1. Wear protective gear, gloves, leather jacket, leather pants or armored pants or chaps over your pants, boots that protect your ankle, a full-face helmet and put ear plugs in your ears before putting your helmet on and make sure to secure the chin strap. Hi-vis or bright colors are a great idea to be more easily seen.
2. Check tire pressure, your engine oil, chain tension, and inspect your rear brake light, head light, turn signals front and rear, during a pre-ride check, make sure everything is working. Test your front and rear brakes, make sure the side mirrors are secure, and make sure you are awake and sharp as a tack mentally.
3. Focus on having fun as safely as possible while riding with the thoughts "They are aiming for me and I am invisible and other motorists are unwittingly trying to crash into me" or similar being on-point, very aware of what is happening around your motorcycling, vigilant and vivid and very bright with excellent attention to situational awareness in traffic in terms of what other nearby motorists are doing, like their vehicular control body language or how their vehicle is moving in the lane of travel, are they driving sane or crazy, what about the drivers posture, are they cramped up on the steering wheel looking nervous or cool calm and collected?
4. Maintain your bike with regular oil changes, coolant changes, brake fluid changes, inspection of the brake pads, rotors, lights, indicators, dash, shifters, levers, running gear, make sure everything securely attached and in good working order before you ride with a pre-ride safety inspection. If you don't know how, or lack the tools, have a professional motorcycle mechanic inspect and maintain your motorcycle to keep it in great working order so that an equipment failure less likely to keep you safer, so that you have agency over your safety as a rider knowing your machine in great working order.
5. In slow stop and go or slow moving traffic, stay to the left or right of your lane so you have an escape route to lane split suddenly to the shoulder or between the other lanes, in case the driver behind you fails to stop as being rearended can be a fatal accident if the car behind you slams into your rear wheel shoving you and your bike into the vehicle ahead of you, crushing you or sending you skyward.
6. Ride within your skill level. A larger heavy powerful motorcycle can be very hard to control for a new rider. A smaller bike with smaller engine and more nimble and lighter weight will be much easier to control, to lane split suddenly to avoid being hit from behind by an inattentive motorist following you or similar. Enter corners at speeds that you are comfortable with, as going too fast can cause you to wobble and lose control, low side or high side, which can be fatal or cause lifelong disability level injuries like being paralyzed.
7. Safety focused defensive riding being vividly aware of situational awareness of what is happening around you in traffic, your surroundings. Never follow too closely to the vehicle traveling ahead and keep a safe following distance. Be prepared to suddenly change lanes if another motorist fails to see you and enters your lane of travel such that they vehicle will hit your front or rear wheel, which can easily cause a fatal accident for the motorcycle rider, while only causing a fender dent or paint scratch on the automobile offender who ran into your bike because they failed to look hard enough to see you. Constantly scan your two side mirrors, never riding in another motorists' blind spots, you should be passing or falling back, never loitering in a vehicle's blind sports. This is all about anticipating and lightly predicting what's about to happen ready in an instant mentally one step ahead able to effectively evade or prevent potential accident scenarios that unfold in seconds in real world riding in traffic conditions.
8. Fair weather provides better traction for the summer tires on most motorcycles. That includes dry days in the autumn, winter and spring and summer clear weather warm riding conditions. Wear enough gear to stay warm, cold hand have a harder time working the clutch and front brake leaver, and cold feet make left foot shifting harder, and shivering can cause you to lose control. In hot summer weather wear vented clothes or a cooling vest or similar to avoid heat stroke. Wear safety gear that matches the weather and riding conditions. This includes checking the weather on your phone or computer or TV before going for a ride, so you know what kind of gear to wear.
9. Never consume alcohol or cannabis or other intoxicants before riding. Always ride sober, sharp and mentally vivid with excellence situational awareness and anticipatory predictive riding defensive style that helps you prevent or avoid potential accidents by dodging them quickly in seconds that can make life of death difference.
10. Beep your horn to let other motorists who failed to notice you of your presence but try not to startle anyone as that can cause an accident by scaring low skilled motorists who are new drivers with very little real world driving experience.
11. Engage in mental visualization exercises about how to evade common accidents. When safe in very low traffic conditions, practice safety evasion moves, like swerving to avoid hitting a sewer lid or pothole when there are no other vehicles nearby. If you are considering riding motorcycles in traffic, sign up for and take the MSF or motorcycle safety foundation course in your area. Those classes book up early, so plan ahead.
12. Watch out for sandy or rocky areas in roadways and intersection where other motorists' wheels and tires rarely travel. They look like triangles of debris in parts of the intersection where no official lanes travel, and they are as slippery as ice. Wet metal grates over roadways, on bridges, even metal sewer lids or metal plates covering construction holes, even with a tiny old film from vehicle that leak, especially the first day it rains after it's been dry sunny weather, a very slipper emulsion of rain and motor vehicle fluids forms on metal surface that make them more slippery than ice.
I am an Expert Rider
I have been riding sport bikes or street bikes in real world traffic on public roads since 2001, so I have over 23 years of riding street bikes near Seattle, Washington State, USA. We have a lot of dangerous low skill and new drivers locally who do not look for motorcycles. This means they will at some point pull out in front of you while riding, forcing you to fully grab the front brake leaver, which causes your body to slide forward, testicles into the gas tank, which can be very painful or cause you to do an endo or front wheely, which can cause an accident easily if you have never practiced endos.
I pretend that I am invisible and that other motorists are unwittingly trying to run into my motorcycle with their automobiles, cars, trucks or SUV or suddenly about to merge into my lane of travel and knock me off or clip the front or rear wheel and cause a potentially deadly accident.
Nearly all of this riding experience in King County, Washington State, USA where there is an abundance of low skill drivers, smartphone distracted drivers, drunk drivers, drivers high from using marijuana, drivers with almost no experience who recently moved to America from a country with virtually no history of automobile use or private automobile ownership, who did not grow up around cars, whose parents never drove or owned or operated an motor car on roads, who grew up riding bicycles to get around, then a non-emission controlled scooter or motorcycle or similar. As a result, such motorists appear like they do not see motorcycle riders, turn out into traffic in front of oncoming traffic without even looking both ways, forcing the oncoming motorists with the right of way to slam on their vehicle.
Be polite and understand that they low skill motorists are not trying to cause accidents, hurt you or harm you, they are just new drivers and bad at driving from a lack of experience. Be gracious and pay attention so you can avoid being in accidents.
Manual Shifting Requires More Focus
Most motorcycles require manual shifting because they are not equipped with automatic transmissions. This means you need to pay attention to the engine RPM and what gear your bike is in for the speed of travel, so you don't lock up the rear wheel with a shift miss match. Some fancy motorcycles are equipped with a slipper clutch and rev-matching to mostly reduce this kind of rider error potential.
Warm Regards
Have fun and stay safe out there riding and enjoying your motorcycle. Keep both wheels upright and don't hit anything other than air. Check your bike over, check yourself over and keep a vigilant attention to what is happening around you and your motorcycle when riding, that way you can enjoy decades of safe fun riding like me :) Godspeed and blessings!
No comments:
Post a Comment