Superhopping

Superhopping is an external velocity (EV) exploit exclusive to outside-drifting bikes (ODBs) using manual drift. It involves performing spinhops repeatedly to gain EV.

Superhopping is notable for being the most widely applicable out of the major EV exploits, as it can be performed even on a flat plane of ground without any setup. On the other hand, it is not as effective for accumulating large amounts of EV. Superhopping saves time on the vast majority of unrestricted and no ultra categories, while it is not allowed in the no glitch category.

Overview

Bikes are able to gain EV by leaning during a hop. Tilting the stick to either side causes the bike to lean in that direction and gain EV; it also increases the lean rotation value until reaching the lean rotation cap, at which point the vehicle stops gaining EV. If the stick is neutral, lean rotation decreases by 10% per frame. this also applies when the bike has been airborne for over 20 frames, no matter the stick input.

Leaning EV is intended to be lost very quickly, due to two mechanics: wheel EV decay and EV to IV conversion. Wheel EV decay activates when a wheel hitbox is touching the ground, reducing EV by 2-4 per frame for each wheel. EV to IV conversion happens when landing from airtime in particular, and also contributes to EV loss.

There is a distinction between a bike's facing direction (yaw), and the direction of the IV vector, which is the direction of movement without EV. The difference between these two direction is referred to as relative angle. When landing from airtime, the greater the relative angle, the more EV dissipation is reduced while the relative angle normalizes.

The drifting mechanics of ODBs allow them to reach a relative angle of up to ~45° in a drift, and increase it even higher by repeatedly hopping. On the ground, the relative angle has a hard limit of 60°. When landing on the ground (without a drift), the relative angle is preserved from airtime, though it is capped at 60° and begins decreasing. For large relative angles, the EV loss is greatly reduced. Performing spinhops over and over again allows the bike to both gain EV by leaning, increase its relative angle (so that only a small amount of EV is lost upon landing), and move roughly in a straight line.

Inside-drifting bikes are not able to superhop, because whenever they land from airtime, the relative angle is immediately set to 0°. As a result, the EV absorbed upon landing is much greater, and it is not possible to slowly gain EV over time by hopping.

Superhopping tends to rotate the bike to turn inwards over time, due to the repeated spinhops. It is still possible to superhop in a (mostly) straight line; if the goal is to gain EV to the right, the basic superhop movement involves alternating a spinhop to the left with a counterhop to the right. Bikes with lower handling are able to take wider lines, making them generally better at superhopping, although every bike slowly turns inwards over time. On the other hand, higher handling makes it slightly easier to accumulate EV, as the relative angle can increase to higher values.

Superhopping is generally easier to perform on flat ground. Ground sloping affects the airtime of each individual hops, making it difficult to test changes and fully optimize superhopping. On uphills, superhopping is less effective because the reduced airtime makes it harder to accumulate EV. On downhills, the increased airtime makes it easier to gain EV, but controlling the bike's trajectory is more difficult on straight lines.

Optimizations

Optimal inputs

Before starting a superhop sequence, it is very important to keep drifting for some time, so that the IV vector points fully away from the facing direction. If the initial drift is too short, the relative angle is too small, which causes bike to lose more EV when landing from each hop at the start of the superhop sequence. (Repeated spinhops continue increasing the relative angle, however, hence why the bike is still able to gain speed after some time.) The exact length of the drift depends on the situation, so it's best to test a few different lengths.

To gain as much speed as possible while superhopping to the right, the angle hop input should be a +2, while the drift commit input should be -1 for a spinhop.
Both inputs contribute to generating EV. For the drift commit, -1 is the only input which starts a left spinhop without gaining EV to the left. For the angle hop, any input between +2 and +7 generates EV to the right, but a softer input is better because it causes a smaller IV decrease. Using ±2 angle hops instead of ±7 makes a big difference when superhopping below 120 u/f.

Other inputs during the hop only affect leaning, not the bike's rotation. The first input upon landing also does not affect rotation. For this reason, adjusting the angle hop and drift commit inputs is the easiest way to control the bike's trajectory while superhopping. Adding a few grounded frames is another option, although wheel EV decay causes EV to decrease rapidly on the ground.

Vertical inputs during the hop always have an effect on yaw rotation due to rotation conversion. Occasionally, vertical inputs also affect the airtime of individual hops, or how much EV is lost upon landing. It is recommended to always test both holding fully up and down for each hop when optimizing superhopping.

Drift hops

To perform a drift hop, drift for 1 frame upon landing from a spinhop before starting the next hop. Drift hops should usually be performed every other hop, but it varies depending on the situation.

Consider a superhop sequence to the right. When lean rotation reaches the cap of +1, leaning does not gain any more EV and superhopping stops being effective. However, by doing a spinhop to the left and landing in a drift, lean rotation is immediately reset to -0.8, restoring the ability to gain EV by leaning to the right. (The same principle works for superhopping to the left, with signs and directions swapped.)

It is important to not drift after landing from a counterhop. In the example above, starting a hop to the right and landing in a drift sets lean rotation to a positive value like +1.1, which nullifies the ability to gain EV by leaning to the right. When superhopping to the right, a common pattern of hops is the following: left drift spinhop, right counterhop.

When performing a drift hop on flat ground, lean rotation reaches the cap again after two hops. To keep resetting the lean rotation, a drift hops should be done every other hop. On downhills, it's better to drift hop every hop due to increased airtime, while on uphills drift hops can be done every third or fourth hop.
Each drift hop counts as one more grounded frame, making the bike dissipate some EV and rotate inward. For long or tight turns, holding the drift for a few frames is the most efficient method to rotate and move tighter. Forgoing drift hops lets the bike move slightly wider, but affects EV generation, so it's usually better to rework previous superhop lines instead.

To perform a drift hop, IV must be at least 55% of maximum base speed upon landing. Even if the bike is moving at 120 u/f, if its IV is too low it won't be able to drift hop. This makes the offroad stat very important on tracks like GBA Shy Guy Beach, which features long stretches of superhopping on offroad.

Neutral gliding

When lean rotation reaches its cap, leaning stops increasing EV. Instead of reaching the cap, it is better to alternate between neutral and leaning inputs, and hover below the lean rotation cap to keep generating EV. This technique is known as neutral gliding.

Using neutral inputs, lean rotation decreases more quickly at higher values, so it is optimal to wait until one or two frames before reaching the cap to neutral glide. Optimal neutral gliding involves alternating between a leaning and neutral input every frame, as detailed here.

Neutral gliding is best used to squeeze out a little more EV before resetting lean rotation by drifting. Consider the previous example of a hop pattern: left drift spinhop, right counterhop. Neutral gliding is only useful at the end of the spinhop, while it should not be used during the counterhop since lean rotation is still far from the cap.

In the long term, neutral gliding is less effective at gaining EV than performing drift hops. It is better to rework the superhop sequence to include more drift hops, than to neutral glide for an entire hop or longer.

Wheelies

Between each hop, there is one frame where the bike is grounded and a wheelie can be started. Even though the wheelie is immediately cancelled by the hop, it still has a small effect on the superhop sequence. Wheelies are subject to the regular 20 frame cooldown, so on flat ground they can only be used every other hop.

Doing a wheelie usually lets the bike move slightly wider while superhopping, though occasionally it may cause the bike to move tigher instead. It is not possible to lean during a wheelie, which slightly reduces EV gain. Wheelies slightly lift the front of the bike, which may cause the bike to gain more airtime when driving on uphill terrain. Finally, adding a wheelie may affect how much EV is lost after landing from the hop.

Although wheelies are often good for taking wider lines, it can be hard to predict what they do in each sitauation. When optimizing superhopping, it is recommended to try adding a wheelie after each hop and check if it is beneficial compared to not doing a wheelie.

On each grounded frame, an alternative option is releasing the A button. This causes IV to decrease, which usually causes the bike to move a bit wider, in the direction of the EV vector. Because IV also determines if the bike can drift hop, this is generally only useful at 120 u/f, and if IV can remain high for the entire superhop sequence.

Soft walls

Soft walls (also known as barrel roll collision) are often found on the edge of the track, and can be interacted with while superhopping. While colliding with a soft wall, and up to 10 frames after, both leaning and wheel EV decay are disabled.

As long as wheel EV decay is disabled, there is no penalty for driving on the ground. This is very useful for accelerating (to increase IV without an EV penalty) and change the direction of IV, especially on straightways where movement options are limited. However, since soft walls also disable leaning, it may be better to avoid them if EV isn't high enough to stay at the speed cap. Soft walls are used for better lines on tracks like GBA Bowser Castle 3 and GBA Shy Guy Beach.

Slippery road

On slippery road, the maximum relative angle on the ground changes from 60° to over 75°. This makes it easier to accumulate EV than on regular terrain, because a greater relative angle reduces the EV lost upon landing from each hop. Likewise, because the traction stat decreases the maximum relative angle further on slippery road, low traction bikes are able to gain EV a bit more efficiently on slippery road.

Instead of alternating between counterhops and spinhops, a viable movement option is to spinhop in the same direction, drift hop, and simply turn away on the ground for a few frames. Over time, this accumulates more EV than counterhopping and prevents IV from decreasing, but it causes the bike to rotate inwards much more than using counterhops would.

Wallclips

When superhopping to the right, the only option for taking a turn to the left is to stop the superhop sequence, drift to the left until the relative angle reaches 45° again, and resume superhopping in the opposite direction. Clipping a wall immediately reduces the relative angle to 0°, by redirecting the IV vector to be parallel to the bike's facing direction. As such, wallclips can be used to shift the direction of movement and reach a high relative angle in the opposite direction more quickly. This is done, for example, on SNES Mario Circuit 3 NU flap's second shroom, to quickly switch from drifting left at the hairpin to drifting right in preparation the final superhop sequence.

Usage with other EV exploits

Although superhopping is widely applicable, it is not the best movement option for every situation. Superhopping struggles with straightways and tight corners due to limited turning, and sections with many elevation changes. ODBs have access to many other EV exploits; when routing a complex track, it is very important to consider what other movement options may be better than superhopping on specific sections.

Outside drift momentum is the most common alternative. ODM accumulates EV by leaning much like superhopping, but the airtime is gained by driving off a ledge or by getting a bounce, rather than by hopping. Without the hop, the bike's turning is not restricted like for superhopping. ODM is especially helpful for rotating outwards to move in a wider trajectory. Lean rotation can be reset by performing a slipdrift, and neutral gliding is also applicable.
If the track's geometry allows for it, ODM is best used to let the bike realign in the air in-between two consecutive superhop sequences. An example can be seen on Luigi Circuit. By using the curbs, it is possible to get a large bounce and perform ODM; this lets the bike take the corners tight and realign, all without sacrificing EV.

Supergrinding is often performed out of a superhop sequence, as seen on tracks like DS Delfino Square or DS Peach Gardens. Compared to superhopping, supergrinding allows for much greater control over turning, and deals much better with changes in ground slope. The main downside is that supergrinding not as versatile; since it requires a grounded hop, it can't be started at will, and any airtime forces the bike out of the supergrind state.
Grounded hops are bad for superhopping, because airtime is necessary to avoid wheel EV decay. Using grounded hops to rapid fire hop is common on uphills, but does not always result in a proper supergrind, as wheel EV decay can't be prevented at times. Instead, supergrinds are usually started out of a superhop by using a downhill slope.

While the Wario Bike is in the superslide state, it is able to hop without ejecting on most uphill and flat terrain. The same principles for superhopping detailed above can be applied while in the superslide state too. In particular, drift hops can be very effective on manual drift to reset lean rotation and quickly build EV; this is situational, however, as drifting requires high positive IV, while negative IV helps to turn tighter in a superslide.
Overall, superhopping in the superslide state isn't more effective than performing regular superslide inputs. That being said, hopping can be used to take tighter lines at high IV or avoid offroad while still gaining EV, as seen on GCN Peach Beach.

Reverse superhopping

In all cases discussed so far, superhopping increases the total speed of the bike. This is because the EV vector has a component parallel to the IV vector. The total speed is simply the sum of the IV and EV vectors; therefore, the more parallel the two vectors, the greater the total speed.

It is also possible to decrease the total speed by superhopping, for example by drifting to the left and superhopping to the left. In this case, the EV vector has a component opposite the IV vector, and the bike appears to gradually slow down as EV increases; in reality, IV remains stable and EV increases, but since they are pointing in opposite directions, the two components cancel out rather than add together. This application is known as reverse superhopping.

Reverse superhopping is generally not useful for 3lap categories, but it has seen use in certain flap setups, such as Mario Circuit. Compared to other EV exploits, the benefit of reverse superhopping is that takes little room to generate EV, since the speed is low, and it can be performed anywhere, including flat ground. It can also lead to other EV exploits, like supergrinding, while the IV and EV vectors are pointing away from each other. However, reverse superhopping alone is less effective than other methods at accumulating a large amount of EV.