DarkLord
25th December 2009, 22:50
So, on Christmas Eve I rode from Taupo to my parents house in Tauranga. I have been horrendously sick earlier in the week (not due to my own doing, to those that know me, it was food poisoning or a vicious stomach bug or something) so I hadn't fired up the mighty SV for a while.
I slept really badly the night before the ride and was feeling quite irritable as I was about to head off, which is never a good headspace to be in before a reasonably long ride. The trip went well from Taupo to Rotorua, no real hitches or anything, road surface was pretty good most of the way and not that much traffic on the roads. I gassed up in Rotovegas and also treated myself to a bite to eat and a V which seemed to improve my mood.
Coming into Tauranga, things began to get interesting. The traffic started to slow right up as we seemed to all of a sudden hit an abundance of campervans and other sluggish vehicles. It was fine for a while but eventually me and other drivers started to get a bit fed up with waiting. It started in Te Puke and sort of continued on from there. There was this one cheeky prick in a nissan of some kind that seemed to be right up my arse as we were stuck behind another campervan and when we finally came to a passing lane, before I even had a second to think about pulling out, this bugger shot out from behind me and passed everyone.
Given that I was already in a somewhat cranky mood I felt that I had to one-up this guy, mainly due to being tired, short tempered and irrational. So I dropped a couple of gears and went belting along after him. I eventually passed him, but the passing lane ended and I wasn't quite able to get in front of the car in front of him, so I kinda got sandwiched between the nissan driver and the other car in front of me, so I ended up passing the car in front on the double yellow.
By this stage I was well aware of the fact that I had been driving like an arsehole for no real reason but to one up someone whom I felt was trying to one up me, and I wouldn't have been surprised if some pissed off drivers had been *555 ing me, so I decided to beat a hasty retreat. After the passing lane there was a lane that split off to the left and ends up in a corner that takes you out to Welcome Bay, so I decided to duck down there. I pulled into the lane, and this was where the fun began.
I realized that I had not adjusted my speed properly and that I was going much too fast to take the corner (it's a very tight one) and the corner was coming up quicker than I expected, so once again due to being tired and irrational I for some reason decided to slam on my rear brake. I slammed on it much too hard and the rear wheel locked up on me completely, so for whatever reason I still just kept the brake on, and found myself going down the road sideways, front wheel going one way, rear wheel going the other. This was no small skid - would have been about 4-5 metres long at least.
Still with the rear locked up the front started dipping into the left, so thinking quickly (and remembering all of the counter-steering practice that you are meant to use whilst in a skid which I picked up from many hours of Gran Turismo) I swung the bars over to the right, and then the same thing started happening, so I swung them back to the left again, just as I was starting to go into the corner.
About this time I finally came to my senses and engaged the clutch and let off the rear brake. The rear wheel regained traction and with my revs now nice and low I trundled around the corner and pootled off down the road, pulling into a friends place to catch my breath.
This must have been a mighty impressive sight to see for others on the road, albeit a scary one at the same time. It sure scared the living daylights out of me and left me wondering how I could be so stupid and so irrational, as well as patting myself on the back for not panicking, thinking clearly and acting correctly in a very intense situation and remaining rubber side down.
LESSONS LEARNED:
1. For fuck's sake - DON'T RIDE WITH AN EGO. Trying to one-up cheeky car drivers is satisfying, and I think in a psychological sense it makes you feel like you've risen to the challenge rather than backed down from it, but in all fairness it is just not worth it. If I had let that car driver go I would never have been in that position. My ego damn nearly cost me everything and I was very lucky not to have been in an accident which would have been 100% my fault, and with nothing to defend myself with. It's a hard lesson to learn, and it has to come from within, from a change of heart, or you'll just end up letting your ego run wild again later on and possibly end up in the same situation.
2. A lot of discussion on this site is to do with counter steering in the sense of when you are pushing on the handle bars. I'm not really sure if enough goes into the type of counter steering used to manage a skid - you need to steer into the skid. If your rear wheel is locked up and going one way - you need to steer the other way, otherwise you'll just go over.
3. The road is no place for irrational behavior due to being hungry/tired/over emotional/all of the above. You tend to take more risks and are more susceptible to road rage and putting both yourself and others in danger. If you are feeling tired - stop. If you are hungry - eat. If you are over emotional - by all means think through it while you are riding as that is something I find very beneficial about riding, but do not let the negative emotions dictate how you ride your bike as you could find yourself in hot water as I almost did.
Anyway I thought I would share my little story with you all. This has been quite a sobering experience and I've hardly stopped thinking about it since. I shall be riding back to Taupo either tomorrow or the next day and I feel that I will be far more sensible this time around.
Hope something in here was of some help to someone.
Christmas cheers and beers
DarkLord.
I slept really badly the night before the ride and was feeling quite irritable as I was about to head off, which is never a good headspace to be in before a reasonably long ride. The trip went well from Taupo to Rotorua, no real hitches or anything, road surface was pretty good most of the way and not that much traffic on the roads. I gassed up in Rotovegas and also treated myself to a bite to eat and a V which seemed to improve my mood.
Coming into Tauranga, things began to get interesting. The traffic started to slow right up as we seemed to all of a sudden hit an abundance of campervans and other sluggish vehicles. It was fine for a while but eventually me and other drivers started to get a bit fed up with waiting. It started in Te Puke and sort of continued on from there. There was this one cheeky prick in a nissan of some kind that seemed to be right up my arse as we were stuck behind another campervan and when we finally came to a passing lane, before I even had a second to think about pulling out, this bugger shot out from behind me and passed everyone.
Given that I was already in a somewhat cranky mood I felt that I had to one-up this guy, mainly due to being tired, short tempered and irrational. So I dropped a couple of gears and went belting along after him. I eventually passed him, but the passing lane ended and I wasn't quite able to get in front of the car in front of him, so I kinda got sandwiched between the nissan driver and the other car in front of me, so I ended up passing the car in front on the double yellow.
By this stage I was well aware of the fact that I had been driving like an arsehole for no real reason but to one up someone whom I felt was trying to one up me, and I wouldn't have been surprised if some pissed off drivers had been *555 ing me, so I decided to beat a hasty retreat. After the passing lane there was a lane that split off to the left and ends up in a corner that takes you out to Welcome Bay, so I decided to duck down there. I pulled into the lane, and this was where the fun began.
I realized that I had not adjusted my speed properly and that I was going much too fast to take the corner (it's a very tight one) and the corner was coming up quicker than I expected, so once again due to being tired and irrational I for some reason decided to slam on my rear brake. I slammed on it much too hard and the rear wheel locked up on me completely, so for whatever reason I still just kept the brake on, and found myself going down the road sideways, front wheel going one way, rear wheel going the other. This was no small skid - would have been about 4-5 metres long at least.
Still with the rear locked up the front started dipping into the left, so thinking quickly (and remembering all of the counter-steering practice that you are meant to use whilst in a skid which I picked up from many hours of Gran Turismo) I swung the bars over to the right, and then the same thing started happening, so I swung them back to the left again, just as I was starting to go into the corner.
About this time I finally came to my senses and engaged the clutch and let off the rear brake. The rear wheel regained traction and with my revs now nice and low I trundled around the corner and pootled off down the road, pulling into a friends place to catch my breath.
This must have been a mighty impressive sight to see for others on the road, albeit a scary one at the same time. It sure scared the living daylights out of me and left me wondering how I could be so stupid and so irrational, as well as patting myself on the back for not panicking, thinking clearly and acting correctly in a very intense situation and remaining rubber side down.
LESSONS LEARNED:
1. For fuck's sake - DON'T RIDE WITH AN EGO. Trying to one-up cheeky car drivers is satisfying, and I think in a psychological sense it makes you feel like you've risen to the challenge rather than backed down from it, but in all fairness it is just not worth it. If I had let that car driver go I would never have been in that position. My ego damn nearly cost me everything and I was very lucky not to have been in an accident which would have been 100% my fault, and with nothing to defend myself with. It's a hard lesson to learn, and it has to come from within, from a change of heart, or you'll just end up letting your ego run wild again later on and possibly end up in the same situation.
2. A lot of discussion on this site is to do with counter steering in the sense of when you are pushing on the handle bars. I'm not really sure if enough goes into the type of counter steering used to manage a skid - you need to steer into the skid. If your rear wheel is locked up and going one way - you need to steer the other way, otherwise you'll just go over.
3. The road is no place for irrational behavior due to being hungry/tired/over emotional/all of the above. You tend to take more risks and are more susceptible to road rage and putting both yourself and others in danger. If you are feeling tired - stop. If you are hungry - eat. If you are over emotional - by all means think through it while you are riding as that is something I find very beneficial about riding, but do not let the negative emotions dictate how you ride your bike as you could find yourself in hot water as I almost did.
Anyway I thought I would share my little story with you all. This has been quite a sobering experience and I've hardly stopped thinking about it since. I shall be riding back to Taupo either tomorrow or the next day and I feel that I will be far more sensible this time around.
Hope something in here was of some help to someone.
Christmas cheers and beers
DarkLord.