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MISTAKES: A common theme in crashing

Great refresher. Last night I had a very rare occurance of another driver (dingbat 17 year old girl) move into my lane aggressively...led to a big rear wheel lockup and her doing it again in another 100 yards. Knowing she had to do it given the circumstances she was facing saved my ass...

Thanks for the refresher!
 
Ride more learn more and learn more to ride more. Thank you for sharing the experience.
 
Thanks Dave...you and I have more than a few crashes in our lifetimes!
 
Which club Lou? Glad to hear it's making round!
 
In my experience, the bike rarely crashes. The RIDER crashes and takes the bike with him. Most modern bikes corner safely at much higher speeds than the guy in the saddle can. Take the time and do the work to really learn a bike and how it works at it's extremes. And that means at the track.

Mad
 
A case of dumb here. Did not know my own road. The Essic / Wyo intersection is on both the outbound and return loop of my favorite ride. I was having a lovely time honking around this exemplary bend on Wyo when I saw the Essic sign too late. Should have stayed in the corner. I didn't. Tried to make the turn. Was in gravel immediately. Could not use the front brake because of the gravel. Dragged the rear tire for 70 feet on the pavement, then 40 feet off road which thankfully featured only a shallow drainage channel and dry loamy soil free of trees. Told my wife that I had done a Marquez, i.e. crash without falling down. Obviously untrue. She knew what I meant. Told her my skid mark was "about 70 feet." When I went back for snappies, I paced it off. 70 feet. If that makes me special I could be glad. It just makes me fortunate.
Photo from terminus.
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Holeshot said:
Great refresher. Last night I had a very rare occurance of another driver (dingbat 17 year old girl) move into my lane aggressively...led to a big rear wheel lockup and her doing it again in another 100 yards. Knowing she had to do it given the circumstances she was facing saved my ass...

Thanks for the refresher!
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Glad you were alert!
 
Glad it may help. I read it again and man...it STILL hits home for me. Back when I wrote it, I didn't know how true the bullet points are and how much I use them in almost every race I've had since then. For me, it's stood the test of time. One last one I might add:

- If you do crash on a roadway and are able to, sight your path OFF the driving surface and get there as fast as you can, however you can. GET OUT OF AN IMPACT ZONE ASAP.
 
Speaking of mistakes and how we react to them, I made one in my recent lowside (see thread in this sub forum - Low Speed Low Side) that I’ve been wondering about.

Since it happened at a slow speed and there was no runoff - just a guardrail - I remember thinking as soon as the bike hit the ground that I had to hang onto it in order slow it down so it wouldn’t hit the guardrail so hard. :rolleyes

As I struggled to do this I noticed the guardrail getting closer at a great rate and realized that as soon as the bike hit it, it would stop, and I would come charging into it at a great rate of knots. And still I hung on, smashed into the top box, and either broke or severly bruised a couple of ribs in my lower back.

I don’t want to rehash the crash causes here, but it might be worth adding something to this list about letting go of the bike once it’s down.

Of course, this flies in the face of a couple of saves I experienced on the track, whereby I hung on and ended up back in the seat, much to my amazement.
https://youtube.com/clip/UgkxwhxMbVsgLlkdoRfqw3Gc_aTgHdBNKXRI?si=FkJ6gmwzu-ARwsC4
Still, it seems to me that in a street environment, letting go would be the better practice since the rider will generally stop sliding sooner than the bike will on pavement. Thoughts?
 
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ThinkFast said:
Still, it seems to me that in a street environment, letting go would be the better practice since the rider will generally stop sliding sooner than the bike will on pavement. Thoughts?
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I can remember a bit over 20 years ago when I was following OldFatGuy down Del Puerto Canyon Rd when he lost the front on a right turn. He hung onto his bike to keep it from going off of the drop-off a few feet past the edge of the pavement. He was able to ride it back home, which probably couldn't have happened if he let go of it right away.

This was a couple of months before my crash on that same road closer to The Junction, which I mentioned in another recent post noting that I've made it 20 years with no more crashes. I didn't have a choice of hanging onto my bike in that one. The bike made it off of the road into a ditch and I ended up on my face in the middle of the road.
 
I would say, having the bike follow the rider into an impact zone/ object is worst case. But also, if you can physically separate yourself from the bike, you're not carrying a large amount of energy/ speed. Ive never been able to change my direction much nor able to really know which direction I'm going; with the bike, or without it. My best advice is: when you can, and as soon as you can: get off the roadway/ riding surface and in a safe area. I don't believe I have much opinion on holding onto the bike as much as not getting tangled with it...but that's really dumb luck in the end. Crashes at the speed we're mostly riding at carry so much energy, the bike and rider are going the same place no matter.

I've seen so many riders end up on the ground and they lay there without serious injuries for minutes on end. Several have been hit cause of that. No thanks. I'm getting out of there as soon as I can, sometimes while still sliding.
 
Yeah, all true. FWIW, if the bike is following you, chances are pretty good you high-sided, in which case the chances of hanging on after you’re on the ground are pretty low due to the violent nature of that type of crash. I’ve saved a high side by hanging on and nearly kissed the front fender in the process. I’ve also violently high sided to the moon and recall looking down on my bike from above, well separated from it.

Low sides, though, especially at lower speed like my last one, provide the option. Bad idea, as it turns out. Ergo, posting here in the first place.

Lastly, I do believe most racers would agree that getting out of harm’s way asap should be a priority after you’ve hit the deck. I think they’d also agree, though, that a newb racer mistake is trying to get up before you’re done sliding, which can result in a bad - and avoidable - tumble. If it’s a lowside enjoy the ride, says I. :)
 
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