING THE REAR BRAKE
In a perfect world, you would never need the rear brake for a wheelie, but here on planet Earth, the back brake is your best friend. As you start to get past your balance point, drag the back brake slightly to bring the ATV down to the proper angle. If you go seriously past your balance point, you can hit the back brake hard enough to slam the quad back into the ground. At first, your rear brake may just get you back to the ground safely, but as you practice throttle and brake control, you will be able to keep the ATV at very slow speeds while riding a wheelie.

Once you have braking mastered, you can learn to shift. Shifting a wheelie is just like shifting with all four wheels on the ground, with an emphasis on using the clutch for a smooth transition from one gear to another. Please remember that if you have truly found your balance point, there is really no reason to shift, as you should be able to stay in the same gear without acceleration indefinitely. If you are shifting because you’re running out of gear and need the speed to keep the front end up, then your wheelie is not steep enough.

To steer a wheelie is pretty simple; turning is accomplished by leaning to one side or the other. Your ATV won’t turn instantly, so give it a little while to catch up. Also, it is much more effective if you are running lower air pressure in your tires.

Once you have practiced the fundamentals, it is time to put it all together. Get your front end up to the balance point as quickly as possible with the throttle on. As you approach the balance point, ease off the throttle. Once you are at the balance point, you should be able to maintain it between 1/4–1/2 throttle using minimal adjustments to keep your angle. Remember not to drop the wheelie below the balance point or you will need more throttle to get it back up. If you’re using power to keep your wheelie going, then it ends when you run out of rpm. Be sure to keep the rear brake within reach at all times. When it comes time to set your wheelie back down, remember that your front wheels must be straight and hold on tight.

With enough practice, keeping the balance point becomes instinct, then you can apply your newfound balance to tricks like deceleration wheelies, where you go way past the balance point and then drag the rear brake to maintain a straight-up wheelie as you decelerate. Dragging the grab bar is fun, too, but wheelies are way more than that. They can be used to blitz whoops, jump logs, drop off of steep stream banks and tackle all sorts of obstacles.