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+--- Thread: Almost Crashing is OK in Our Sport! Tuesdays w/Nick (/showthread.php?tid=13596)
Almost Crashing is OK in Our Sport! Tuesdays w/Nick - Ulvetanna_imp - 11-29-2016
Here is the best article Mr. Ienatsch has yet posted.
[url=http://www.cycleworld.com/cover-your-brakes-avoid-deer-motorcycle-safety-ienatsch-tuesday]Covering the brakes and knowing how to use them.
I mentioned Nick and I have similar backgrounds, going back a long way.
The incident(s) he describes are just like the near misses I've had, "almost" crashes that weren't, because of two things: good riding skills and covering the front/rear brakes at any partial-throttle setting. The only time you ever want four fingers on the throttle grip is when you're wide open (when you can't reach the brake lever anyway), or...well, I can't think of any time I'd ever hang on to the throttle with four fingers unless I was out on the open road, just taking a few seconds to relax the right hand, or, oddly enough, on a racetrack, where I already know just about when I am going to need to brake. High cornering speeds and lean angles take a lot of strength, so we often see the top racers using all four fingers on the right grip until just before they need to slow down for the next turn. That's not a good plan for street riding.
This technique Nick describes saves me very often; I can think of twice in the last week where just having the one index finger covering the front brake got me slowed down real nice when (for some strange reason) delivery trucks were parked fully across the lane just beyond a blind turn. Traffic patterns get very weird on holidays; I've seen this maybe half a dozen times in many years of riding that particular road, it's very unusual, but it's just like the animal running out, as Nick describes.
Been reading about quite a few close calls or even accidents here lately; Nick's training is well worth working into your riding.
RE: Almost Crashing is OK in Our Sport! Tuesdays w/Nick - Cormanus - 11-29-2016
My motorcycle training 45 or so years ago was, by modern standards, a catastrophe. Having learned the rudiments of riding on a trail bike on a farm—and I mean rudiments: changing gear, staying upright, basic braking—I went to the transport authority, paid AU$1 and was allowed to ride a street bike (my trusty CB175) on the street. As far as I can recall, the only limitation was that I was not allowed to carry a pillion passenger for at least a couple of years.
That was it.
I learned a bit by experience and managed to stay upright until some clown turned in front of me and took me down. I wasn't covering my brakes because I'd never been taught.
I do now. I've learned it in the past few years and was surprised recently that I felt uncomfortable when I wasn't doing it even though I was in the middle of nowhere with nothing in sight. Mr Ienatsch's thesis that the least possible time from seeing danger to getting pad on rotor has to be a benefit seems inescapably sensible to me.
Good piece, Ulvetanna. Thanks for posting.
Almost crashing IS OK.
RE: Almost Crashing is OK in Our Sport! Tuesdays w/Nick - Rocky_imp - 11-29-2016
As a teenager in the 50's when I started with a 650 BSA, all you did was take a simple riding test while an observer watched.
There was no instruction or training of any kind. You learned through the school of hard knocks.
34 years later, when I came back to bikes upon retirement in 1992, I immediately signed up for a riders course. I did it mainly to quell the fears of my wife who saw herself becoming a widow in short order.
But the more I thought about it, the more it seemed like a good idea.
It was time and money well spent. I learned things that I would probably never even thought about until something bad happened.
It's been a great and safe 25 years since then.
RE: Almost Crashing is OK in Our Sport! Tuesdays w/Nick - Ulvetanna_imp - 11-30-2016
I have really appreciated Nick's columns here recently, he's really found his calling. I love hearing the stories of how some of these techniques have helped people.
I have undertaken the task of teaching a new rider the basics. First off will be the training course offered by CMSP here in CA. Then begins a long process of details and just plain "self-discovery" because there is so much to be learned about riding that has to be done first-hand.
So many of these things I do automatically, I have forgotten where I learned them. Some I am sure I just picked up by trial and error, but I know many of them, I read about in the better columns or books that were available. Many I learned from the riding school binge I was on, and from getting my novice racing license. Dirt riding teaches a lot of skills, too, but for older riders that's really not a good option past a certain stage of health.
These new bikes are getting SO good and with the traction control and ABS systems coming along, that will be a great help, but they can't prevent every scenario.
[url=http://www.sportrider.com/riding-with-traction-control-riding-skills-series]Andrew Trevitt over at Sport Rider discusses how traction control is still no substitute for proper throttle control; like ABS, in certain ways it can help, but that old ham-handedness can still get a rider into trouble.
I have a couple of bikes with TC, it's great fun once you figure out how it works and learn to trust it, but it'll still allow some wheelspin and sometimes in unexpected ways.
Smooth is best. Freddie Spencer always taught "the fastest rider has the slowest hands."
RE: Almost Crashing is OK in Our Sport! Tuesdays w/Nick - Ulvetanna_imp - 11-30-2016
Man I wish more riders would read these articles and posts; too many threads about guys throwing their bikes away. They think it was the fault of the road conditions, tires, whatever but I think Nick would agree with me here, they were avoidable. But if one rider is helped, very good.
RE: Almost Crashing is OK in Our Sport! Tuesdays w/Nick - Rolls_imp - 11-30-2016
I'll be covering my brakes more diligently. 22 ft. @60 mph?? I'll take it!
RE: Almost Crashing is OK in Our Sport! Tuesdays w/Nick - Ulvetanna_imp - 11-30-2016
This is key:
"You never grab the brakes, even in an emergency."
I hear and read so many times, over and again, the phrase "panic brake" as though that's the only option, just grab a handful and pray. "I had to panic brake!" No. That's nuts and it's wrong. It's entirely possible to train a rider to never grab the brakes even under the most severe duress. You can teach a pilot to recover from a stall, which is not even close to being instinctive behaviour. But after practicing stall recovery, a decent pilot can do it every time (and he or she had better!).
Same thing for brakes. I learned this a long time ago and it has saved me from some real problems. You bring in a certain amount of brake to compress the suspension part way whilst retaining control, then start to maneuver. It later becomes instinctive.
RE: Almost Crashing is OK in Our Sport! Tuesdays w/Nick - flynrider - 11-30-2016
Like many of us older riders, I learned to ride "the hard way", without benefit of formal training. My first five years of riding were peppered with two wheeled mishaps that resulted in a lot of scraped metal and skin. All of those mishaps were avoidable and primarily the result of a lack of experience/knowledge.
Eventually, I realized that much of the carnage involved improper braking technique (i.e. "panic braking"). Locking up the wheels when danger loomed seemed to be the natural response, but it became clear that I usually ended up much worse off.
This was right about the time I'd started racing at the track and learning a lot about how ride near the limits of a bike's performance. I learned all about covering the brake when things looked dicey as well as how to apply maximum brake, without locking the wheels. That, plus learning to quickly change the direction of the bike at speed, made all the difference.
Ironically, the only time I've scraped motorcycle metal in the last 28 yrs. was thanks to a deer. I didn't see it until it was a few feet away, though I was still able to brake enough to hit the deer (and the ground) at a relatively low speed. In my book, anticipating the need to brake (covering), then being able to apply maximum brake should be at the top of anyone's motorcycle survival skill list.
RE: Almost Crashing is OK in Our Sport! Tuesdays w/Nick - Ulvetanna_imp - 11-30-2016
(11-30-2016, 11:52 AM)Flynrider_imp Wrote: Like many of us older riders, I learned to ride "the hard way", without benefit of formal training. My first five years of riding were peppered with two wheeled mishaps that resulted in a lot of scraped metal and skin. All of those mishaps were avoidable and primarily the result of a lack of experience/knowledge.Deer! Doggone them. Good job on that!
Eventually, I realized that much of the carnage involved improper braking technique (i.e. "panic braking"). Locking up the wheels when danger loomed seemed to be the natural response, but it became clear that I usually ended up much worse off.
This was right about the time I'd started racing at the track and learning a lot about how ride near the limits of a bike's performance. I learned all about covering the brake when things looked dicey as well as how to apply maximum brake, without locking the wheels. That, plus learning to quickly change the direction of the bike at speed, made all the difference.
Ironically, the only time I've scraped motorcycle metal in the last 28 yrs. was thanks to a deer. I didn't see it until it was a few feet away, though I was still able to brake enough to hit the deer (and the ground) at a relatively low speed. In my book, anticipating the need to brake (covering), then being able to apply maximum brake should be at the top of anyone's motorcycle survival skill list.
RE: Almost Crashing is OK in Our Sport! Tuesdays w/Nick - the Ferret - 11-30-2016
Deer, in all liklihood the most dangerous aspect of our sport because of their unpredictability, their size, strength, and body density. We see a car approaching we might be able to assume they are going to turn left in front of us and take evasive action, we see someone coming from the right or left at an intersection at a high rate of speed and we realize they might not be able to stop if the light changes so we wait and see before preceeding same if we see someone appraoching at high speed in our rear view mirrors, we seek an outlet in case they don't stop in time. If we are following someone and they are looking around as if lost, we realize they may be looking for an address and to back off and give them space in case they slam on the brakes.... But deer? No telling what they are going to do.
Safety guru Larry Grodsky, someone who lived and breathed safety on a motorcycle, wrote a column about it in Rider Magazine for 20 years, was taken out by a deer. Truthfully, I wonder if I am not destined to the same fate. So many close calls over the years.