+infinity

I could not agree more. IMO, there should be no freedom of choice, NO FREEDOM/RIGHT TO CHOOSE, wether or not to wear a helmet. Not wearing a helmet when you ride, regardless if its just down the street or to the store 5 minutes away, is like not wearing your kevlar and body armor in war. Without it, you will get F*CKED UP. Just like military requires you to have kevlar and armor on, govt should REQUIRE all motorcycle riders to have helmets on; jackets, gloves, pants, and shoes i understand are all optional..hell lately i have even been riding without a jacket on because it's so damn hot out, even with a wind chill when I am riding. Helmet is a must.

 

Oh, and as an add-on...for the guy who is opposed to the required helmet law, not trying to be a dick here to anyone...maybe i am, you trying lowsiding your bike on pavement and flip over it without a helmet on your head and see how your head likes the contact with the pavement. let me know how it feels =]

my friend and i were lucky we decided to wear gear that day (we always wear our gear but for the sake of argument pretending we dont), had we not wore helmets, we would've been in the back of the ambulences that came to help us out.

too many ********* do not wear gear thinking they are cool, when in fact, it's the opposite. I wanna take a bat and swing it at the bikers who ride by with no gear on.

 

I had a friend go to the hospital with a fractured skull just riding his bicycle down the street when he was about 14 years old. If you fall right, it doesn't matter what speed or what you're doing, you can get screwed up hardcore.

 

Oh, and when i said, "off the throttle", I meant ease. Not let it out completely. Just not give it more gas.

 

Correct Phase2style.

Chopping the throttle will also reduce your ground clearance and upset your suspension...

If you are already into the corner too hot, all you can do is look as far into the corner as you can - it is far better to drive a bike into a potential low side leaning, than to guarantee you loose the front or hit the guard rail.

If you are approaching a corner hot - then you have time to brake. 2 fingers on the brake, smoothly squeeze... as you get to the corner, smoothly release the brake and lean lean lean. You can NOT be leaned hard at the same time as braking hard.

The traction pie:
You only have 100% traction - beyond that and you will crash.

In a straight line you can use 100% of the traction for braking.

For the apex of the hardest corner you have ridden you can use 100% of the the traction for turning.

For that apex that means you have NO traction for braking. As you enter the corner and lean over, more and more of the traction has to be given up from braking and given to leaning. As it is nearly impossible for mortals to do this - plan to be off the brake before you start to lean. When that time for you is, is purely practice.

To complicate matters as the bike leans its contact patch on the road gets smaller... so while you can still use 100% of the available traction to brake, that 100% is a smaller real world number than when the bike was sitting up -- and this is why you see racers getting their body off their bike. The more weight they get inside the corner, the less the bike has to lean for THAT specific speed around the corner...

More body lean - less bike lean - more traction... more room for safety/speed.

As you are a new rider, I would not suggest that you throw your weight off the side of the bike and try to drag a knee. In all likelihood you wouldn't be able to do it smoothly or confidently. Meaning - you'd be as likely if not more likely to crash if you did that.

What we have to remember on the street is that if we are anywhere near normal speeds the bike will make the corner. The mind might not believe it will - but the mind also thinks a roller coaster will fly off the rails. It isn't infallible. On the street, if you have ANY doubts about whether you can make a corner it is too late to do anything else... look into the corner and the bike will make it. That's your best chances... if it didn't work you either weren't smooth, or were going twice the safe speed for the corner. If this happens to you, it is time to reevaluate your riding style. You're taking it too close to the limit on the street and could easily hurt yourself, others you are riding with, or an innocent bystander. If this happens frequently, you should really take a break from riding, and find a new way to have fun on the street.

Here is what it feels like entering turn 2 of the local track.

Coming into 1 you are braking down hilll from the front straight in 4-5th gear. Downshift once and maintain speed. Turn 1 is pretty fast. I tend to enter it a bit deep so that I can exit early ON THE BRAKES.

Coming down this hill, if I'm not in 3rd already I get into 3rd by blipping the throttle and notching down.

I roll off the throttle and smoothly get hard on the front brake.

I am for the outside edge of turn 2, and move my body off the bike so my right side of my butt is almost on the left edge of the seat. Knee out.

I ease off the front brake and start leaning the bike in at the same time. I then bring the throttle to neutral - neither engine braking nor on the throttle

I'm now looking at the exit straight from 2... I'm brushing the apex and very gently rolling on the throttle. At this point I've hit max lean angle and am about to start bringing the bike back up.

I'm now pulling my body into a tuck, looking at turn 3, and approaching wide open throttle - due to the surface of the track I don't run wide on 2s exit like one would normally do... the few ripples in the pavement mean I get a few skimmers

In one weekend I hit that corner 100-120 times. I can guarantee there was no dirt, oil or wrecked bikes (thanks to the marshals), that there was no oncoming traffic or animals... that the track was warm and that my tires were hot. There was a paramedic team waiting on pit road. I ran that line and tested modified lines repeatedly. I had markers to know when to turn in, when to roll on, when to start braking. Essentially - I'd eliminated all variables except my body... as a result not in any one of those laps was there a millisecond of fear. What I am saying is that the track is a completely different world than the street.

When I started riding on the street, I was an ok rider. I rode pretty safely, and pretty quickly. I picked up my flashy new ninja 600, and started riding in some of the sportier groups. I could "keep up" no problem... we used to see how fast we could go on sections of road. I had an accident on the street that could have been a lot worse... and probably should have happened a few years earlier. I was going through a corner at twice the posted limit, probably only 7/10s of what I'd done it before... a cat crossed the road, I changed my lines, tucked the front, and slid for what felt like miles. A few more friends had accidents, and I realized that I was doing it all wrong. At some point it was going to go all wrong. OF all the trips we took on the roads we probably didn't even pass the same corner any where near the same number of times I did in one track weekend. The corners were always different, and the traffic was always a variable... even riding at the speed limit traffic is a big problem. I sold my ninja... and kept my UJM

So I gave up squid riding on the street - riding a twisty road got boring as a result... so I started touring... that was a lot of fun. Twisty roads were still boring, I think in the same way that a junkie feels about real life after detox. I knew what the road could feel like, but I couldn't do it again.

Eventually I brought my F4. Older, wiser... perhaps. I spent the next few years touring with it, and slowly buying up track gear. I'll go once I said... get it out of my system.

After the first weekend at the track I almost quit riding on the street. I know it might sound weird to some people, but I haven't felt as safe on a bike as I have on the track. Surrounded by professionals... there are very few variables that matter aside from riding your bike. Right now my bike is sitting in my shed, it is a sunny day, and I'm not even going out to visit it... she's dressed in track gear and isn't street legal... I'm not motivated to go out and switch her over for the street... the only thing I enjoy on the streets now is helping run the rookie rides*, and touring.


* Rookie rides - if your local groups don't run rookie rides, it is something you might entertain doing. We found that most of the local rides devolved into high speed runs, and the rookies were showing up and either getting lost or having accidents. We started doing rookie rides a few times a summer... it's great to see new faces and to answer any questions they have about street riding. The rookie rides never go over 5-10km/h over the limit (6mph) and often drop below the limit when the group gets large.

 

I'm not saying don't wear your gear. What I am saying (and this is off topic so I won't bring it up on this thread again) is that there are plenty of people who want less government intervention, not more. Specifically a government that saves me from others, not myself. I always wear a seat belt, but completely disagree with my states law that fines you if you don't. Once again, goes back to the basic principles of government.

More relevent, your MSF talked about what to do when you go into a turn too hot? That's better than mine. We spent hours talking about the friction zone and don't drink and drive wish there had been more practical stuff that wasn't common sense.

 

So basically, you want to smoke but not be subject to second hand smoke. I'll be scratching my head for a long time on that bomb shell. Sounds to me like you got pulled over without your "always on" seat belt and had nothing better to say than "But, but, but...." This argument doesn't make a lick of sense. A seat belt protects you from others just like the cage around you. Who is to say that the wreck that sent you flying through the windshield of your car and sending you 100 feet down the road was your fault?

 

The worst is when I see guys ride by without a helmet on...but the helmet is hanging off the side of the bike on the hanger...not gonna do much good there.

As far as a Law. I have mixed feelings. I dont think the Govt should tell you that you have to do something if you arent hurting someone else. Now, I ALWAYS wear my seatbelt when in a cage, and wear my gear on my bike. But if someone doesnt want to, thats their choice. They are just showing their ignorance and lack of common sense. They dont realize that they are just reinforcing the stereotype that bikes kill. And they are gonna hurt their families more than anything if/when they get hurt/die.

Natural selection at its best. If you dont have the common sense to wear a helmet, then we dont need you to breed.

just my .02

 

Here's an example of what I had said previously.
Young riders are hoping on these superbikes with little to no previous riding history and well...here's the outcome.
I'm almost positive I know the seller, the bike was purchased from C&C Powersports for a kid named Dan about 17 years old, his brother and cousin are friends of mine.
I would see him flying down the streets in Brownsville up until recently when I noticed I had not seen him in a while.
I hope he is alright.

http://corpuschristi.craigslist.org/mcy/1212183632.html

Less than 500 miles on the Odometer.....things like this are inevitable.