Superstitions can kill you

[Horse]

As it's Friday 13th, I've borrowed this from the now defunct UK Bike blog.


Superstitions can kill you

A colleague recently asked me whether I'm superstitious? Simple answer: 'No'.

That's "No, not in the 'Friday the 13th' sense" - and I certainly don't believe that stepping on the cracks in the pavement will allow the monsters to get me (well, not recently!).

But there are superstitions which make sense. Walking under a ladder, for instance, can be unlucky for you if the person 'upstairs' drops their hammer... so some superstitions are a bit like stereotypes and cliches - there may be some 'real' reason or 'truth' behind the belief.

Similarly, superstitions are often supposed to involve 'luck' - but it can be possible to swing that luck in your favour. I don't walk under a ladder unless I've looked 'up' first - and from some way back. Indeed, a friend says there are two types of luck: good and bad.

Many riders believe they're 'unlucky' when they're involved in crashes - but I can't help wondering whether they've relied on 'luck' rather than choosing which luck they'll rely on - like the quick check up before walking under that ladder. Indeed, the way some riders rely on racing leathers and a bright headlamp to keep them 'safe' you'd think they've discovered the biking equivalent of a 'lucky' rabbit foot - and they were never lucky for the rabbit...

Biking has its cliches and stereotypes as well as talismans, as riders tend to have the same basic types of crash again and again:
- Junctions: the well-known 'SMIDSY', or RoWV (Right of Way Violation)
- Corners: usually crashing at speeds where the bike could have got around, but the rider failed to achieve it
- Overtaking: often passing a group of vehicles in one move, without checking 'why' the group is moving slowly

None of these types of crash are big secrets. Indeed, there are even more detailed 'cliche' bike crashes that continue to catch riders out - the 'taxi does a U-turn' is a classic example.

So if riders have the same types of crash, over and over, involving the same basic situations, why is there surprise that the crash has happened, why are they considered 'bad luck'?

More importantly: why don't riders take the effort to reduce their reliance on good luck? By looking at the situations you're riding towards, and then either influencing the situation, or altering the way you react to it, you can change the 'luck' and put it in your favour.

Let's change the wording, rather than 'luck', let's use a more 'modern' set of terms: Why doesn't the rider use 'Risk Assessment' and 'Risk Management'? Look at the road ahead, and start to take control - rather than sitting and waiting to see what happens. Instead of trusting to good or bad luck, use another more modern term: change from 'reactive' to 'pro-active'.

Each of the three main types of bike crash has its own details, its own clues, and likely effects on the rider.
- SMIDSY crashes are more likely to be urban, at slower speeds, and involve injury more than death.
- Cornering crashes are more often 'rural', at higher speeds, and more like to be fatal.
- Overtaking is usually rural, and at very high speed.

Although all three have different build-up - often by a very simple sequence of seemingly minor decisions - there are ways in which a rider can think about the situation ahead.

There are two simple questions to ask which give a good idea of this:
- "How can that affect me?"
- "What if that happens?"

In traditional 'Roadcraft' terms, this is using 'Observation Links': finding a small detail, a clue, and using it to 'link' to a likely outcome. This is hazard perception, but not in the form used within the DSA's Hazard Perception Test where you're marked only on reacting to 'developing hazards' (where you must change speed or direction), instead we're looking at risks, seeing potential danger before you must take urgent action.

Of course, it isn't really as simple as 'pro-active versus reactive', it's more a matter of reacting sooner to a hint of a problem, rather than waiting for it to develop. Often your only 'early reaction' will be to notice a potential problem then keep an eye on it in case it worsens.

Then there's the extra mental step of looking for problems where they don't exist (or, at least, can't be seen). Here you're using guesswork or imagination to create a mental picture of problems likely to occur. In an odd way, you move from superstition to fortune-telling and looking in to the future! Of course, this is not so much 'end of the pier palmistry' as informed decisions.

Essentially, you're looking and planning for possibilities from 'clear, straight, road' to 'narrow, blind bend with oncoming vehicle', depending on what you can see ahead, and what your imagination tells you. In 'old Roadcraft' terms:
- What can be seen
- What can't be seen
- What can reasonably be expected to happen

Having an idea, imagined or otherwise, of what you're about to meet allows you to plan a response - or range of them. This pre-planning reduces your reaction time if something does happen, and can help avoid panic reactions.

This might seem a doom-laden, down-beat, way of thinking about your riding. Well, perhaps it is. I call it 'being a happy pessamist'! If nothing you've planned for happens, then you continue on, if something untoward does happen then it's no big deal - you already have it predicted and planned for.

Having identified actual or potential danger, there's one final action you must take, and that's to believe what you've decided enough to take notice of it! For instance: if a narrow bend has a limited view it's reasonable to expect oncoming traffic. In fact, it's more than 'reasonable' - it's essential to think like that if you wish to avoid becoming a bonnet mascot! If you've decided that, what are you going to do about it? Your planning must allow for stopping within - at most - half the distance you can see is clear, and being prepared to stop if necessary.

I used the term 'essential' to expect oncoming vehicles, and ride with that in mind. Do you agree it's essential, or do you rely on luck? When you arrive at a blind bend, can you roll a 'six' every time?

[iansoady]

When you arrive at a blind bend, can you roll a 'six' every time?

Yes, you can roll that six dozens of times and get away with it but rolling a single one can kill you.

[Horse]

When you arrive at a blind bend, can you roll a 'six' every time?

Yes, you can roll that six dozens of times and get away with it but rolling a single one can kill you.

[porter_jamie]

i used to work with a Fella who on the surface of it always seemed to terrible luck. It got to the point of asking him if anything had fallen out of the sky and crashed into the house every monday morning. However after careful consideration of all of his woes, we realised that actually he is just unlucky because he was born a fucking idiot. almost everything that happened was avoidable if only he had thought about it properly. (i mean it wasnt his kids getting ill or anything horrible like that)

[Horse]

i used to work with a Fella who on the surface of it always seemed to terrible luck

It's also what people choose to talk about.

I know one guy who until fairly recently used to be an absolute mood hoover. If ever you asked how he was, first response was a big sigh then "Well ... ". This is a bloke who, ok he's had bad times, but has a reasonably well-paid job, somewhere to live, a good relationship with his sons and grandchildren, etc.

[Count Steer]

I did work with someone who you would have thought was plagued by bad luck, until you discovered he was the clumsiest person on the planet. The sort that would visit you, enter the front door and swing round, clearing everything off the furniture behind him with a sweep of his rucsac. It got to the stage where, as with children and errant pets, you'd prepare by removing anything breakable to a safe place before he arrived.

At work he'd be doing something involving high temperatures and pressures. You'd hear CRACK! and turn and see him in his *sad face/shoulders dropped* mode with hot shrapnel everywhere.

Then he bought a motorbike.....

[Bigyin]

It's also what people choose to talk about.

I know one guy who until fairly recently used to be an absolute mood hoover. If ever you asked how he was, first response was a big sigh then "Well ... ". This is a bloke who, ok he's had bad times, but has a reasonably well-paid job, somewhere to live, a good relationship with his sons and grandchildren, etc.

I used to work with one of them and every time anyone met him the one thing you never said was "How's things?" or similar. Our team all walked into an office where he was once and a colleague said "Hi Harry, hows it going?" and we all looked at the one asking the question with the same FFS Really!!!!! look just as he started his tales of woe about his missus probably about to leave him, shit luck, broken down car etc etc for the next 10-15 minutes as we tried to slip out the room before he engaged with the rest of us

[Horse]

until you discovered he was the clumsiest person on the planet. The sort that would visit you, enter the front door and swing round, clearing everything off the furniture behind him with a sweep of his rucsac.

Mood hoover (as above). Visited a friend's house. Broke the toilet flush mechanism. There were about 40 people there for a party ...

[Scootabout]

There was a guy in my canoe club years ago who was a pretty terrifying driver. He'd play Russian roulette on blind bends with overtakes, tailgate in the wet in the hope the driver in front wouldn't brake, etc. He went off the radar for a while. Next I heard was he'd taken up paragliding and had interfaced with some overhead power cables, resulting in a fairly long stay in hospital.

[Cousin Jack]

Had a mate like that many years ago. Always doing daft stunts, his nickname was Screwy.
Then one day he went for an overtake and had a head-on. He was 18 years old when he died.

[Dickyboy]

Had a mate like that many years ago. Always doing daft stunts, his nickname was Screwy.
Then one day he went for an overtake and had a head-on. He was 18 years old when he died.

Ditto, although his name wasn't Screwy it might as well been, I guess making home made explosives and blowing up a tree as a 13yo didn't bode particularly well, add that to parents buying him motorbike & cars that he insisted on hitting a ton in going down Marlow Hill (the dual carriageway into high Wycombe if you know it) and low and behold his 'luck' ran out on his bike at 18

[Horse]

I guess making home made explosives as a 13yo didn't bode particularly well

Indeed.

We waited until we were 14 or 15.

[Dickyboy]

I guess making home made explosives as a 13yo didn't bode particularly well

Indeed.

We waited until we were 14 or 15.

He also managed to chemically dye his parents patio pink at the same age & police were involved in the exploding tree incident

[Horse]

We avoided officialdom. I guess consequences now would be far worse than then.

As posted previously:

That's reminded me of a hobby a few of is had while at school.

Started with banger guns. Metal tube, closed at one end, fitted to a wooden stock. Light banger, drop in the muzzle, aim at opponent.

Then we moved on to weedkiller/sugar explosives. First go was a Humbrol paint tin fired by Jetex fuse. Went about 40 ft in the air.

Several fun 'toys' including a miniature cannon for when the class did a 're-enactment' of an English civil war battle on the tennis courts.

We'd got as far as an electrically-fired, breech-load gun on a swivelling bipod stand and were developing an exploding shell.

[Cousin Jack]

My route into explosives was by accident, my biggest and best rocket motor exploded. Bang was heard a mile away, and a 100ft column of smoke marked ground zero. Luckily all I lost was eyebrows and a bit of front hair.

[Horse]

That sounds more substantial than the little 'Jetex' motors!

Our first sugar/fertiliser was just a little Humbol paint can, but that went about 40 ft vertical.

[Rockburner]

Had a mate like that many years ago. Always doing daft stunts, his nickname was Screwy.
Then one day he went for an overtake and had a head-on. He was 18 years old when he died.

Ditto, although his name wasn't Screwy it might as well been, I guess making home made explosives and blowing up a tree as a 13yo didn't bode particularly well, add that to parents buying him motorbike & cars that he insisted on hitting a ton in going down Marlow Hill (the dual carriageway into high Wycombe if you know it) and low and behold his 'luck' ran out on his bike at 18

I know that hill well.
Everyone used it as a speed test.

[Cousin Jack]

My route into explosives was by accident, my biggest and best rocket motor exploded. Bang was heard a mile away, and a 100ft column of smoke marked ground zero. Luckily all I lost was eyebrows and a bit of front hair.

Oh yes, it was very nearly the end of CJ, before he had really begun!

4 inch galvanised iron pipe, with a whole series of reducers down to about 3/4 inch, with an end cap on the back end (galvanised iron of course). Far too heavy for a plane, but it was intended for a jet boat. At the last minute I decide to do a first test with the end cap off and the whole thing buried in the ground with the nozzle pointing up. It turned out my rocket motor was a bomb in disguise, lucky for me that I got bombarded with earth and small stones, it would probably have been cast iron shrapnel had I left the end cap on.

I gave up on rocket motors after that and turned to bomb making, but rather more cautiously.