Do you ride with fear?

[Bri w]

I love my bike. My "fear," if it is fear, is breaking my lovely bike by getting it wrong. As a result I often go out to practice specific things. As for breaking me, like Mark, I carry a few scrapes that interfere with life and occasionally its frustrating but hey, that's life.

If I was in a wheelchair I'd probably take up extreme crochet, or riding unaccompanied in a lift. Life's too short for wasting time on worrying.

[SoulKiss]

Originally Posted by Frank Herbert - Dune

LITANY AGAINST FEAR

I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.

Basically a mechanism to recognise fear, remind yourself of the effects and just deal with it

[dizzyblonde]

I rode with a fixation of anything coming out from the left for years. It's dulled with time. Sawing a deer in half does that to you, it tried to kill me.

Peg left parts of his knee stuck to a car and roadside. His biggest fear is probably not riding. Tough old boot that fella of mine.

[rictus01]

Originally Posted by Bri w

extreme crochet.

where?

[Geodude]

I still have 'worries' not real fear after my off a few years back when cornering which i still haven't managed to overcome yet.

Originally Posted by agy

the very serious ones are rare and injuries often caused by lack of appropriate clothing.


Then again even a low speed fall could crash my knee and mean I can never do a squat or a lunge for the rest of my life. I guess I don't think about it on a regular basis...

The first part on appropriate clothing - to an extent it helps, and you should always wear appropriate gear, but it's not the utopia of invincibility everyone seems to think it is.

Appropriate clothing helps with the fall and the slide, and perhaps with some encounters with small dangerous objects along the way such as kerbs, fencing, hedges, your arm or leg clipping a lamp post, etc, but if your torso hits a tree or post at anything over 30-40mph, or your head, there's not much a layer of leather or a helmet is going to do to save you.

Body armour helps protect certain bones from breaking, most important being you back protector as that's your most important set of bones. It also helps absorb impact with objects, but only if it's the armour that hits the object, and most road riders ride with the very vulnerable neck, rib cage and stomach totally un-armoured.

Leather protects your skin and helps hold your body in one piece in the right shape, and the latter is why it's better than textiles.

Helmet protects your head - to an extent.

I always say though that falling off a motorbike is not dangerous (MotoGP riders do it at 150mph and walk away), it what you hit after you come off and the stopping you too quickly that gets you, and if you hit something solid at normal road speeds, that's going to give you severe internal injuries, forget appropriate clothing.

People ride outside of their ability and get this delusion that they will be OK if they come off, because they wear the right gear, and if our recently departed friend Reeder or Simoncelli last year, teaches us anything, it that it's bolox. If either of their circumstances had been a split second different, they'd both be alive today, and Reeder would have been posting one of those threads we see every week saying 'Whoops, I ended up in a field and broke some plastics'.

You can't control what you hit after you come off, the only way to ensure you don't die or get seriously injured on a bike (on the road), is don't fall off in the first place. Save pushing the boundaries and putting yourself at risk of falling off for track days IMO.

On the second bit, a friend of mines little brother recently toppled off his push bike, damaged his spinal chord, and is now paralysed, so you are absolutely right, there's no point in thinking about that kind of accident. If life is going to deal you that blow, then you've been very unfortunate.

Originally Posted by rictus01

Interesting topic, now I'd have to ask a question in order to answer yours, define fear for me?

Exactly what I was thinking.

I ride with fear in that the fear stops me doing silly things. I almost never have heart in mouth moments when riding nowadays, I can't remember the last time another motorist did something that surprised me (though it will happen one day!), and other than one right of way violation when I was a teenager and too inexperienced to see it coming, I have only ever crashed a motorbike when I was doing something silly.

Originally Posted by agy

Secondly, I am yet to see a motorbike that would actually ride at the speed limit... If we all sat patiently behind cars and not try and squeeze though every gap, would it be safer?

No, definitely not. I am doing ROSPA training at the moment, and it's supposed to be all about removing dangers and improving safety. You have to ride at or below the speed limit however, and that is totally contradictory to the aims of the organisation, and introduces dangers into your riding. Cars get impatient and try to overtake you. They can't figure out why there is a bike in the mirrors that is not trying to overtake them. They pull out even though they've seen you, when they realise you are not going as quick as they initially expected, and they have more time and space than they thought they would have (in actual fact in the time they've spent thinking about it and getting confused, that space is gone). They generally get confused and do silly things, because the biker is not behaving in a way that they normally expect a biker to behave. Part of being safe on the road, is understanding what other drivers are expecting you to do, and being very careful if you are going to do something different. Much safer to flow with the traffic, than it is to rigidly obey speed limits.

On my pushbike more than anything else, I have had some words with car drivers I think the whole of Baker street noticed when a taxi cut me up, the passangers heard me through a closed window! When I first got my SV yes a little bit, but once I got used to my bike it was fine.

As Jambo said if your so caught up with fear, then you just can't ride. The only way to ride a bike, is to be relaxed if your wound up tight and stiff then it just won't work, but that goes with anything. Just relax it will all feel more natural then, rather than like a forced action.

Originally Posted by Sid Squid

No. That's just not sensible, if you're scared of something then just don't do it.

I'm scared of everything, this advice could make my life much more boring.

Originally Posted by SoulKiss

[/B][/I]Basically a mechanism to recognise fear, remind yourself of the effects and just deal with it

Is it bad that I actually use that?

[ChrisCurvyS]

Have to totally agree with Ralph - proper gear saves your skin (literally!) but that's where it ends. It's all about whether or not you hit something solid as you're sliding along, or highside so badly that the impact with the ground itself breaks bones and damages the head.

Ralph's also spot-on re speed limits - I'm also doing my advanced RoSPA training and while I agree with a lot of what they teach you (positing in corners for visibility, constantly adjusting your road positioning relating to potential hazards etc) I do find riding at the limit on my lessons often puts me in danger.

When you're pushing on and overtaking everything ahead of you, you're concentration is intense and you've only really got to worry about what's in front of you. You can also put yourself in a nice little bubble with no other traffic around you where you're very visible, rather than getting bunched up among cars and lorries and being at their mercy.

Always found riding my 125 really stressful as I spent all my time waiting to be overtaken or watching yet another car driver pull out on me once he saw the L-plates. Now, the only reason I'd trade in my SV is to get something that can absolutely see off any car (I live in footballer-infested Cheshire so it's full of knuckle-draggers in 911s, M3s etc which will keep up with an SV once you're rolling).

I'm not afraid of riding but crashing scares the crap out of me

In no way would I be happy to die, this "if I die on my bike I'll die happy" thing is complete bull**** if I die on my bike I'll die paralysed with fear and a distinct oder of my own urine. To end my life now would be the worst thing I could possibly imagine, I love my wife and son very much and to miss out on seeing him grow up would cause me more pain than any injury.