Yeah, right. Bike week is upon Arizona again, and a multitude of signs with the subject of this post have sprung up all over. Normally I try to be out of state for bike week (I won’t tell you what I refer to it as), but this year I didn’t quite make it. Now it doesn’t officially start until Saturday, but a bunch of the bikers are already here. The weather being just about perfect, I would normally be driving my convertible sports car with the top down, but with the noise and unsafe stunts I’ve had to avoid in years past, I was driving my F150 Supercrew down Carefree Highway (yes, it really does exist). A motorcycle with a couple riding it sans brain buckets made a turn across 3 lanes of traffic and cut me off. I barely was able to avoid hitting them, which at 45 mph would have at least put them both in the hospital. So maybe there should be at least as many signs that say “Motorcyclists, watch for Trucks”, or “Don’t ride without helmets!”, or even “Obey the rules of the road, physics is a bitch”.

quote:

Originally posted by Nuclear:
Yeah, right. Bike week is upon Arizona again, and a multitude of signs with the subject of this post have sprung up all over. Normally I try to be out of state for bike week (I won’t tell you what I refer to it as), but this year I didn’t quite make it. Now it doesn’t officially start until Saturday, but a bunch of the bikers are already here. The weather being just about perfect, I would normally be driving my convertible sports car with the top down, but with the noise and unsafe stunts I’ve had to avoid in years past, I was driving my F150 Supercrew down Carefree Highway (yes, it really does exist). A motorcycle with a couple riding it sans brain buckets made a turn across 3 lanes of traffic and cut me off. I barely was able to avoid hitting them, which at 45 mph would have at least put them both in the hospital. So maybe there should be at least as many signs that say “Motorcyclists, watch for Trucks”, or “Don’t ride without helmets!”, or even “Obey the rules of the road, physics is a bitch”.

The Bullhead (formerly Laughlin) River Run starts up on 26 April. The week prior and during we hear an endless stream of them on US 93, and returning on Sunday. Some even carry their bikes in toy haulers for the trip.

The other part of the equation is as a biker, EXPECT every left turner & vehicle coming into the roadway to do so in front of you.

Our pastor has been a biker for many decades, trips all around the country. He may of hit a deer or so, but never a major accident with a vehicle.

I asked him how he does/did it? He said he rides like he’s INVISIBLE. That was all he added.

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Originally posted by sourdough44:
The other part of the equation is as a biker, EXPECT every left turner & vehicle coming into the roadway to do so in front of you.

Our pastor has been a biker for many decades, trips all around the country. He may of hit a deer or so, but never a major accident with a vehicle.

I asked him how he does/did it? He said he rides like he’s INVISIBLE. That was all he added.

That's was exactly my philosophy when I rode, I felt I was invisible. It worked as I never had an accident although I did have some close ones.

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Originally posted by Flash-LB:

quote:

Originally posted by sourdough44:
The other part of the equation is as a biker, EXPECT every left turner & vehicle coming into the roadway to do so in front of you.

Our pastor has been a biker for many decades, trips all around the country. He may of hit a deer or so, but never a major accident with a vehicle.

I asked him how he does/did it? He said he rides like he’s INVISIBLE. That was all he added.

That's was exactly my philosophy when I rode, I felt I was invisible. It worked as I never had an accident although I did have some close ones.

Ride like everybody out there is on a mission to get you because they are.

quote:

Originally posted by Flash-LB:

quote:

Originally posted by sourdough44:
The other part of the equation is as a biker, EXPECT every left turner & vehicle coming into the roadway to do so in front of you.

Our pastor has been a biker for many decades, trips all around the country. He may of hit a deer or so, but never a major accident with a vehicle.

I asked him how he does/did it? He said he rides like he’s INVISIBLE. That was all he added.

That's was exactly my philosophy when I rode, I felt I was invisible. It worked as I never had an accident although I did have some close ones.

Same here but I'll add that I would deliberately make eye contact with people stopped at red lights or stop signs. I wasn't being aggressive, I just wanted them to know I saw them and hopefully they saw me.
I sold the bike last year as it was getting to dangerous and I also had leg surgery.
I went to one rally in my life and never went to another. The amount of idiocy was astounding.

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Originally posted by shovelhead:


Ride like everybody out there is on a mission to get you because they are.

This is undoubtedly the best philosophy.

I was on my way home through neighborhood streets. A car backed out of a driveway suddenly, no warning at all. No injury to me, but major destruction to the fairing on my BMW R100-RS.

Cop came to take a report. He knew the driver, addressed him by first name, and asked him "Again? When are you going to learn?"

I have friends that ride and once got so fed up with one of them I said, “You always get in everyone’s faces about watching out for motorcycles and then ride like an idiot. If you’re not concerned about your safety then why should I give a shit?” He didn’t speak to me for a few months. Finally admitted I was right though.

There's a reason there are motorcyclist fatalities every year at Sturgis.
Posts above hit that nail on the head... pure rider stupidity.

quote:

Originally posted by Nuclear:
A motorcycle with a couple riding it sans brain buckets made a turn across 3 lanes of traffic and cut me off. I barely was able to avoid hitting them, ...

I regularly see bikers doing everything from incautious to downright st00pid stuff.

The unwise stunts I see very frequently: Cut in front of cars without adequate space. Ride too close to the car in front of them. Camp out in car and truck blind spots. (I just love that one--and I see it all the time.)

Then there's the crotch-rocket types that like to randomly nail it in heavy(-ish) traffic when they get a clear lane. Every time I see that stunt I just cringe. All it'll take is one car or truck getting over-anxious, not checking their mirrors closely or the bike just happening to be passing through their blind spot when they do, and taking the lane.

I rode as if my Harley was an oil can and the guy form "The Jerk" that hates oil cans was everyone else on the road.

The rain should let up by morning.

Clean the patio and patio furniture or ride?

Hmmmmm....

I'll ride as if 1pissed off Scorpius Rex, 2 dyspeptic Indominus Rexes, 3 LGQT Spineosauruses, an Indoraptor on meth and 101 starving Velociraptors are all out to get me.

Never attended any major rallies in the 10yrs on the cruiser. But most if not all of the smaller rallies I attended there was way too much alchaol be it beer or hard licquor available to the attendees that some were knee crawling because they could not walk but were attempting to get on their bikes and ride off........ Yes some of the bike riders are ok with other traffic and some can be the ""north end of the south bound mule"" towards other traffic and expect the other traffic to watch out for them and get out of their way... Over the years rode dirt and street legal dirt bikes and then later a v-twin cruiser but you could not pay me enough money to ride a crotch rocket.. just not my cup of tea............................ drill sgt

I have a hard time with that slogan. As a road cyclist I have had more problems with motorcycles than cars or trucks. They really don't seem to care whether they hit me or not.

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Originally posted by cobre sig:
I have a hard time with that slogan. As a road cyclist I have had more problems with motorcycles than cars or trucks. They really don't seem to care whether they hit me or not.

It's actually a good one to remember. You never know when one is going to appear suddenly and do something stupid. My experience over 50 years driving is that whenever 4- (or 18-) wheelers and motorcycles are both present, if anybody's behaving like an ass, 95% of the time it's the dude on the motorcycle (even though he represents less than 1% of the number of vehicles out there). Just yesterday I had one come up from behind, lane-splitting (which I guess is actually legal in Oregon now although I don't understand why) at double the speed everybody else was doing. Until he got a quarter mile ahead and then in one swoop dove across 3 lanes of traffic to the offramp. And not a day - not a SINGLE day - goes by that I don't hear, from my home, some a-hole on a crotch rocket doing his 0-to-60-in-2-seconds thing down a busy city street.

The club / rally riders are actually OK for the most part. They ride in groups (herds? gaggles?) and generally obey all the rules and don't ride like they're setting out to annoy or scare people. The only really obnoxious thing about them is the signature Harley exhaust noise. Somebody ought to invent a silencer for motorcycles. Oh, wait...

Drivers shouldn't engage in stupid road behavior, especially motorcycle and bicycle riders simply because they're so venerable, but unfortunately there are some who do. I don't have a problem with the slogan "watch out for motorcycles" though because drivers really need to watch for *everything* (pedestrians, bicycles, motorcycles) not just other cars and trucks. Statistically something like 70% of motorcycle accidents don't involve another vehicle, the bike just runs off the road. That I have some control over it's the other 30% I worry about.

I've had two motorcycle accidents involving cars. In both cases the drivers were elderly men who pulled out in front of me from the right. The first time was in 1982 and I was on a 2-lane 40 mph road with my 7 year old son on the back. It was middle of the afternoon and I was riding my 1981 BMW R100RS with headlight on. I noticed a car up ahead on the right in a parking lot that (I assumed) was waiting for me to pass. As I got closer I was looking at him in the eyes, and he at me, when he pulled straight out across my path. I hit both brakes an instant before T-boning his left rear door, my guess is I had slowed to maybe 25 mph at impact.
I got up and carried my crying son off the road and just sat there holding him while others who had stopped got my bike up and pushed into the lot. I was a little dazed and just couldn't understand why he pulled out when he was looking right at me? The old man came over to my son and I and said "OMG I'm sorry, I didn't see you." I said "God damnit you were looking right at me, we were both wearing red jackets and bright white helmets, the headlight was on, what do you mean you didn't see me?" He just kept insisting he didn't see us. Thankfully my son was ok other a few bruises, same with me. The bike was totaled.

The next time was in 1995, I was riding my new 1995 BMW R1100GS east on Rt 40 in PA following a pick up in light traffic. Ahead in a parking lot on the right was a Suburban nose up to the road waiting for the truck and I to pass in order to cross our lane to turn left on the westbound lane. Again I saw the old man looking at the pick up and me as we approached, then to the right, then as the pick up went past, back at me. This man didn't pull out in front of me, instead he gunned the Suburban and ran directly into my side, broadsiding and knocking the bike and me across the lane. The bike went into a tank slapper then all I recall was the bike on its side and I spinning down the road. The policeman that later came told me he's never seen a rider survive an accident with motorcycle so completely destroyed. Parts were scattered everywhere, the right cylinder with its header still attached was 20 yards from the bike. No doubt that the boxer's right cylinder and the right hard saddlebag are what shielded my right leg from the impact.
This time I was more than just dazed, I remember coming to and looking up at people staring down at me. Someone was telling someone else not to remove my helmet, and there was the old man looking down at me saying "I didn't see him, he just came out of no where!" I wanted to get up and choke him but my side was too sore. Someone replied "no... he did not come out of no where, he was on the road and you ran into him!".

Plesse watch out for motorcycles especially in traffic where it's easy miss seeing us among the cars and trucks.

I live in central Florida. Around where I live it is about 50/50 as to the way motorcycles are road around here.

Most obey the traffic laws like everybody else however I am seeing an increase of thing like, racing down the shoulder of the roads, cutting the lane in between cars, all kind of crazy stunts like riding on just the back wheel going 70 miles an hour down I4.
I watched a guy racing down the road doing about 100 miles an hour cutting off cars one day. As he went by me he kept looking back as tho we was being chased.

So in the end around here it is not to just look out for he safety of the motorcycle but for my own safety as well.
This is another reason why I now have a front and rear facing camera on my car.

I occasionally see some of the same behavior 71 Truck, most often in heavy traffic areas which by nature are already the most dangerous for motorcycle riders. Maybe that's why I only "occasionally" see this because I try to avoid those areas. Out on the open road they don't seem to goof off so much. Or maybe those kind of people just don't get out on open roads much? The worst example I recall was once when riding some damn beltway around Chicago. I was riding with traffic around 75 mph in the far left lane and noticed 3 sport bikes in my mirror weaving through cars and coming up fast and popping the occasional wheelie. When they went past 100 mph or more I saw they were all boys and just wearing short sleeve shirts. I wonder how many of them are still alive?

OTOH my sister was with me one time in my car and she pointed out a motorcycle ahead of us shifting lanes saying "I hate it when those things do that." I asked "what?". "Motorcycles that change lanes moving through traffic in front of cars". I pointed out that rider looked to be riding perfectly fine getting through slower cars plodding along in the passing lane. Being much smaller than cars, plus having quicker acceleration, motorcycles can filter through traffic that larger cars and trucks can't. As it turned out her problem was simply that he was able to filter through traffic.

quote:

Originally posted by ridewv:
I occasionally see some of the same behavior 71 Truck, most often in heavy traffic areas which by nature are already the most dangerous for motorcycle riders. Maybe that's why I only "occasionally" see this because I try to avoid those areas. Out on the open road they don't seem to goof off so much. Or maybe those kind of people just don't get out on open roads much? The worst example I recall was once when riding some damn beltway around Chicago. I was riding with traffic around 75 mph in the far left lane and noticed 3 sport bikes in my mirror weaving through cars and coming up fast and popping the occasional wheelie. When they went past 100 mph or more I saw they were all boys and just wearing short sleeve shirts. I wonder how many of them are still alive?

OTOH my sister was with me one time in my car and she pointed out a motorcycle ahead of us shifting lanes saying "I hate it when those things do that." I asked "what?". "Motorcycles that change lanes moving through traffic in front of cars". I pointed out that rider looked to be riding perfectly fine getting through slower cars plodding along in the passing lane. Being much smaller than cars, plus having quicker acceleration, motorcycles can filter through traffic that larger cars and trucks can't. As it turned out her problem was simply that he was able to filter through traffic.

Yes it is pretty much the same. Most are young men and some are young woman. Shorts, flip flops, t shirts and no helmets most of the time. The no helmet thing here is because we do not have helmet laws in Florida.