Newsgroups: rec.motorcycles
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!crabapple.srv.cs.cmu.edu!fs7.ece.cmu.edu!europa.eng.gtefsd.com!howland.reston.ans.net!agate!dog.ee.lbl.gov!network.ucsd.edu!pacbell.com!att-out!cbnewsj!car377
From: car377@cbnewsj.cb.att.com (charles.a.rogers)
Subject: Re: Countersteering, to know or not to know - what is the question?
Organization: AT&T
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1993 03:50:05 GMT
Message-ID: <C5v9Bp.L1E@cbnewsj.cb.att.com>
Summary: Hurt study, braking, accidents
References: <LOTTO.93Apr19121530@husc4.harvard.edu> <mjs.735395430@zen.sys.uea.ac.uk>
Lines: 36

In article <mjs.735395430@zen.sys.uea.ac.uk>, mjs@sys.uea.ac.uk (Mike Sixsmith) writes:
> lotto@husc4.harvard.edu (Jerry Lotto) writes:
> 
> >The understanding and ability to swerve was essentially absent among
> >the accident-involved riders in the Hurt study.
> 
> >The "average rider" does not identify that countersteering alone
> >provides the primary input to effect motorcycle lean by themselves,
> >even after many years of practice.
> 
> I would agree entirely with these three paragraphs. But did the Hurt
> study make any distinction between an *ability* to swerve and a *failure*
> to swerve? In most of the accidents and near accidents that I've seen, riders
> will almost always stand on the brakes as hard as they dare, simply because
> the instinct to brake in the face of danger is so strong that it over-rides
> everything else. Hard braking and swerving tend to be mutually exclusive
> manouvres - did Hurt draw any conclusions on which one is generally preferable?

Apparently the instinct to brake in the face of danger isn't as strong 
as the instinct to freeze up and do nothing in the face of danger.  Hurt
found that a surprising number of accident-involved motorcyclists hadn't
used their brakes at all prior to impact.  

I think the only way you'll ever use countersteering reliably and correctly in 
a crisis is to make it the only conscious method of directional control you
ever use, and to practice it constantly, even when you have no need to do
any turning.  If you follow me down a long straight, and I seem to be 
wiggling back and forth randomly or suddenly without obvious need, it's because
I'm practicing countersteering and avoiding imaginary obstacles directly in
my path.  All of this practice may indeed be futile, but if I have even
milliseconds to react, the most *familiar* tactic available (and hopefully 
the most automatic) will be countersteering.  The same logic applies to braking
with the front brake, of course.

Chuck Rogers
car377@torreys.att.com
