Road rash tales and lessons learned

[Iron Cowboy]

You know how the saying goes. If you ride enough "you've either been down or are going down" I really like talking to guys

about thier experiences of what really happened to them, what made things go bad. I try to learn from it cause you cant be too carefull and I want to come home to the fam. at the end of the day. I learned when I was 18 (the hard way) never have a passenger on the back that outwieghs the rider. right off the corner going way too fast.

Also never ever trust a cars blinker

and a real good one for todays cellphone addicted drivers--when at a stop light allways keep the bike in gear with an escape route in front with an eye in the mirror for whats coming up behind you....saw a guy that didnt, the car behind him rear ended a truck stopped at the light with him in between them, bike in nuetral rapping the pipe looking at whos watching .......he didnt go home that night. Dont mean to get to grim but I tell you what I remember that guy every time it seems im in that same situation. Whats everyone elses story?

[Bandit]

I crashed once. My headlight blew on my 81 lowrider, and I hit the field. There was no ditch. I was laying face down 90 degrees from the bike with my leg under it. Try as I might I could not lift it enough to get out from under it. Then it started on fire.

Adrenaline does amazing stuff. I threw if off like nothing. Up till this point I didn't even know I was hurt, but when I stood up my right ankle hurt like [PoorWordUsage]. I was about a mile from town. Thank god I had good boots on. That was the longest walk of my life. Turns out my ankle was broke.... I don't like to ride much after dark anymore. That was the worst. Next was when I slid against a curb getting out of the way of a car that ran a stop sign. And lastly, I hit a dog , scared the ^*&(^ out of me, but didn't tip.

[muc33]

went over the handlebars once... ouch, don't catch a sand spill on a corner. I also bit it once in a parade on my 125 with the shrine... horse dung and jawbreakers are killers!!!

[The_Duckslayer]

I had a Yamaha 850 special when I lived in CA back in 82. I spent the entire afternoon cleaning the thing up and she looked really purdy when I got done. Went to take it for a ride and in front of the apartment complex there was a 4 lane undivided road. Well I saw an opening in traffic and took it, laid on the gas and slid right off the bike! That was the LAST time I ever put armor-all on a bike seat! Dumb, DUMB idea. Hind sight is always 20/20 isn't it? Take care and N Joy the Hunt././Jimbo

[Eric Wettschreck]

I was at the in-laws. My bro in law and I just got done working on his Ascot and got it running well. I took it out for a test ride. His drunken neighbor was backing out of his driveway and wham, he got me. Both the bike and I had enough road rash to last a lifetime.

Lesson to be learned here. Nobody sees you. Assume you are always in the blind spot and they can't see you.

The wife and I were out on a ride one evening and I hit a raccoon. Luckily we didnt' tip. The coon didn't fare as well.

My dad spent 3 weeks in the hospital after hitting a deer. I try to avoid riding right at sunset as that's when they're moving. I've had a few near misses with deer myself. Knock on wood I've never hit one.

[Bandit]

Duckslayer, Thats funny,lol I did the same thing once, never fell off or anything, but was really careful and NEVER did it again. Yep, I'm still chuckling.

[Iron Cowboy]

Bandit, an 81 lowrider, cool... man to me nothin to this day sounds as good as a shovelhead (especially the old generator ones.) Yea I allways tell people that dont ride how its a whole different feeling when going down the road and having a dog run out in front of you on a bike compared to the car.

I live out in the woods and use to try to take the scoot whenever I could for my commute to the metro but I have hit a racoon too, held it straight, darn thing whent under the front wheel and hung up on my ankle for a second before I shook it loose, that will wake you up faster than any coffee. Have also had a few near misses with the deer. Once had a big buck dancing around back and forth in front of me in the middle of the road trying to get away, the wierd part is it was about noon without a cloud in the sky in the middle of summer. I was coming around a corner and it was getting away before it saw me or I it. the only thing I can think of that did it was my loud shorty pipes, I think they really do save lives sometimes.

[Macgyver55]

My closest call (no road rash involved thankfully) was last year. I was on 35W heading home from work, running about 65 MPH. Suddenly the car in front of me swerved sharply out of our lane.

I quickly found out why. A cinder block (you know, the kind they build foundations with) fell off of the contractor truck in front of us. Thankfully it broke in pieces, but of course I had to hit the biggest one while trying to dodge them all. I braced on the bars but I was literally airborn for a bit. I pulled off on the shoulder to regain my composure (clean my drawers) and check out the bike. Everything looked ok but when I took off again it had a shake to it. After some thought I decided to replace both tires just in case and that smoothed it out again.

Now, I have it a deer on my snowmobile at 50+ before, but that didnt hold a candle to how shaken this left me. At least when the deer jumped out I never knew what I had hit until I got stopped.

Jeez, pretty soon I'm gonna get a bit gun shy if this stuff keeps up.

[CrappieAttitude]

Thankfully, I have yet to be involved with any type of road rash. However my family has covered more miles in the United states on motorcycles than we have in cars. All of my childhood vacations were done on motorcycles. The only times in all my trips that we had any close calls was when we tried to push more miles out of a day and ended up riding into darkness. My advice to anyone who is planning a long trip is to leave early and stop early". Nothing good happens on motorcycles riding in the dark. To many road obsticles that can affect two wheels.

CA

[BoxMN]

I can say this... I used to let friends take my Virago 750 for a spin to see if they would like riding. Well, after a good buddy laid her down I quit doing that. He was okay, bike was a little worse off, but I won't let anyone who doesn't have alicense ride my bike anymore. I would have felt horrible if he would have died, and not just due to and law$uit$...

So far, I have kept the shiny side up, except on dirt bikes, ha! I don't ride that much anymore though...

[Bandit]

Cowboy, I am sure those pipes helped, I have Vance and Hines short staggered on my fatboy, can't hardly hear yourself think. Always wanted to take the baffles out just to hear it once, but never have.

I really liked that lowrider, Just before I crashed I had the upper end gone though and put an SS carb on it, It was running pretty good. I did have to carry tools with me, seemed like about every 100 miles I would have to tighten something up.

Hey Mac, I too had some fun with a deer on a sled once. I never hit her as she turned just as she got to me and was running right along side. After a few seconds and my heart started beating again, I actually reached out with my left hand and swatted her on the rump.

[ChemE]

The lesson I learned was that road rash is painful and expensive. Some ways to avoid it would be to drive a cage instead of ride a bike but since that is no fun I try to stay alive by wearing the proper protective gear every time, choose the appropriate entry speed for the turn, choose the appropriate trajectory through the turn, look through the turn instead of at the scary tree or other obstacle, modulate the throttle to maintain your chosen trajectory, and above all: wear the proper protective gear every time.

[Shack]

I had a buddy stop over last summer with his Custom Soft Tail, after going over all the add on's and upgrades (SS this and SS that), he encouraged me to take it out for a spin. I felt a little leery hopping on a $20,000.00 bike, but I did. Every thing went great, until I got back. Never do a last minute hop on with shorts on. You never think of it, until it happens. I got a large Harley tattoo on the inside of my right leg calf from the custom exhaust.

[Eric Wettschreck]

Ouch!!!

[Iron Cowboy]

I've got a couple nice one's too....dont feel bad about one, chaulk it up to a lesson learned (hard way)...really sucks to get one after the first and you know better

[Macgyver55]

That brings up a another memory for me. After bugging my wife, (who doesn't care to ride often) I convinced her to go on a ride one nice day. Just to make it a "positive experience" I opted to take her to a place she wanted to look at stone for the front of the house. She actually seemed to be enjoying herself! When we got there my first words were, "Be careful the exhaust is HOT" she quickly slid over the seat only to have her pant slide up enough to expose her leg and burn it. DOH! After several apologies (and eventually agreeing to buy the stone) we left for home. The ride home was nice and uneventful. I brought the bike to a stop and said "BE CAREFUL, we don't want to do that again".

With a quick "I'm not that stupid" she proceeded to slip off the opposite side to avoid the chance of hurting her original burn. Well, we all know what happened right? Yup...matching "tatoos" on the inner side of both legs! She hasn't wanted to ride since!

[Iron Cowboy]

Well, we all know what happened right? Yup...matching "tatoos" on the inner side of both legs! She hasn't wanted to ride since!

[sparkyaber]

I had a yamaha r6 a few years back, and put it down twice in the same week-. First time i was messing around trying to get the rear tire off the ground (stoppie) and the front brake locked up on some sand, the second time I was in a corner real hard and a goose walked righ out of some weeds right in front of me. hit the breaks, and low sided hard. Little scuffs both times, and the bike went down on the same side both times, so I got by lucky.

[Johnny_Namakan]

Yeah, I've got a good exhaust burn too. Like it was mentioned, never go for a quicky with shorts on. This was back in highschool and I had Yamaha 225 Enduro. I took it to a sand pit, climbed up one of the hills and burried the rear tire half way up. She got stuck still standing upright. I climbed off and got behind her and lifted to get the rear tire out of the rut and ended up lifting the exhaust right into my thigh. I still have that nice scar. On my tourer I've had some close calls with deer, but nothing that's put me down, knock on wood! Last year I had a doe coming running out of the woods at full speed right in front of me. I locked 'em up and controlled the skid and missed her literally by inches. I could actually hear her hooves on the pavement trying to get traction as I skimmed past her. Had I been a split second late on the brakes I probably wouldn't be writing this now. Yup, better than any coffe for an early morning wake-up.

[CrappieAttitude]

We were on a backroad deep into Kansas and were following a semi pulling a flatbed with a Combine on the trailer. We were probably traveling at 25 mph and all of a sudden noticed a poof of smoke and the trailer hopped. Out from behind the trailer came a full semi trailer tire (rim and all) rolling and bouncing right down the lane towards us. Not knowing which way it was going to go, we definately had our game faces on and ready to make any necessary adjustments. Luckily we were traveling at slow speeds and it veered off into the ditch before we got to close, but still it was enough to get the blood pumping. Morel of the story... ALWAYS KEEP ENOUGH ROOM BETWEEN YOU AND OTHER VEHICLES

CA

[hondarider550]

I and the family were on a vacation to Wisconsin back on Aug 1st, 2003. My son was riding with me until Lacrosse Wisconsin where he and a friends daughter made a switch for who was going to ride the rest of the way to our destination. About 6 miles east of Toma Wisconsin on Interstate 90 & 94 traveling about 65 mph the valve stem of my front wheel broke off. In about 10 seconds the front tire went flat. The 81 goldwing that I was driving wanted to go into the left hand lane into traffic and of course I did not want to go there... I leaned the bike to the right and layed it down at about 60 mph. When I and my passenger stopped rolling down the highway we were on the white lines between the two lanes of traffic. I was lucky enough to be able to get up and help my passenger off of the highway. When we found my goldwing it was setting upright in the ditch with the trailer jack knifed so to hold it in place. The only damage to the bike was a need for a new tire and a few scratches in the paint and crash bar. Both my passenger and I went to the hospital to have our road rash cleaned and bandaged. About 5 hours after the accident I got on my wife's bike and drove another 2 hours down the same interstate with my wife on the back to our destination. The only injury that I ended up with is some road rash on my arms, legs, and one broken finger. They thought that my passenger might have a broken leg but she ended up with only bad road rash and some sore joints. A couple days later I drove that goldwing home on a new tire AND TWO NEW VALVE STEMS!!!

What I learned from this is every time you replace your tires ALWAYS have the valve stems changed. For only a couple of dollars you can make sure that this does not happen to you. The tires that I had on the bike only had about 1000 miles on them. What I did not know is that alot of motorcycle repair shops DO NOT change the valve stems when they put on new tires. If this continues for two long the valve stems will dry out and eventually break off like this one did. This almost cost the lives of two people. We found out later that there was a semi following us and by a miracle it happened to be able to get around us without hitting us or anybody else.

God was definitely watching over us that day!!!

[fishuhalik]

I use to work at a suzuki shop, I mostly prepped new bikes and wheelers and some little maintenance, but we were real backed up one time and they had me do some internal work (head gasket) on a turboed 'busa. We always made sure to take 'em on a little test drive before giving 'em back to make sure they work good, so when I had her on the highway doing about 70 I decided it'd be fun to see what a turboed 1300cc bike could do, bad idea. I had an r1 at the time and know how to ride, but I sent her over backwards. No downshifting, just cracked 'er about 3/4 throttle in 5th. I lost my job after that one. The customer wasn't too mad, I explained to him that I wasn't pushing it too hard. I just didn't know what that bike was capable of!

Lesson learned: take it easy on a bike you don't know!!!

[sparkyaber]

fishuhalik-WOW that is a bummer. What an embarrassing moment. Did you get hurt at all? I hope not, you must have felt horrible. Hey, at least you got a story to tell your kids.

[shizzy]

 Originally Posted By: fishuhalik

Lesson learned: take it easy on a bike you don't know!!!

no kidding. I ride a Honda 750 Shadow. its your basic small CC cruiser bike. A friend handed me the keys to his R1. I decided to take a quick hop on 694. I figured I would just hop on, twist the throttle to see what it was like and pull off on the next exit. well, the next exit came and went MUCH quicker then I planned. I looked down at the speedo to see I was going well over a hundred and some MPH I have never taken my Shadow over 80 so needless to say I took the next exit I saw and brought the bike back to my friend. I told him thanks but no thanks. Ill stick with my 45HP scoot.

[fishuhalik]

that's the thing about sportbikes, it's waaaay too easy to go waaaaay too fast. Very addicting though. I remember one time a viper pulled up on me and wanted to race. I figured why not, no one on the road. Next thing I knew I was doing, well, alot fast than you did. It felt like I was maybe doing 90-100