Speed as a Factor

[Fowlersrs]

Without question production bikes are getting faster, you only have to look at the BSB/ WSBK to know that, lap times are being smashed all the time. Technology is also getting superior which also plays a role in the confidence to go faster on the roads... Which after an incident the other day and the reading of an article in this months "ride" got me thinking....

If anyone's read this months Ride clinic then theyll know where I'm heading with this, it is usually without question on most A roads these days that bikes are travelling at much greater speeds than the rest of the caging traffic.. So when I came back home on one of my regular comfort roads last night and came round a bend to a straight and I met a car overtaking another car on obviously my side of the road it got me thinking....

My initial reaction was like so many... Oh fuck need to stop what the feck is this idiot doing! However when I got home and had chance to re evaluate the ride I realised that maybe if an incident had occurred I would indeed be partly to blame because of the speed I was carrying around this bend.

Then onto this magazine article, they do indeed mention that a common factor in many court cases now is "motorcycle speed", we are associated with speed, dangerous manoeuvres, blah blah!!
But now it seems that it's being used against us in a court of law to reduce damages to the guilty caged who pulls the manoeuvres that causes accidents in the first place... It's an interesting concept and something I've not really taken into consideration when I'm out on the road...

So what do u think?! Right or wrong?!! Are we all doomed discuss!!

[supZ]

the short answer would be that whilst the guy would be at fault for overtaking approaching a corner on your side of the road, if you're over the speed limit then it will be considered as a factor.

regardless of how fast our bikes 'can' go, legally we are meant to obey the speed limits.

that said, if you're on a 60 limit country road and take a very sharp corner at that speed where most cars would slow down a lot to take it then 'legally' you're doing nothing wrong but then they could moan at you for not riding to the road conditions.

even so.. on the road the rule always is, can you stop in the distance you can see? if its a blind corner if you have any self preservation you should slow 'just in case'.

and no.. i dont always follow the advice i just posted above
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CBR954RR - Daily toy
CBR600RR - Trackbike

[matto]

We're all doomed!

Also in this kind of situation being in the right while you're flying through the air and then sliding down the road on your face isn't a good kind of right.

It's not possible (or desirable) to always ride at a speed where you can stop within the distance you can see is clear but by using good road position and knowing where your limits are and keeping reasonably within them you should be able to minimise the potential for serious harm. Which is all we can do, and it looks like you must have done that last night hence avoiding the collision.

[EXC-Rider]

Faster bikes HELL YEAH!!!!

we all speed but there is a time and place for it, some people its all the time why would anyone buy a 1000cc bike and never open it up, faster the bike is, the faster that person is willing to go, If you own a fast bike you are going to go very fast at some point.

so yes we are doomed.... but in a good way
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owned bikes: DR50, Thumpsta 110 , Honda CR85, Speedfight 100, Yamaha XT125X, Honda CRF450, Honda Hornet '07
current bikes: KTM EXC525 AKA the wheelie machine
A friend in need is a friend indeed but a friend with weed is better!

[MarJay]

This is why I think that it has gotten to the point where people are shying away from Sportsbikes, particularly the 1000cc variety.

You only need to look at the sales of adventure and naked bikes to realise that people are starting to wake up to the fact that 200bhp and 160kg is just not acceptable on the road.

I actually think speed should be a factor in less accidents these days, than more just purely due to the number of idiots on 1200GS's.
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British beauty: Triumph Street Triple R; Loony stroker: KR1S; Track fun: GSXR750 L1; Commuter Missile: GSX-S1000F
Remember kids, bikes aren't like lego. You can't easily take a part from one bike and then fit it to another.

[T0MMY]

I'm not sure it matters if it's a motorbike or a car...if you're speeding then you will likely be partly to blame if someone does a manouvere that would have otherwise been safe if the closing speed hadn't been much greater than people might expect.

I get this a lot on roundabouts as I tend to be somewhat reckless either in the car or the on the bike going round them at high speed. If someone pulls out on you you can hardly blame them and I don't really...just get frustrated that they've ruined my fun.
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ZX6R + CBR600RR

[Teflon-Mike]

This same 'dabate' comes around time and time again....
Back in the days of the Bonny, when the UJM 'Fours' started to up the performance envelope; then again when the Japs started the technology race, making them water cooled with loads of valves and acronyms; then again when they started wrapping them in fairings and clip-ons and calling them race replicas, and so on and so on and so-forth....
Recall headlines when the 'Blade was released suggesting that it would be the 'end' of biking... too much performance, too many people wrapping themselves round trees...

Ironically, 'Blade probably did more to 'save' biking as we knew it; making people question the Japanese technology race, and start ask for 'less' single-minded crotch-rockets and asking for 'traditional' street-bikes, sports-tourers, adventure sports and other more 'useful' real-world machinary.... and err cruisers, I suppose!

Idea that bikers are associated with wreckless speed and riding abandon, I think is now probably rather LESS applicable than it was twenty years ago.

Ask a Grannie in my youth to describe a 'Biker', and they describes some denim clad 'yobbo' on a loud fast bike......

Ask a grannie now, and their idea will probably be of a middle aged acountant.... either in tassles & chrome living out a Sons of Anarchy fantacy, or in a power-ranger suit, living out a boy-racer one!

Folk are actually more clued up, these days.... while the idea we are ALL speed crazed loons is rather better balenced by the cut-off brigade... who we probably have to thank for showing the slower side of biking.

Doomed?

Well, been suggested time and time again in my biking career.... not happened yet!

And if ANYTHING will get us, I dont think it will be superficial stereo-typing based on more exuberant sports-bike riders... though dont doubt that the ideas will swap opinion in halls of power...

But it will be the legislation that comes out of those halls of power.....

And impending licence changes? Restricting access to bike licences; combined with ever tightening emmision regulations; fuel prices and other 'motoring' taxes.

Yeah, WSB is posting faster laps.... Latest R1 is declaring an extra 4bhp and an extra 2mph, its increasing all the time.....

But an increasinly small segment of the market... though I admit that the technology, watered down does filter down to lesser models....

But; with the cost of performance getting inordinately higher; things will, as ever re-align themselves, and the focus wil be back on the middle ground.

IN WHICH, is a very healthy growth in more sensible 'every-day' all round useable machines, and more people USING them every-day.

Look at that 'forgotten majority' of bikers, there's a lot of positives that could be drawn from it, rather than looking at the ever diversifying fantacy bikes of leisure riders.... who have for twenty years been where the money was at...

But I think, that as economics get harsher, and people give up seldom used 'toys'... or find a better use for them.... that bubble will burst.

Money, and hence focus of attention, is likely to shift to the commuter/every-day rider market.
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[TaiChi]

I'm confused, I don't know what the subject is that you're trying to discuss here?

Are you suggesting that it's my fault if I ride my motorcycle through a bend, & a vehicle 'happens' to be on my side of the road, then it's my fault?

I can think of differing scenario's where it both is & it isn't.

What exactly are you on about?