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Originally Posted by Alex
I don't understand why the bike fell over. If the front end washed, and the bike still didn't travel far enough to hit the truck or anything else, you need to figure out what you'd have done differently to keep the bike upright in the same situation. I'd spend some time practicing emergency braking, so it becomes second nature when the inevitable dumbass comes across your path again. As you've mentioned, it's pretty much a given that we run into silliness on the roads from time to time; the better prepared we are to deal with them the better off we'll be.
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Yes I should definitely practice panic braking in a parking lot. I've considered an MSF course, but for the 100 bucks I've lurked in the shadows and watched the entire event and didn't see anything I couldn't practice on my own. Didn't really see many womens attending either so there'd be no ulterior motive.
Thanks for posting, keep running this excellent site.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Motofool
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I will have a look at those threads, and thanks for posting.
Very frustrating especially this time of year when saving 4 dollars on a television seems more appealing to people than basic human decency and traffic courtesy. It'd definitely be smart to practice some panic stops.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Used Ninja
Luckily, throughout my years of being on two wheels I've never had anything bad happen, nor any drops... one car tried turning left on a yellow (downtown, ugh) while I was going straight on yellow... I just swerved quickly to the right.
Then, a truck (always a truck...) once slowly merged onto my lane and I was like what the eff is going on here so I just squeezed my brakes and let him merge.
Fingers crossed.  |
Yeah I've had that happen so many times. One of the main reasons I'd like to get a bigger bike... it's nice to have some extra power to downshift and blast through that tiny closing gap between the un-aware person merging and oncoming traffic.
Before I bought the 250r, my ride was a lowered and fully built honda CRX. Anyone familiar with that car knows that it's freaking TINY and once it's lowered and blacked out with tints and a dull paint job it's about as visible as a motorcycle in traffic.
I still have my CRX, but I never finished tuning it after supercharging and motor swapping 300whp in because my laptop broke. 300whp is not much, until you put it in a 1900lb chassis.
Quote:
Originally Posted by choneofakind
Learn from this mishap.
^^Remember you only have $10.00 of grip budget to split between turning and braking. Can't expect to spend $12.00, you'll just lock and skid, as I'm sure you learned today. Separate turning and braking actions whenever possible to avoid what you did today.
If you skid the front while upright, you can unlock it and go about your merry way. If you're off the brakes, you can throw the bike into a turn in an instant. Can't do both at the same time. That's why you went down; you demanded too much of the front tire too suddenly.
This is just as lame as when people 'lay er down' to stop faster than with their brakes. I call BS here. You locked the front while also trying to turn when you panicked and asked too much of the front tire. Then, the bars jerked to the blocks like they do in that situation and you fell over. Of all the thoughts going through your mind, "oh my gosh my fairings!!" was miles behind, "DAFUQ?!??". Crashing is fine. Admitting you panicked and made a mistake is fine. Playing off panic reactions as controlled and thoughtful actions is lame. I know the feeling of a panic. If you had that much time to think about your fairings, you had time to use some more modulation skill on that brake lever. Ergo, you did not intentionally turn the bars, that was a product of the locked front wheel.
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I agree with your observation. I guess it's how my post came off -- a little hard for me to remember things clearly. I remember the first thought through my mind when the guy cut in front of me was "You've GOT to be kidding" and then when I saw brake lights and him stopping his truck inches from my front wheel, I dunno what happened I just started raging. Stopping my bike wasn't really my primary concern, neither was swerving, or anything else logical or rational. The fact that my bike was about to sustain potential/massive damage was distantly on my mind, but not in the forefront of my thought process.
Please understand that's is difficult to explain 'rage' in a logical way to people who don't know what it feels like.
It's like my brain clicked "gonna crash, and it's this fu**king guy's fault, must translate the damage to my motorcycle to this a**hole's face asap."
Not trying to shirk any responsibility, and I admit my fault(s).
For what it's worth, when I first bought my bike, I set up a camera and got in front of a mirror while sitting on the bike and leaning it as far as I possibly could to assess exactly how far I could lean it before the kickstand/pipe dragged, what parts would touch the ground first, how I could 'safely' lay it down without smashing the fairings, which way to turn the bars so they would touch down first, how to angle the mirrors so they wouldn't be ripped off in a crash etc.. Honestly speaking I was trying to figure out if 300 bucks worth of frame sliders would really be worth protecting the investment etc.
I think I mentally resigned to the fact that I was going to drop the bike before it happened and was more concerned with smashing my way through the window of the truck and into the face of the driver who cut me off than I was with saving the bike.
Hard to explain, and thank you for posting. Hopefully you can understand part of the point I'm trying to articulate.
Quote:
Originally Posted by csmith12
Way to keep your cool and chin up. Dat's what's up.
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Thanks brah, I wouldn't call myself a violent individual but my record is well documented on paper. Can't afford to get in any more confrontations or altercations over something as simple as a scratched up motorcycle. Not going back to jail.
Feels like I'm kind of a level headed zen monk, but then I find myself in a situation and all of a sudden get hit with this "what the fukk happened OMG what did I do" exclamation which makes me wonder how well I know myself.
Proud how I handled it
