Not taking the coner

[davedixon]

In the 1970s I worked with a skilled engineer who had owned many Bonnevilles, Nortons and BSAs his bike of choice by then was now large BMWs. We all rode to work along the same old road every day year in year out. A ride of about six miles in the country with one village to pass through. On the homeward run one sunny warm Friday afternoon he missed a right hand corner and went straight on into a small wood. This corner could easily be taken at 50 mph. He was back at work within a week but he could not remember what happened. In the 1990s a friend who rode fast everywhere on a Fireblade was killed in France when he also missed a corner. His friends said that the corner was a gentle curve well signposted but he missed it. Anybody else come across anything like this? Its worried me for years. Dave.

[Extremist]

Sounds like both of them fell asleep in the saddle.
It's easily done, especially on the way home from work, nice sunny afternoon, same route every day. The kind of route you can do in your sleep. Except you can't.......

I found that when I was away on my little Euro-tour last September, I had real problems staying fully awake in the heat of the day and took to pulling over for a kip anywhere between noon and about 3pm. This was purely down to being too drowsy, nothing to do with being too hot per se.

On one or two occasions I struck camp, set off and within 20 miles could feel myself going numb behind the eyeballs, so had to pull over for 45 mins! Not due to hangovers, just had to accept it and stop, I know the consequences of plodding onwards, even though I felt stupid at having gone through the ritual of loading bike, suiting up, MP3 player on, tightened all the straps and velcro, getting comfortable etc etc then stopping before I was almost out of sight of the last campsite.

The real danger sign for me is when I start thinking absolute nonsense - and by that, I mean sentences spring into my mind that mean nothing, have no relevance, just a stream of confusion. That means, "FFS, pull over NOW, you are already asleep dude!"

[Mervinh]

did it once in the truck in holland, on the motorway ,was on cruse control too hitting the crash barrier at 56 mph in a 44 ton artic soon wakes ya up, luckily no serious damage, as you say i had only been up for a couple of hours and had a good nights kip the night before, but i did have the flu at the time, now the first sign of dropping off it is into the next service area nad into the bunk for an hour
Merv

[Yeti]

brain fart!

Watching too much telly??? if you are momentarily distracted you switch into a zombie like state of 'staring at a moving picture mode' and your brian is used to doing that! every night for most! Normally movement in a visual sense (eg periferal vision ) alerts us, but we train ourself on the sofa to zone out to it these days!

Riding can also slip off into the back of your mind if something more interesting is being thought about or looked at!...........Summer certainly brings out the breast in women!

[winxp-master]

Sounds like both were simple cases of lack of concentration. Just goes to show you can't drop you guard for a second on a bike... keep it safe peeps.