Interesting new ways to get splattered

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High_Side · #1 Unread post by **High_Side** » Sat May 02, 2009 1:46 pm

Now this is a new one. While testing a Street-triple today we were cruising through an 80km'hr zone on a 4 lane highway. As it was a test ride, we were plodding along like a bunch of Shriners in staggered formation blah blah blah....

As we are passing a School bus he suddenly swerves in to my lane.....fast. The guy behind me told me that I he thought that I had bought the farm. The little Triumph managed to get the rear wheel airborn on a sand laden street that had yet to be cleaned since winter. Scary stuff. This was one of those ones where it happened so quickly that I couldn't spare any concentration for the horn.

I'm still a little rattled that the idiot driving it was so completely useless that he couldn't see the mass of bikes around him. All he would have needed is a signal light. F@#ker.

king robb · #2 Unread post by **king robb** » Sat May 02, 2009 5:17 pm

Congrats on your survival....thank the idiot for helping to insure that riding never gets less exciting.

RhadamYgg · #3 Unread post by **RhadamYgg** » Sat May 02, 2009 7:11 pm

The two times on the highway I've had problems were passing trucks. They merged in to the lane with me still in that spot.

Nowhere near as fast as your issues; however, and leaning on the horn and a judicious amount of throttle got me out of there on the NJTPKE.

I think the lesson for me is that on roads with large vehicles, never spend too long passing.

RhadamYgg

High_Side · #4 Unread post by **High_Side** » Sun May 03, 2009 3:05 am

Now that I have had the time to cool off, I started looking at it like I was investigating an incident, or near-miss incident at work to better understand my part in how it was so close. I have people cut me off all of the time but it's part of riding and I usually don't get on the internet to complain about it every time that it happens. This one was within a few inches though so I`ll take my turn to whine online

His part: Doing what I normally expect every other vehicle on the road to do: Trying to take me out.

My part:
1.) Testing a cool little rocket with arrow pipes and an aftermarket mirror (yep, only one) that was 2/3 the size of a playing card. The temptation to be on and off the throttle and constantly looking over my shoulder took my mind off the game for just a moment.

2.) Riding in staggered formation. I've told myself in the past that the only time that I would ever do this was when I was old, joined the Shriners, and travelled from town to town entertaining kids by formation riding in parades. Other than parades, riding in staggerred formation is a great way to remove your escape options when school-bus-trainies decide to bounce me off of a gaurd-rail. They teach it in riding schools, but they shouldn't. They require it on motorcycle test rides, and I play along for the two times a year that it happens. I usually stay at the back of the pack though, to prevent some formation-riding-idiot from riding too close through turns etc. Yesterday was no exception, but becuae there was a "sweep" rider at the back I had to stay fully in Shriner mode.

When the bus came over I had my own issues going on. My mind wasn't completely on task as I was plodding along in this parade of bikes, focused more on the growly Triumph beneath me than I should have been. I was riding in the right hand side of the left lane as I moved past the bus at approx. 15km/hr faster than the bus was travelling. Usually in this situation I always ride in the far side of the lane, away from the traffic that I am passing (another no-no with many riding schools). This always gives me a little extra room to escape when the inevitable happens, but in this case I was being a good little staggered formation minion. I didn`t really have my head where it should have been, and it was just sheer luck that I didn`t get taken out. A decent eye-opener to wake me up for the season!

jstark47 · #5 Unread post by **jstark47** » Sun May 03, 2009 9:29 am

High_Side wrote:2.) Riding in staggered formation....... I was riding in the right hand side of the left lane as I moved past the bus at approx. 15km/hr faster than the bus was travelling. Usually in this situation I always ride in the far side of the lane, away from the traffic that I am passing (another no-no with many riding schools).

Staggered formation as I was taught allows you discretion to choose your slot as needed to adjust to conditions. You wouldn't stay in the right hand slot if there was a giant pothole, right? The opposite-slot-one-second-offset is just supposed to be the default formation.

High_Side · #6 Unread post by **High_Side** » Sun May 03, 2009 9:39 am

jstark47 wrote:
High_Side wrote:2.) Riding in staggered formation....... I was riding in the right hand side of the left lane as I moved past the bus at approx. 15km/hr faster than the bus was travelling. Usually in this situation I always ride in the far side of the lane, away from the traffic that I am passing (another no-no with many riding schools).
Staggered formation as I was taught allows you discretion to choose your slot as needed to adjust to conditions. You wouldn't stay in the right hand slot if there was a giant pothole, right? The opposite-slot-one-second-offset is just supposed to be the default formation.

The issue that I have with staggered formation is that if you are following close enough that you feel that it you feel that it is providing you any* benefit, you are likely following too close. Typically when I ride I move back and forth to the safe side of the lane continuously to leave myself an out. This drives the formation types up the wall.

* When I say "any" benefit I mean other than a slight benefit of seeing a little farther up the road in front of you - in which case you could back off a little and gain the same benefit. *

HYPERR · #7 Unread post by **HYPERR** » Sun May 03, 2009 10:04 am

Scary as it sounds, school bus drivers are hands down some of the most unskilled and inattentive drivers on the road. They are the only operators of large vehicles that seem to be extremely unskilled. They run lights, run over curves, go over the centerline, don't signal, you name it, they are guilty of it.

BuzZz · #8 Unread post by **BuzZz** » Sun May 03, 2009 10:30 am

Formation travel is best left to the airforce.

I'm with you, I want the option to pick my own 'best' place to be to save my own skin.

I don't play well in large groups, I see no reason I should ride in them either, lol. Besides, who needs all those witnesses to whatever violations I may or may not commit on an average ride.

#9 Unread post by **MZ33** » Sun May 03, 2009 10:37 am

school bus drivers are hands down some of the most unskilled and inattentive drivers

I have absolutely no tolerance for shitty driving from "professional" drivers. It makes me furious. This is different from my nontolerance for cellphone junkies and inattentive ya-hoos--those make me sick.

I am so very glad, High_Side, that you have lived to tell about it. I suppose no one flagged down the driver or got any info on the bus??

Hey, look, the curse filter lets us say "shitty"!! Not "poo poo", of course. That would be crude.

Shitty shitty bang bang, we love you!

High_Side · Sun May 03, 2009 3:20 pm

BuzZz wrote:Formation travel is best left to the airforce.

I'm with you, I want the option to pick my own 'best' place to be to save my own skin.

I don't play well in large groups, I see no reason I should ride in them either, lol. Besides, who needs all those witnesses to whatever violations I may or may not commit on an average ride.

I knew that we would get along while riding......funny how we have never pulled it off. Perhaps that's what happens when we are both anti-socials, pissed off with much of the group riding bullshit that seems to happen when more than a couple of bikes get together. We should form our own gang, that never meets or gets out on rides

Seriously though buddy we are due for a ride...