[a beginner]

There doesn’t seem to be a statistical comparison of soldiers dying on motorcycles compared to the identical group who are not soldiers. May be the numbers aren’t much different.

Adults who want to start riding motorcycles are encouraged to do that without being advised properly. The military appears to believe a couple of days of training is enough. Considering their expertise is preparing people to work in hazardous environments they should know better.

It’s fool hardy to ride a motorcycle in traffic until you can maneuver the bike at least as well as a car in an emergency. That minimum level of skill is going to take at least several years of practice (I’m not there yet) and ongoing practice to maintain. The military is smart enough to assess the readiness requirements for all their battlefield specialties but when it comes to motorcycles they get stupid.

[a beginner]

My first ride was on a TW200 on a big grassy area. I was so stiff on the bike I ended up with a heavy duty backache that lasted a couple weeks. That wasn’t discouraging because I knew that would pass. When I started riding daily the first few days were limited to 15 minute sessions. That built up to 2 hours a day with half of that practicing.

There’s a silent partner on the bike that nobody talks about, the human balance system which includes the Vestibular, the Visual and the Somatic Sensory Systems. It’s worth taking some time to learn about those. That system does more than just manage lean angle. It also feels changes in traction (which may also be felt as very slight changes in lean angle). The sooner changes in lean angle and/or traction are felt the easier they are to manage. The balance systems can’t feel the bike very well in the beginning (feel of the bike also declines with any short layoff) and that’s a big part of why newbies feel insecure and unstable. The balance system need months and years to reach it’s potential to feel the motions of the bike. Progress is faster by doing drills and exercises.

[a beginner]

Start with a light weight bike, under 280 pounds, even smaller is even better. For the first 300 hours spend half that time doing drills and exercises in a parking lot and the other half on quiet streets going under 30 mph. Keep practicing and avoid traffic until you are certain you can maneuver your bike better than your car in a panic situation.

[a beginner]

I’ve been looking for discussion about practice with people who practice. People who don’t practice could ignore this thread instead of interfering.

I started riding in June and got about 320 hours on the bike before the weather closed in. I spent half of that time doing drills and exercises, PLP. After all that I asked myself, am I certain I could maneuver my bike in a panic situation at least as well as my car. The answer is no so it’s certain I can’t, yet.

Motorcycles have better brakes and turning than any other vehicle on the road yet after so much practice I can’t yet equal what I can do in my car. That is the same as driving the car wiith bad brakes and steering, which nobody would do in their cars yet most bikers do exactly that when they ride their bikes.

I’m sure I can learn to do emergency maneuvers on the bike better than in my car with enough practice. That project might go better and be more interesting if there were other riders with the same goal interested in discussion about it. Where are those riders?

Maneuvering skills won’t prevent every crash but it will improve the odds a lot. My impression is at least 30% of crashes happened because the riders had inadequate skills and hesitated, chose the wrong action or froze at the controls in a panic.

Who wants to talk about how to get collision avoidance skills on the bike that are superior to what you can do in your car?

[Author]

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