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Comment by bartvk | Hacker News Reader

I agree but every now and then, he comes with truly exhausting things. Like protectors being not worth it.

Fully agreed. I t-boned a car that cut me off, doing approximately 60-80 km/h. My shoulder dented the car's roof through the door frame. I went flying through the air and landed on my back, on cement-cast stones protruding slightly from the cement (the decorative edge of the roundabout).

I walked out of the hospital a couple of days later. I wouldn't have been walking then, nor today, if it wasn't for the protective shoulder pads and spine protection in my jacket. It took about 18 months of physiotherapy to stand and walk normally again, but still.

Edit: I realise this is a POV with n=1, but it convinced me.

Please disregard user mawr. Fact is, the body armor protected you. I’m happy you’re able to stand and walk again.

One of my buddies also got hit by a car and had a similar story. Nowadays I ride with a jacket with integrated airbag. Fantastic stuff. Also, check out the new Diablo armor from D3O.

I really don't understand why anybody rides motorcycles. The severity of injuries from crashes is just so high.

My commute from Oakland to SF was 20-25 minutes in rush hour (1hr in a car), without having to do anything particularly sketchy, just by filtering/lane splitting.

If you're looking at USA stats, you should know that there are many, many people in this country that will regularly get on their Harley, which they've never bothered improving technical handling skill on, after five or six beers, wearing a small plastic hat that resembles a WWI infantry helmet more than a proper ECE/DOT/Snell rated helmet, with jeans and a cutoff leather jacket, and wrap themselves around the nearest telephone pole trying to impress some chick.

If you ride with technical skill, good protective gear, and a respect for the machine and the unpredictability of drivers, you have much better prospects than the stats would suggest.

But you are fundamentally at the mercy of a single driver turning left with or stopping in front of you with no warning.

When I learned to ride, I was to taught to assume that I was invisible, particularly when at a stop light and an oncoming car was turning left. And proper following distance - for both cars and motorcycles - is to leave enough room to stop if the person in front slams on the brakes.

Yes, and. You always leave yourself an out.

Oncoming unprotected lefts are the most dangerous feature of city streets, and good motorcyclists learn to be extremely wary of their users.

Re: stopping in front of you - this is one reason why lanesplitting can actually be safer. If a car in front of you does an emergency braking maneuver, you're not pointed at the back of them. Additionally, you're not in the way of the car behind you who was watching Harry Potter on his phone and hasn't yet noticed what's happened. We call the longitudinal gap between cars the "squish zone."

There is nothing you can do about someone ramming you from behind though.

Do you ride motorcycles or is this just conjecture? You seem to be reaching for things to convince yourself of the danger.

You can reduce the danger of rear impacts on the highway, again, by lane splitting at a bit over the prevailing speed of traffic. At stops, you shelter next to, and between, larger vehicles.

And is one of the primary reasons lane splitting should be legal everywhere, it keeps bikers in the safe no man or car land of the dotted white and lets them not take a full car spot on the red light.

The same reason that anyone does any risky activity... Adrenaline and dopamine boosts. Riding motorcycles are a calculated risk, one that can make you feel absolutely amazing. You can greatly reduce the risk by riding safely and defensibly. Give yourself space, assume everyone is out to murder you, avoid riding at night, absolutely do not ride inebriated, wear visible gear, etc.

Here is a short from a doctor who rides, explaining his rationale https://youtube.com/shorts/r53eHYCF6Sc

And a video breaking down accident stats https://youtu.be/uZm8Kj0fC88

> truly exhausting things. Like protectors being not worth it.

What do you mean? The video is very convincing, I don't see a hole in the logic.

This video has a bunch of cherry picking results and sound bites from already underpowered studies.

As an uninformed observer, the studies were the least “convincing” part of his argument. It was the minimum force transfer numbers and the human force limit numbers, and then the note that other sports have stricter standards for the protectiveness of their gear that was the standout argument.

The obvious questions that come to mind are “does commonly available gear exceed the standards despite the minimums” and “is the test representative of real world impacts”.

Many in the racing community share his opinions. All these things seem to accomplish is making you hot.

It's partly true. I used to ride dirt bikes with full protection everywhere and it just makes you hot, I went to thinner protection and with more focus on getting the basics right: protect your feet at all costs, and protect your head. Aside from that, you're mostly fine. I still wear some light armor on knees and upper body though.

Why are the feet so important?

Well, perhaps not more important than other body parts, but more likely to be injured.

Every basic motorcycle safety class will urge you to get good boots. I just wished I had heeded that advise in time instead of buying them after my first crash ;-/

Because if you fall on dirt, there is a big risk you will mess up your feet or ankles without proper boots that protect them.

Well, I rode on the road but can imagine the same goes for off-road, but the right pair of boots makes a huge difference in one’s confidence and ability to securely put one’s foot down at a stop, especially if it’s a bit slick from oil, or loose debris. That, and you can imagine an object hitting your foot while flying down the highway at 80mph feels very different when you’re wearing riding boots vs. wearing vans. Then there’s the whole, sliding on assault aspect.

Offroad is completely different to circuit racing in terms of the kinds of protection required.

For interest, and to the point, Toby Price gearing up for the motorcycle leg of the Finke after completing the 4 wheel leg:

https://youtu.be/WKRcUtVGP4M?t=274

but there is a huge difference between:

1) racing, and normal motorcycle use -- like the kind of accidents you run into commonly differ hugely

2) you being able to afford a end of the line product or being very budged constrained

and this are two important aspects completely ignored in this discussion

What racing community? Circuit racing? If so I really think you're wrong. But always happy to learn something new.

I've seen a few of his videos — I think I am more put off by his lack of nuance. This is the RIGHT thing and all other opinions are idiotic.

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