The Syndrome - Losing Focus While Riding

[deadwolf]

https://www.cycleworld.com/2015/09/15/ienatsch-tuesday-watch-for-the-syndrome-of-losing-focus-while-riding-your-motorcycle/

This article might be worth a read. Pretty sure many of us have had similar experiences. Am always wary of getting 'into the zone' nowadays, especially on long straights where it's easy to just zone out and start thinking about how nice and perfect everything is...that's when you know it's all about to go tits up
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Motorsapien Art

[Sun Wukong]

People always (always) tell me how dangerous riding with music is.

But I never zone out when I have music on. But I do it all the time without it.

People always (always) tell me how dangerous riding in Asia is... the traffic is unpredictable, the pedestrians suicidal and the stray animals enjoy a bit of tarmac sunning in the middle of the road.

But I never zone out when riding over here, and 30mph feels like an extreme sport (literally, if you get to 50mph you are on fire in most countries).

Safety Nazis.... terribly dangerous lot.
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Top cat
"Hard times lead to hard people. Hard people lead to good times. Good times lead to weak people. Weak people lead to hard times." Smegballs
"Oh and STE balloons would be one of the nicer things we would receive at the office, the amount of dog turd in jiffy bags is not funny." Jsmith86

[smegballs]

Almost rear ended a sportsbike as he cut across me to turn left riding my pushbike the other day. It'd be easy to say ''i couldn't see the indicators cos they had direct sunlight on them (which was true)'' but truthfully I should have been on the ball. I didn't even clock there was a motorcycle there until he turned across my path.....

[MCN]

[andyscooter]

Worst one I can remember is riding home from work one morning

Got home and couldn't work out how Ihad got there

Also went to work the other day and went the wrong way as iI forgot which work I was going to
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gilera runner vxr200 (chavped)
if its spelt wrong its my fat fingers and daft auto correct on my tablet

[Rogerborg]

Oh, so when I binned it a few months back I wasn't just being a dozy tw​​at, I had contracted Lost Focus Syndrome. Well, now I feel much better about myself. Gosh, me, with a Syndrome, just like the celebrities get.

Are there support groups for survivors of Lost Focus Syndrome? Can I get it treated on the NHS or do I have to go private? If I can identify who I caught The Syndrome from, is there blame, and a claim?
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Biking is 1/20th as dangerous as horse riding.
GONE: HN125-8, LF-250B, GPz 305, GPZ 500S, Burgman 400 // RIDING: F650GS (800 twin), Royal Enfield Bullet Electra 500 AVL, Ninja 250R because racebike

[MarJay]

I read that when you go into autopilot you are actually safer. If you read Professor Steve Peters book 'The Chimp Paradox' you'll realise that the subconscious is the fastest part of the brain for processing and can react faster than the 'computer' part of the brain.
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British beauty: Triumph Street Triple R; Loony stroker: KR1S; Track fun: GSXR750 L1; Commuter Missile: GSX-S1000F; Cheap project: CBR900RR FireBlade
Remember kids, bikes aren't like lego. You can't easily take a part from one bike and then fit it to another.

[chickenstrip]

[stinkwheel]

The guy in that article is mostly on about racing and sems to be implying something to do with karma and over-confidence morethan the commonly observed effect of doing a journey and having no recollection of parts of it

I think people ride perfectly well when "zoned out" on the road.

Everything is working as it should, your brain is just not laying the events down in your short term memory. Your reactions and reflexes are exactly the same, you just have no memory of doing them.

I could compare it to the short and long term memory because the same happens. Say you go through a traffic light on your way into work. Was it on red today? I bet you can answer. Was it on red a week last Thursday? I bet you have no idea because your brain didn't see fit to put it down into long term memory BUT you know you did the journey, so you passed the traffic light and I'm sure you dealt with it as appropriate.

Your brain is being selective about the information it retains. Just because you don't remember sections of the ride, doesn't mean you didn't do them or react as normal during them.
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“Rule one: Always stick around for one more drink. That's when things happen. That's when you find out everything you want to know.”
I did the 2010 Round Britain Rally on my 350 Bullet. 89 landmarks, 3 months, 9,500 miles.

[rubyhorse2]

a lot of riding/driving is memory based.

i think the post recently in the new biker section relates to this a little in that new bikers struggle to take everything in when learning, clutch, brakes, throttle, observation, etc. Those with experience, all this happens pretty much via memory.

So when 'zoning out' we are still doing all this, well we hope so hey

Got to admit, and this mostly happens in the car, i have got places and suddenly thought i dont remember the last few mins of driving as i've been thinking or talking to someone.

[Wafer_Thin_Ham]

Just sounds like over-confidence to me.
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[stinkwheel]

I suspect racing is like cycling.

It shouldn't get easier, it should only get faster. If it's easy, you're not going fast enough.
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“Rule one: Always stick around for one more drink. That's when things happen. That's when you find out everything you want to know.”
I did the 2010 Round Britain Rally on my 350 Bullet. 89 landmarks, 3 months, 9,500 miles.

[Major Doss]

I knew someone who fell asleep on the A4, same section, everyday. Only to wake up bright as a button at Perivale, the turn he wanted. Never anywhere else, just that stretch eastbound to P Vale. I reckon it was only for a split second, if at all, but he would regale of dreams and stuff.
I called him out as diabetic (this would be after lunchtime), but he wasn't (I made him piss on a sugar piss stick thing- (got millions of them)). Weird.

[Rogerborg]

[recman]

The only time I can remember zoning out on the road was in a car many years ago coming up to a set of traffic lights.
The lights were set to prioritise the busier road so usually I met them on red but in this instance of course, they were green.
I slowed down and actually stopped, much to the displeasure of the driver behind.
When the inevitable beeeeeep returned me to this dimension, the lights had just turned to amber.
I whizzed through leaving the beeeeeeper on red.

[bikertomm]

The only time I lose focus is when the fit birds are out in the sun.

Tinted visor comes into it's own then.
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07' Honda Hornet now full powaah! My guide on performing an oil change!

[RhynoCZ]

[Sun Wukong]

[pepperami]

Hmmm? LFS you say?..... nope, not happening to me when I`m on a bike.
I value my life to much, and I`m all soft and squidgy, so roads, kerbs, and other road users hurt when I hit them.

In a nice warm comfy car, I can understand it, and maybe, possibly, I might? be guilty of LFS once long ago
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I am the sum total of my own existence, what went before makes me who I am now!

[Undinist]

[Kaya75]

[hellkat]

I can safely say I have never crashed whilst perving on c-dug's or Doovy's or Chris-Red's collective arses.

Or Gerry's.
Or YenPowells.
Any others I have missed? Bound to be.

Anyway. I was not not-paying-attention
I. Was. Very. Carefully. Focussed.

(just not on the road)
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Not nearly as interesting in real life.

[wristjob]

it had a pop up add and i lost focus and closed the page.
did it say anything we didnt already know?

[hellkat]

Has bcf even got pop up ads?
I just get those ones at the top and bottom.


Deleted due to blondeness

hellkat in "Losing focus during reading shocker"
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Not nearly as interesting in real life.

[Major Doss]