Total Motorcycle Community Forums

I was just taking a look at the video from another post of a serious deadly motorcycle crash and it got me thinking. It seems like almost all serious deadly motorcycle crashes involve sport bikes rather than cruisers. Obviously the different mentality of the riders comes into play I would think. Is it just my perception that sport bikes seem to be responsible for a greater percentage of serious and/or deadly crashes even though they make up a smaller percentage of the biker community or are there statistics to back this up? Or am I just completely wrong on this?

based on pure observation, I would say that most people who I see driving a sport bike have a much larger chance of causing an accident then the people I see driving cruisers. Not that both groups dont have idiots, but purely from what i've seen, there are more idiots on sport bikes.

Its pretty simple; Speed demons and guys that want to do wheelies on the road dont buy Harleys or standard style bikes, because well, who does wheelies and goes 100 mph on those types of bikes?

IMO "cruisers" are exactly what they say they are for. cruising. sportbikes are made for speed. that being said, it just takes an a$$hole on ANY bike to end their's or someones life if they are driving like a maniac.

I am in the insurance industry and we are being told that the highest risk group is now the over 40 cruiser/tourer group with the superbike crowd coming second and we will not insure a dual on it's own, you have to put it with a house or business policy. This is South Africa but I am sure the trend is global.

All the figures I've read indicate that the biggest increase in fatalities is amongst the over 40 cruiser riders. Figures also show that the majority of single vehicle bike accidents involve alcohol.

My personal observation here in NE OH shows that cruisers make up 99% of the bikes parked in front of bars.

NHTSA gives data on accidents by age groups but doesn't break them down by bike types.

http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/pdf/nrd-30 ... 809908.pdf

I'll gladly ride my bike to the bar if the weather is warm enough. I'll also gladly have a coke and ride home sober.

I would go with sapaul and gs jack on this one--in SW Washington state, at least, it seems to be the older, often re-entry rider on a Harley that gets carried away and offs himself by running off the road and attempting some logging on his bike.

I have two cents to throw into this arena. First coper piece is that serious accidents can happen anytime regardless of bike. Heck a serious accident can find you even if you are looking for it.

The other coper piece is that the other day I went to go buy a Kawasaki Concourse. The owner told me that he sells anywhere from 80 to 100 ninja's per month but only one connie every 3 to 4 months if he is lucky. Using the law of averages it stands to reason that of the 320 bikes (four months of 80 bikes) he sold - one would get into an accident. I would never hope that on anyone but....

See where I am going with this?

I'd agree that the biggest category of bikes in serious accidents these days are cruisers, as often as not driven by the over 40 crowd by drivers that are relatively new to motorcycling.