You dropped it how many time!

I still cannot talk about the cow crash. My Bonneville was totaled. The damn cow survived.

 

Make that 4!
My leg most love my bike, it prevented major damage to the plastics again.

 

4 times total

1) Ninja 250. Last turn to my home street after a long ride on Ca-128,121( Napa , Berryessa). Approaching the turn very slow (~15 mph). For some reason I started the turn too late and ended up 1 foot over the DY once the turn complete. There was my neighbour's car coming the other way and I panic braked and lost the front end. Damage to bike was minimal. I was wearing gloves Jacket and helmet for riding gear. Rest was all street gear. Injury was knee, ankle and my right foot, big toe. Been ATGATT ever since.


2) Triumph Sprint RS, in Panamint Springs on the way back from Death Valley: The clutch cable broke while in Death Valley, and I was riding back without use of clutch lever. As I was approaching the the Gas station in Panamint Springs, I need to make a left into the gas station driveway but there is oncoming traffic. So I put the bike in neutral while rolling, come to an almost stop with the intention of pushing the bike across the road into the gas station. I roll off the right shoulder and put my right feet down, feet sinks into the soft sand and bike goes down. No injuries and No damage to bike.

3) '94 VFR, In Middletown, CA- going straight , looks around leisurley, then looks forward to see rest of my group making a right turn, panics , puts on the front brakes hard to slow down to make the turn off , front wheel go sliding and i go down fast. Luckily no injury for me( 1- piece suit, sidi vortice, Helimot gloves and shoei qwest). Right side plastics cracked and rashed, Coolant hose broken. So couldn't ride the bike home. Left the bike at a gas station and came back with a trailer next day.

4) less than a month after crash#3, Ninja 250, thunderhill raceway, turn 8: Put on the brakes too hard too soon while leaned over and bike went down. I am uninjured, thanks to gear and low traffic behind me. Got his one on Video.
[video=youtube;Nx4UakW8KqM]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nx4UakW8KqM[/video]

All of these crashes were my fault and I think I learned from them and will be able to avoid the same mistake again.

 

Well I dropped my 06 vfr on a blind curve in wrong gear-it stalled went right over on my foot-I used that for a slider-I would have a broken foot if I had full tank of gas. But I did save the plastic. A slider would have worked perfect and also saved my foot. I think people who don't run a slider are stupid because this bike is very top heavy!:director:

 

The thread comes back to life. List updated in first post.

 

So far, we have 183 admissions of people being momentomly challenged here.

 

Read my signature.

 

Ive dropped my vfr 4 times, its been backed into once on top of that.

1st down!
Learned to always test the side stand. Flipped out the stand, put bike on it, put bucket on mirror like normal and watched it lean and fall on me. Only scraped the plastics a little. I took the brunt of it.

2nd down!
Doubling my wife (at time gf) had to pull a u turn and the front wheel slid out from under us on some sand. Thankfully it was at extreme slow speed. Most rocks move faster than we were

3rd down!
Pure stupidity. We will leave it at that.

Bike gets backed in to by f350. His fault as my bike was fully visible to the mirrors. Got new tank, plastics and a couple bits and pieces.

4th down!
Wet grass in my yard and trying to turn around under power had fun and no damage but down she went and the engine shutdown so it counts.

Now for all you 6th gen with abs, how many times and what was the situation of when it was used?
Medicine Hat, Ab. Instant down pour and the grey van infront disappeared, then tail lights came on. Hydroplaned to a stop a couple of inches from the bumper then took the first parking lot I could find. Total time of 3mins feom rain to stopped.

 

This thread should be re-titled "Confessions"!

1982 CB125T – rode diagonally across railway lines set into the road in the rain. Slid to a graceless halt next to the Police station.

1983 CB250RS – doing a “Road Trial” with the Auckland University Motorcycle club, following navigation instructions taped to the tank. Looked down to check whether it was the 1st right or 3rd right that we were meant to be taking. Naturally it was the first right, and I ran right into the club president who was braking for it…and broke his arm. Sorry Bruce.

1983 CB250RS – left the sidestand down, flicked the bike through a right/left junction and flicked myself down the road. Am now anal about checking the stand position even with a sidestand switch.

1984 CB400NC – had a great track day out with the club at a race circuit, grinding the heck out of the brake and centrestand. Two days later attempted to repeat my Spencer-esque antics on the road home after uni and ran out of ground clearance and traction (and skill) at the same time. Slid to a graceless halt in a gas station forecourt. Failed to wittily ask the attendants to “fill ‘er up”!

1985 VF400F – Nice sunny day riding a favourite twisty road, fell on a big patch of water round a blind bend that had just been dumped by the local fire engine. Failed to appreciate the irony.

1985 VF400F – took a free turn travelling through the city, a j-walking pedestrian stepped off the centre island heading across my path for the curb, I dodged behind him, he decided to turn back as well, and we collided. I did barrel roll across the top of the island which did major damage to the chin bar on my helmet but not my face. Thanks Arai!

1985 VF750F – not mine (until just afterwards…)! Borrowed the bike from my bike-shop employer for an evening test ride. Gave it the obligatory top speed test, then decided to see how hard it would stop. Turns out the twin disc on the 750 were many times more powerful than the inboard disc on my 400; I locked the front wheel which tucked under, and I did a great Superman impersonation at about 160 km/h, thankfully fully leathered up. Was given the option of paying my employer's insurance excess or buying the bike (which looked like I’d taken an angle grinder to it!) for his cost and getting parts at cost. Chose the latter, ended up with a mint 750 which I wish I still had.

1985 VF750F – too much front brake on a wet road when some dickhead pulled out in front of me in his car. Lost the front end.

1985 RG250 – not mine! Was employed as a rider for the production of a Japanese-market advertisement for Bridgestone tyres. Apparently my home town (Auckland NZ) was an exotic location to the Japanese, they wanted to hire a VF400F for the shoot which I owned, and they needed a rider to fit the Kushitani leathers and Arai helmets they’d bought. Was a great fun week. They also hired my very good riding mate (and his GPz900) for the shoot, as well as a few other bikes (RZ250, RG250, Moto Guzzi 500). Anyway my mate was on my VF and I was riding the RG, and we were pretending (for the camera) to race at the local race track. Had a braking duel at the end of the straight, he turned across my bows into the hairpin so I had an option of braking more or t-boning my friend and my bike. Chose the former, outbraked myself and fell off at low speed.

1987 VFR700F – Going a bit quick, came around a corner and a dickhead started to pull out from a driveway, braked hard, he stopped, I let the brakes off, THEN he decided he would pull out anyway. Braked hard, TOO hard, lost the front end. Didn’t hit the car, but in hindsight probably should have as his insurance company denied all involvement in the crash.
1988 VFR400R – 200m from home, a dog darted out from parked cars across the road and straight under my wheel. The dog bounced away yelping (and appeared unhurt afterwards) but I came down a lot harder, as did my poor bike!

And that’s all (touches wood…). 11 drops in 32 riding years doesn’t seem so bad, no broken bones.

One more drop (but I wasn’t riding so it shouldn’t count). Standing behind and rolling the RF900 off the race stand while holding the grab rail, leaned the bike over onto the sidestand…which I had not deployed. I managed to soften the landing so no damage done except to my pride.

 

When I crashed into the cow, I was pretty sure I was done with riding. Riding is DANGEROUS! Dudes, it's RISKY, because hitting a cow in a car with your seat belt on and air bags deployed just isn't that bad, but hitting a big-assed cow on a Triumph Bonneville HURTS!

But, after recovery, I missed riding. Yeah, I missed managing the RISK. You can't eliminate the danger, but you can manage it.

Am I nuts? If I am, you are too!

 

That counts! You are down for 12. You don't have the authority or ability to change that. Executive prerogative.

 

One of my biggest fears is dogs on the road. They are completely unpredictable and even reasonably small ones can cause serious damage.

 

Dogs are not the only ones he came across who were unpredictable. Hell he had idiots backing out of driveways, turning from corners and shit heads Jwalking in front of him. I think he was just a rolling victim over the years. But he is still with us.:cheer2:

 

I was noticing that his post was a primer in motorcycle problem situations from inattention and excessive speed to excessive braking and traffic hazards. It's all pretty textbook and worth a study.

Thanks Cadbury64 for the post. I am not dissing you but I did take a moment to study each of your falls to see how they applied to me and if I needed to adjust my riding to avoid any such problems in my future. I think it is a good learning opportunity.

 

I'll consider myself executed then, sir!

 

In my defence, m'lud...I spent all my formative years (well 17 years onwards) on motorcycles as they were my only source of transport plus a weekend hobby, so I was clocking up 30000km per year. In hindsight it does seem like a lot of incidents but over the same period I had 0 accidents with cars that I was driving. Can we average that out???
Definitely consider myself older and wiser for the experience!

 

Awesome, I love it!

 

I think Jim is one of the oldest guys here....on earth. I run a close second I think. We won't count cars. I mean, I have been in quite a few of those, some very deliberately!