On my way to work this morning I was behind a motorcycle driven by a man with a woman riding behind him. Several times they started weaving around in their lane very quickly, kind of like you do on a bicycle for fun. Except they were on a motorcycle. Also several times they both stretched out their arms straight out to the sides like they were flying. Again, cool on a bicycle, not cool on a motorcycle. Especially since were on a winding 2-lane road with a speed limit of 45.
So what stupid behavior have you witnessed recently?
My 17yo son’s BFF. Lives down the street. Mom & Dad signed off on it, so he takes the MSF, gets his license, and comes to me for advice. We agree on a 250 Rebel for a couple of years, then we’ll re-evaluate. I give him a mesh Joe Rocket armored jacket for the summer, and plenty of my 30+ years of experience.
Now I see him racing through the neighborhood, no jacket, no gloves, shorts, riding his little brother from school. He’s been down twice with the brother, even though I told him to wait on this.
Meh. Can’t get too worked up about it. I often weave within a lane. Roads tend to be straight around here, and weaving a bit is fun. Do it enough, and you can help avoid making a flat spot in the tire.
Arms out? Not on a winding road. But many motorcycles tend to be pretty stable. On freezing days in light freeway traffic I’d put my hands on the cylinder heads. Once a coworker caught me cruising along with my hands in my pockets. He thought that was ‘crazy’. As an experienced rider, on that particular bike, it was a calculated risk and the risk was low.
To me, this is stupidity: Riding between lanes is legal in California – as long as it is done in a ‘safe and prudent’ manner. This means that you don’t go too fast for the conditions. One morning I had this squid pass me at a high rate of speed. A mile later he was on the ground, having been hit by a car that changed lanes. That sort of recklessness is what I consider stupid.
To the OP: Why do you think weaving a motorcycle on a straight, flat surface is stupid?
Because … motorcycles are meant to weave/lean, and are incredibly stable while doing so. If the passenger knows what he/she is doing, then that’s still safe. The only danger is with an untrained passenger who might suddenly try to counteract the lean.
Anyway, it breaks up the monotony, eh? So I do it all the time. Helps you prepare for a time when you may need to do a quick swerve to avoid a road hazard.
Spiff – MSF-certified motorcycle instructor
P.S. I’ll agree with John DiFool: Helmet-less riders are the stupidest. You can die from a head injury falling off your motorcycle at parking lot speeds, or even while standing still. Stupid way to die, and someone did just that in a parking lot in St. Paul, where I live, just this past summer.
The stupidest thing I see on my morning commute is motorcyclists keeping pace in a cagers blind spot. Worse yet is keeping pace anywhere near a cager who is on the phone, eating, putting on makeup, or engaged in any of the dozens of other activities cagers distract themselves with.
One of the things learned in motorcycle safety class is that when you pull up behind a vehicle stopped at a light that you leave plenty of space between yourself and that vehicle. That way if another vehicle approaches from behind you and fails to slow down you can accelerate out of the way to the left or right.
However, I do see a lot of idiot cycle riders who pull up behind stopped cars about 3 feet away.
This is a bit of a hijack, but since we’re talking about motorcycle accidents, it’s kind of relevant. I work in the surgical/trauma intensive care unit in the largest public hospital in this part of my state. Basically if you get shot, stabbed, wrecked or otherwise jacked up bad enough and you’re within LifeFlight range, you’re coming to the hospital I work at. I see PLENTY of motorcycle accidents, that’s not up for debate. What I have noticed recently are the f’ing HORSE accidents!! Those things are dangerous! I’ve seen so many people broken, blinded, brain dead and just plain dead as a result of horse accidents. I would love to know what the accidents per hour of use rates for motorcycles vs horses are. (Obviously cant’t use accidents/mile as that would be very unfair to the horses.)
Not the OP, but I’d guess that it’s because the weaving was unnecessary to traveling on that flat, straight surface, and posed at least a non-zero risk of laying the bike down while a car (the OP’s) was following right behind.
When I was young, I wove my car in that manner a few times, just for breaking up the monotony, and was promptly pulled over by a police officer for “weaving.”
I was later pulled over by another officer, who said he pulled me over because (and I’ll never forget the exact words,) “You looked like you were going to weave.”
If cops can pull over cars for potential future weaving that has not happened yet, I submit that motorcycles should lay off the weaving for fun while in the flow of traffic.
I suspect it has much to do with those big, steel-shod, kicky feet they have, or just the height from which one has to fall. God knows I see enough damage resulting from “falls from standing” (thank you alcohol and old age), so the difference in riding height between motorcycles and horses must also be a factor. Seat height on a HD 883 Sportster is only 25.7 inches. Who knows how many hands it is from the saddle to the ground on your average horse.