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Well I had my first collision yesterday with anything larger than an insect. It had to come I suppose.

I was moving along in heavy traffic about 20yards behind a car, when the car suddenly spat a rock the size of a couple of oranges from under it right under my front tyre. Before i could do anything I hit the damn thing head on, and after an unintentional wheelie and a nasty bang, I pulled over. Luckily the front wheel was no worse for wear and I the forks are fine, thanks mainly I think to the thicker fork oil I put in them a month or two back, otherwise I would have had the fork insides outside.

Oh and I decked the pegs on this bike for the first time today. The new tyres are really paying of, as I have never trusted the bikes handling on the older tyres, so im really happy that she was rock steady even with decked pegs.

That sucks man, glad to hear your ok.

I've hit a couple things in the past years of riding. I went over a sheet of 1/4" plywood. Only thing I could think to do was pull in the clutch and coast over it.. seemed to work ok. I narrowly missed a 3' long 2X4 but I was able to slow down enough to kick it off the road. Dont worry about cats, that dont throw you off balance to much. And I also got a bird in the head once. dont know what kind it was but it wasnt all that small, good thing I had the face shield down.

That's the moment most everyone fears, I do.

I did on other stuff like dirt bikes and ATV's until I had one of each. Then I realized that I could survive.

Most importantly your ok, in the end that's all that really matters.

damn! glad to see you're fine and didn't loose it from the surprise wheelie.

this is one example on why i need to learn how wheelie for emergencies like these.

I was damn lucky the rock flew away before it hit the back tyre as well, that could have made things a little more nasty.

Learning to wheelie might help, but I think that its mostly common sense and instinct that save the day in situations like these. If you've ever ridden a mountainbike and jumped of curbs etc then you will know that as long as you keep the front wheel spinning and straight for a good landing, nothing much will go wrong.

Then again if the rock is really large, then it might help to know how to wheelie, as you might have to make a drastic weight transfer forwards to stop the bike going over backwards.

Ok, i will try not to get carried away with more disaster situations

Tyrone ORourke wrote: Learning to wheelie might help, but I think that its mostly common sense and instinct that save the day in situations like these. If you've ever ridden a mountainbike and jumped of curbs etc then you will know that as long as you keep the front wheel spinning and straight for a good landing, nothing much will go wrong.

Then again if the rock is really large, then it might help to know how to wheelie, as you might have to make a drastic weight transfer forwards to stop the bike going over backwards.

Ok, i will try not to get carried away with more disaster situations

never ridden a mountain bike and jumped of curbs.

How fast were you going that a little rock or 2x4 would do harm?!?!

Suspensions are designed to soak up shocks from small rocks, potholes, 2x4s, and suchlike.... if it was only the size of a "couple oranges"...well, I don't know what size oranges you are talking about but if you mean the standard oranges we get around here that's what I'd call NBD (no big deal)... I've gone over bigger w/ my ninja's front and back tires. Front suspensions have 8ish inches of travel so you can go over a 4" high bump without bottoming.

It'd be a serious issue if you were in a corner... but if you're going straight and hit a rock like that the tire just steps out a bit as the rock rolls out the side and the wheel falls off the other way. Feels a bit weird but that's all you can really say.

The key to clearing something in front of you is to speed up a bit. This lightens the front end, and generally makes things a lot easier.

There's a metal grate bridge in town that a lot of bikers hate because it shakes the front tire back n forth as it moves over the grating.

Just start out way slower then traffic and accelerate through, feels just like tarmac. The same idea applies to anything out of the ordinary that'll affect your front end, be it potholes or oranges.

Make sure the bike is vertical when you do.

Sevulturus wrote:The key to clearing something in front of you is to speed up a bit. This lightens the front end, and generally makes things a lot easier.

There's a metal grate bridge in town that a lot of bikers hate because it shakes the front tire back n forth as it moves over the grating.

Just start out way slower then traffic and accelerate through, feels just like tarmac. The same idea applies to anything out of the ordinary that'll affect your front end, be it potholes or oranges.

Make sure the bike is vertical when you do.

or in the case of christmas trees (from personal experience) just don't follow the car infront so close... an extra 10 yards space isn't going to make you take longer to reach your destination