Instinct, skill or luck? Van pulls out in front of me!

[KnightRider]

Wow, just had a run in with a van on the CBR!

Going down the road to my work, indicating right to turn into the company car park was off the throttle doing 30ish. Courier van pulls out straight in front of me from a road on the left.

1. Grab front brake - no skid, not stopping fast enough either.

2. Hit rear brake - no weight on the wheel + it is very moist ...it locks up engine stalls...doh

3. Bike slides with the rear coming around my left hand side
(I'm thinking, this is going to hurt...side on into the van not fun)

4. Cue instinct, I spin the rear the other way (ie over my right and side instead of left) and do a perfect semi circle around the front of the van with my front wheel missing his bumper by centimeters.

5. Kick the clutch in hoping to drive forward a tad to rescue the bike from falling....no engine already stalled it.

6. Bike comes to a stop sideways. I'm facing toward the curb, momentum of bike pushes me over to the right of the bike. Left foot out....crap can't hold it and I gently lye it down on its side.

And then to the van driver. His excuse....I thought you would stop for me.

No damage to either me or the bike.

So the question. Instinct, skill or luck? I can remember wanting to spin the rear to the other side of me but cant remember how I did it. Felt a bit like a skid I would do on my old push bike. I guess the principles are similar?

Anyhow, you live you learn.

Need to practice braking in the wet it seems. Not too happy about stalling and I have never done that before in an emergency. Especially annoyed as I have been training myself to keep my toes on the pegs to avoid over use of the rear brake. There just seemed to be no traction on the rear tyre at 30 in the wet to keep the wheel moving even with what I thought was a light amount of rear brake. Any suggestions on how to improve my skills in this area?

[KnightRider]

Of course, I also need to improve my observation skills! Dented courier van sat on a side road in front of me...alarm bells should have been ringing.

[Luckypants]

I hope to god you reported him for dangerous driving.

I'd say a combo of all three, but more so instinct than anything.

Only thing to mention in those kinda of situations, are that often you will have more grip by keeping the power on and steering around them (if it's possible) than to brake and stop.
When it comes to braking, if you've already got the front brake on, all the weight of the bike and you will be at the front of the bike, and one the front wheel - meaning that when you put the back brake on, it is almost certainly likely to lock up, especially in the wet!

The only 'text-book' addition to slowing down, it to change down gear and use the engine braking to progressively slow the back wheel down, but when I've had one of those situations, it's normally the last thing you think of and too late before you think of it!

I'm not sure if this is a good thing or not, but I always change down a gear whenever I brake. Whether in the car or bike. Obviously not for minor adjustments but it really does help. As this is now instinct, in emergancies I find myself automatically changing down gear for the engine braking, meaning generally don't have to brake as hard and therefore less chance of locking anything.

In regards to your incident, well done for saving it all. +1 to reporting him for dangerous driving.

As far as practising goes, I'm not really sure. If you had a small capacity bike you don't mind throwing down then perhaps practice on private land? Other than this I can't think of anything.

[Red Herring]

I think the fact that you were able to swerve around the front of the van lends support to the argument it would have been better to swerve than brake, however hindsight is a wonderful thing and when you see the van pulling out you don't know it's going to stop and leave you room so going for the brakes first is instinctive. The main thing is not to snatch the front brake as that will lock it before the weight gets a chance to transfer, and it sounds as if you did that bit spot on, however then going for the back brake was the problem because by then all the weight is off the rear.
The textbook technique in the wet is to go for both brakes at the same time and then release the rear as the front loads up. The application of the rear tends to squat the back of the bike which helps keep the CoG low and some weight on the back, but as the front then loads up you do need to release it and let the engine braking take care of the back wheel. Nice recovery though, bit of everything I'd say.

Are you going to wear more than jeans to work now Jon

Glad you managed to avoid contact with road / van. Nice one chap.

agree with the all three, but well done for the save, could have been nasty. new pair of trousers perhaps

The force is strong in this one.

tbh it sounds like instinct was you friend there ,well done btw you could have easily bottled it and made it far worse, as for improvement more wet time is all i can suggest on top of the above, also a big carpark to feel the max of your bike is good eg brake limits etc