Passenger vehicle drivers pose a significant threat to motorcyclists on the road. Not only do they struggle to see bikes, but they often drive while distracted, whether it’s by a cell phone, food, or something else.
Distracted driving results in more than 3,300 deaths and 400,000 injuries each year, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Many of those incidents involve motorcycles. And because motorcycle riders aren’t protected by a steel cage, the impact is usually far more severe. In addition to extensive medical care, injured motorcycle riders often need to take time off work, which can cause financial problems.
If you’re going to ride a motorcycle, you need a strategy for outsmarting distracted drivers to avoid accidents that can leave you with catastrophic injuries and mounting medical bills.
Below are several ways you can make your experience on the road safer.
- Take a motorcycle safety course
A formal motorcycle safety course will teach you the fundamentals that will make you a safer driver. You’ll learn how to control your bike, including how to start, stop, shift, and turn, as well as techniques to avoid hazards. In the classroom, you’ll learn a little bit about how motorcycles work, traffic laws, and the theoretical aspect of safe riding practices. Once you learn the information, you’ll apply it in the real world.
Learning to ride a bike well enough to pass a driver’s exam doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve learned all the necessary skills to drive safely on the road with other cars. Formal training will help you build the skills you need to drive safely and defensively under all road conditions while mastering handling skills like emergency braking and evasive swerves. These skills are essential for avoiding cars that drift in front of you.
You’ll learn important skills like proper braking distribution between the front and rear brakes, facing your direction of travel, leaning into turns, and choosing your turn arc so you start wide and come in tight. These are things that will help you stay safe on the road that you wouldn’t necessarily know if you learned how to ride without a course.
The best part about taking a formal course is getting feedback from instructors so you can refine your skills and build more confidence. The more confident you are as a rider, the less likely you are to experience a preventable accident.
- Take an advanced defensive driving course
Learning to drive defensively will be your number one protection against preventable accidents. While you’ll get a bit of defensive techniques from a motorcycle safety course, you’ll get next level training from a defensive driving course.
You’ll learn to enhance your situational awareness, refine your braking skills and cornering techniques, and learn advanced skills to avoid hazards. After a defensive driving course, unexpected situations won’t be so scary.
Some of the most useful skills you can learn include:
- Scanning the environment for hazards
- Anticipating the actions of other vehicles
- Braking without locking your wheels
- Braking while cornering (trail braking)
- Navigating turns with a decreasing radius
- Handling sand and gravel
- Skid recovery
- Minimizing risk based on personal limitations
- Safe following distances
- Lane positioning
- Communicating with other drivers
Some insurance companies provide discounted premiums for riders who complete either a motorcycle safety course or defensive driving course.
- Learn to predict driver behavior
A lot of people say not to worry about what other drivers are doing on the road and just pay attention to your own vehicle, but that’s a recipe for disaster. While you don’t need to obsess over what other drivers are doing, it does help to be observant so you can somewhat predict what they might do. After a while, predicting behavior will come naturally at a glance.
For example, if you need to make a right turn at a red light and you’re next to a car whose driver has not once glanced in your direction, but their attention is focused left, there’s a good chance they’ll turn right in front of you, even if they haven’t pulled all the way up to the line.
Look where wheels are pointed, notice drivers who seem distracted by braking oddly or gazing down. The better you get at noticing the subtleties that indicate a driver’s next move, the safer you’ll be on the road.
- Plan your routes
If you ride your motorcycle to work every day, or you take other routes regularly for any reason, plan your routes carefully. Choose roads with the least amount of risks, like hazards and distractions. When possible, use low-traffic streets where you won’t find a lot of drivers juggling their phones. If you need to drive at night, stick to streets with street lamps so you don’t get lost in the shadows. You can’t control other drivers, but you can control where you ride – at least sometimes.
- Ride like you’re invisible
On a motorcycle, you have to ride while assuming nobody sees you because, statistically, they usually don’t. Treat all left turns as potential threat zones. Wait that extra split-second before entering an intersection when the light turns green. It’s not just cars running red lights that you have to watch out for. If you’re turning left on a flashing yellow light, oncoming traffic might not see you until it’s too late.
If your face shield is up, make eye contact with drivers when possible. One moment of acknowledging your presence can prevent an accident. Most importantly keep a safe buffer around your bike to give yourself time and room to react. Chances are, you’ll be in drivers’ blind spots most of the time.
- Avoid driving in the dark
Riding at night isn’t safe just because you have headlights and a reflective vest, although those things help. Visibility is bad enough in the daytime. At night, it drops even more, and so does your ability to spot hazards and distracted drivers. Whenever possible, avoid driving at night and plan your trips to be completed before it starts getting dark.
Ride smart to stay alive
Outsmarting distracted drivers requires a strategy that begins with learning defensive driving skills and accounting for factors outside your control. Riding a motorcycle will always carry risk, but when you have the right skills and mindset, you can stack the odds in your favor.
