Tips #2

Cell Phone Impaired Drivers--They're Worse Than You Thought!
I bet you can name the last time you were riding and saw someone with a cell phone who was driving erratically. A recent study by researchers at the University of Utah proves that cell phone-using drivers are actually measurably impaired. I thought we'd highlight a few findings, and let you draw your own conclusions about avoiding these kinds of drivers--and cutting down on your own usage while driving.

If you put a 20-year-old driver behind the wheel with a cellphone, his reaction times are the same as a 70-year-old driver," said David Strayer, a University of Utah psychology professor and principal author of the study. "It's like instant aging."

And it doesn't matter whether the phone is hand-held or handsfree, he said. Any activity requiring a driver to "actively be part of a conversation" likely will impair driving abilities, Strayer said.

Motorists who talk on cellphones are more impaired than drunk drivers with blood-alcohol levels exceeding .08, Strayer and colleague Frank Drews, an assistant professor of psychology, found during research conducted in 2003.

Strayer said they found that when 18-to-25-year-olds were placed in a driving simulator and talked on a cellular phone, they reacted to brake lights from a car in front of them as slowly as 65-to 74-year-olds who were not using a cell phone.

In the simulator, each participant drove four 10-mile freeway trips lasting about 10 minutes each, talking on a cellphone with a research assistant during half the trip and driving without talking the other half. Only handsfree phones - considered safer - were used.

The study found that drivers who talked on cellphones were 18 per cent slower in braking and took 17 per cent longer to regain the speed they lost when they braked."

The article as reported by the AP can be found here. The new study in its entirety appears in this winter's issue of Human Factors, the quarterly journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society. Here's more about the ongoing study.

Pilots have a saying: "Fly the airplane, not the radio"--which means, "don't fixate on talking when you need to be taking care of control issues". This is a good saying for motorcyclists to remember, too. Remember that it only takes a half-second of inattention for an everyday drive to become a tragedy. Keep your head and eyes moving, scan those rear-view mirrors at stoplights and keep the motorcycle in first gear at a stop you you can get out of the way of someone who's not paying attention. And if you find yourself driving distracted, stop, put away the distraction, clear your head, and motor on.

Braking

You probably remember your first lessons about braking--that the front brake does all the work. You may have also heard a lot of people talk about how easy it is to skid when you hammer the rear brake, so perhaps you've eased up on using it. But it's important to use both. Combination braking is always best, with both hand and foot brake applied with smooth study pressure, right to impending skid. If you happen to lock the rear wheel, always look for an avenue of escape and keep the brake locked. If you keep your head and eyes straight you will skid straight. If you need to know how to handle your bike in a real braking emergency, check into our Precision Maneuvering School--we devote a significant portion of the class to real-world braking.

The Lowly Bungee Cord
The next time you're out shopping and notice those little $2 bungee cords or the more fancy high-tech "cargo net" for under $10 bucks, go ahead and treat yourself. These little things will often save the day but more importantly, they'll keep you from being tempted to balance a bag of stuff on your gas tank, which doesn't always work as well as you'd like it to. Even a small thing like a cargo net can make your motorcycle more useful for those errands and keep you from riding distracted. Your job is to control the motorcycle, not balance that box of Vanilla Wafers that you were requested to pick up on the way home!

Remember that if you train with precision, you'll ride with precision--and react properly when your hide is on the line! Come see us if you want to make 2008 your best riding year ever.
Sincerely,
Mark Brown.