Illawarra Riders were invited to participate in a joint initiative between the RTA and the Motorcycle Council of NSW. The aim of the scheme is to raise the awareness (and skill level) of safe rider strategies to develop our own riding abilities and to assist others along the way. It’s kind of like one person tells two people who tell two people and so on and so on – go forth and propagate the gospel of rider self enlightenment!!
As riders we need to ask of ourselves and consider three things;
Recognize when we take an unacceptable risk
Recognize when we exceed our comfort level
Recognize when somebody else prevents a crash with us
The first two are perhaps self explanatory but the third can come as an epiphany – It may simply be luck that another rider or vehicle isn’t coming towards us when we are cornering. Reflect on how easy it is to put my head on the wrong side of double lines when riding the pass. We have all ridden this many hundreds of times and have always been aware of our lane position and approaches and exits but, in some cases a person at 185cm tall and riding a bike with a seat height approaching 1 metre – can be right in the middle of a lane and still have their head on the centre line while negotiating a fast right hander. Sobering isn’t it!. If we don’t create
or by not setting up using our brakes when we see a potential hazard, or if we follow too close to the vehicle or rider in front or if we ignore an overtaking hazard, the only thing preventing an accident is the other person.
Simple things that we add to our riding can make it far less risky. The key message for us all to pick up on is that we are responsible for our own safety. If we leave it to chance or to other road users then we are simply putting ourselves at an unacceptable risk. There’s a great tongue in cheek saying that “just because you’re not paranoid, it doesn’t mean that you’re not being followed” it could be translated for us as riders into “just because you didn’t have an accident, doesn’t mean you didn’t put yourself in the position of being an accident waiting to happen”. The fact that someone wasn’t there may have been the only thing that averted an accident.
If anyone is interested in coming along for a good ride the Illawarra Riders will be really happy to have a chat along the way about some of the concepts that were raised. The idea is not to preach but to help each other by improving our approach and skills on the road.
