Bonneville America Forums Forums Rider Safety Forums Riding Technique Does higher mileage = Safety??

Here's a question borrowed from Motorcycle Consumer News. "Are high mileage riders more at risk due to time spent in the danger zone, or does accumulated experience add to youre safety?"

My response,

It's a comment we hear all the time, in person and on message boards, "there's two kinds of riders, those who have crashed and those who haven't yet". I myself don't completely buy into that mindset.

I approach riding in terms of risk management. You use your head and pick your spots. While it would be arrogant to think I will never go down, I don't get on my bike thinking the more I ride the closer my number is to being called. It's similar the lottery, your chances of winning don't go up the more you play. The individual odds of winning are the same whether it's your first ticket or 100th (btw an old statistics professor once said your odds of winning the lotto are about the same if you simply flush the dollar down the leu).

Having said all of that I have hit three deer over the years in my pickup and zero on the bike. Not that it couldn't happen (like today!!), colliding with large animals on a motorcycle doesn't sound like my idea of fun. It's all about exposure. Therefore I always get "leathered up" as they say. New riders are at risk, as are those who's ego exceeds their actual ability. I try to avoid being among the latter...

Ride safe all......

JH

I never took statistics in college. It was an 8am class... But I had friends who took it and it's weird stuff. I do know that statistics are only as good as the people who collect them, ya know? Or the way they were collected. Which basically means any stat someone comes up with could be tossed out like that dollar down the can.

I would agree that the the usage of the two kinds of riders cliche may be overused. I have heard it every time I took a motorcycle safety course over the years.

I do admit that I get a visual of myself crashing at high speed every day I ride....the visual pops into my mind as I accelerate down the two lane on my way to work each day. I dont really dwell on it but I think the fact that the awareness of the extra implied risk associated with being on two wheels as opposed to four and just that extra bit of awareness may help to keep me on my toes. It wont guarantee anything but it helps.

I'd like to think that any instance of the bike going down will occur at slow speed or simply a FUBAR whereby the bike is dropped from a standstill. Probably ...statistically this is where the phrase comes from. Most of will drop our bikes albeit a simple act of disregard or a brain fart usually within the confines of our garage or driveway or a parking lot somewhere.

I do think new riders or riders who are coming back to riding after years of being away are at a higher risk.

I have had my bike for three months now and I try to keep telling myself each day that although my skill is improved I still have a ways to go. I try not to let myself become
comfortable to the point that I relax to much. I think personally we all need that edge that comes from the idea that we probably will go down some where some time.

Its kind of like the first time we all rode a bicycle. We all dropped one and scraped our knees. The same principle applies big time to new riders of motorsickles.

The bike has a soul too. Stay in tune with it.
I always try to remember; I am riding the bike, it's not riding me.
Then I give the bike the respect it so deserves. xxoxoxxo
Oh and the ground deserves some respect too.
No matter how many miles you have, the road has more!

In my opinion, and you know what they say about those...
I learned to ride in the dirt. The only thing to worry about while learning the 'mechanics' of riding were not hitting trees and not falling down too hard.
Getting a motorcycle license at 15, the only thing you needed to concentrate on was learning the rules of the road and watching for the other guy. The mechanics of riding were second nature and not something that had to be thought out while learning to ride on the street.

I have the highest respect and regard for anyone who would learn to ride a streetbike as an adult. Having to learn both the mechanics of riding to the point of not having to think about it is a tough job, at the same time add to that having to watch and learn about being invisible in traffic!
I'd be hard pressed, knowing now what I know, to learn to ride a streetbike as an adult today.

And I agree, crashing is not inevitable, but the odds are not good (well, not particularly good for me). In 40 years of riding I've had lots of dirt bike crashes, street lowsides, many wheelies gone bad, and got whacked by a car once. Almost all were operator error. So it's not all about miles and time. My first cross country was at 16 on a BSA and there have been a few since, and some upcoming. So it's not just about time and miles. It has a lot to do with attitude.

Are high mileage riders more at risk due to time spent in the danger zone, or does accumulated experience add to youre safety?

Both. The more you expose yourself to danger, the higher your chance of something happening. But over time, you learn to identify the risks and act accordingly to reduce them. Like John says, it has a lot to do with attitude. The young crotch rocket riders like to slap those "No Fear" stickers all over their bikes. I had one that said "Know Fear". I've been riding on the street since the 70's and haven't gone down yet (on the street.. dirt bikes are a different story ), and that motto has served me well so far.

Cheers,
Brad

It's all a lottery. Getting up in the morning is a lottery.
The Pgh. "Mr. Safety" magazine writer dude who died awhile back hitting a deer in Texas proves that.
You can drop the bike in a parking lot and break your neck.
Or, you can put on your power ranger kevlar carbon fiber carborundum 4000 square inches of reflective disco ball material suit with your orange safety vest, titanium lined gauntlet gloves, full face teflon coated pop-off helmet with neck guard, GPS, and rear view camera, and hop on your air-bag, ABS, motion sensor, proximity alarm equipped Gold Wing and get hit by a tractor trailer.
Either way you're dead......

Pick your happy medium and keep grinning.....

Well basically being a new rider & an adult I really don't like that saying about 2 types of riders. As many have pointed out before I look at it as taking your own freewill & responsabilty out of the equation & sucummbing to a predetermined fate... Now there's no accounting for soccer-mom, not looking & puttin on make up but ultimately we are responsible for ourselves & need to take on the amount of risk you, yourself are comfortable with.

Granted the likely hood is greater for an "accident" to occur on two wheels vs four. But it's nothing I dwell on for sure but never let it too far outta my mind... gotta keep that PMA!

But I did just go thru riding school about a coupla months ago & for what it's worth the stats given to me showed that riders with between 2-3 yrs of seat time are more likely than ppl with under 1yr! I suppose the theory behind that is that's the time frame when the ego over takes the rational part of the brain that keeps you on yer toes!

While I agree that statistically the odds are the same each time you ride , you have to figure in the "real world" factors of:more elderly,Baby boom drivers(cages and bikes), and more cell phs. stuck to the left ear as unfortunately raising the risk factor for bikes. Be careful, not overconfident in abilities. Bob.

As Mark Twain once said, "There are lies, damned lies, and statistics."
When someone first starts riding, they are clueless and hazardous. New riders account for a large number of crashes simply because they have not developed the correct automatic reflexes and don't know what is dangerous nor what can or cannot be done.
Most experienced riders are a bit safer because they have survived enough incidents to have programmed their reactions more or less corectly and have a good feel for what they can do without getting hurt.
There is a next stage where overly experienced riders start thinking they are really great at this and can do what they damn well please. If they survive the results and learn that they aren't gods afterall, they will move back to stage 2 and be safe again.