Less than 30 days till I roll west for the 26th annual RFTW....time to clean house and dust and uncobwebb the old Blog

Normally I have written here before this.  Normally I have written some trucking stuff, or observations of motorcycles during the year.  This has not been a normal year.  My Wife has had surgery and is recovering nicely.  She is coming home from the hospital in the next few days.  But that is not why I have not written here.  It has been a very busy year, and that is not the reason that I have not written here either.  Maybe I am getting older and just have not had anything to add here.
That is a good excuse but it also is not the reason that I have not written here.  I have been lazy, that is the real reason.   I have posted several things on Face Book, just not here.


Clyde is ready to roll, I still have to change his oil and take him up to the local nitrogen dealer and make sure his tires are properly inflated.   *Note I have been running nitrogen in Clyde's tires for a few years now and his tires are lasting a lot longer.  I highly recommend that if you have not made this $5.00 change to your bike do it.  $5.00 verses $180.00 per tire plus labor is pretty much a no brainer   Example  rear tires usually last about 13 to 15 thousand miles on air, front tires last just about as long.  Clyde has nitrogen in his tires and rear tires are lasting 20,000 miles fronts over 20,000 miles.  Front tire is at half it's wear and it has 13000 plus miles on it.  That is two runs with a third one done easily.  So the $5.00 is worth it.


Now for some observations on motorcycles.  These are made from a truck drivers perspective.  I have seen many many groups riding.  Several were riding like organized groups.  Lots of PGR missions out there.  You guys all looked sharp, and organized.  There are a few folks out there that ride very responsibly and respect trucks.  Then there are some suicidal complete idiots out there!  When I pass a truck I do not pull over in front of them until I can see the top of the trailer in my mirror, and if I am on a 75 mph road I count to 3 by thousands and then move over.   The more room I can give a truck moving faster than 55 mph the safer I am.  As a truck driver I know it takes four seconds from the time I hit my brake pedal until I stop.  It takes the average driver two seconds to realize that they need to stop and to get their foot on that brake pedal.
Two seconds means @ 60 mph I roll 176 feet before I even start slowing down, then 352 feet later I stop so lets get the calculator out.....176 + 352 = 528.  that means 528 feet to stop a truck at 60 mph.  That is if the driver is paying attention and not having an argument with his wife, dispatcher, or a bill collector. That is if the road is dry and the driver has checked his equipment and every thing works properly.  So why do my fellow motorcycle riders cut in front of a truck at 180 feet?  They are not stupid, they are not crazy, they are not suicidal, they are quite simply IGNORANT.  That doesn't mean stupid, it means they are uninformed.   They do not know what it takes to stop a big truck.  If a truck is closer to you than 528 feet and you stop the end result is you will die.  That is if you are on a bike, or in a car.  Nothing I as the driver can do about it, nothing you can do about it, that is simply physics.  When I get passed by a motorcycle I start paying attention, but I ride.  I will back off a bike that cuts me short, but that is me.  There are a lot of new folks out there driving trucks, and they like the motorcyclists are simply IGNORANT.  They are either not aware of how long it takes to stop a truck (Do not think "How can this be, they are driving it and they are professional"), or they simply do not care.  Getting comfortable around trucks is a bad idea.  The average driver is very good, and very professional.  But then the average cyclist is very safe and very aware of the dangers of riding.  It only takes one mistake to get you killed on the road.  Example the recent big truck vs. bus accident in California.  Ten people dead, including the truck driver and the bus driver.  No one will ever know what either of those drivers thought, or did.  They will figure out what happened to an extent, but we will never know.  The truck driver was a professional, and the bus driver was a professional, but the cars around them were not. 

So now for a few words about the Run.  We ride in formation, no matter what that formation is the goal is to protect the rider beside you and in front of you.  The bigger the city, the worse the congestion the tighter that formation has to be.  In some of the eastern cities we ride in if you give a car a 6 second gap they are coming into the formation, and they will see you and run the guy on your right or left over, then claim they never saw them.   If the formation passes a truck it had better give that truck lots of room.  Think about this, first platoon passes a truck, the platoon leader waits till he is 700 feet past the truck then he moves over.  He has 60 bikes behind him, the first 30 riders move when he moved, then two (and it only takes two to start this) riders decided to cut over at 500 feet, by the time the platoon moves over the tail gunners are 10 feet in front of the truck.  The Truck driver is on his brakes and backing off.  Second Platoon is beside the truck, and maybe Third Platoon is too, but Fourth Platoon, Fifth Platoon, Sixth Platoon, Seventh Platoon (Bikes with trailers that do not stop very vast) and Eighth Platoon (Trikes and trikes with trailers that stop a little faster) are behind the truck.  Everything is going great but that truck is slowing down, and traffic doesn't want to allow anyone into the left lane because they do not want to behind those DAMN Bikers.  So what happens, the same two riders that started this insanity by not thinking start waving at an over pass and forget that there are 500 bikes behind them, they back off and the end of Platoon one stops.  The truck because he has already started stopping some how gets stopped without killing anyone, he is on his radio Screaming "Brake Check, these idiots are stopping!!!!!"  and Second Platoon stops in the left lane, Fourth Platoon might get stopped without hitting the truck, and then we go on.  That is a perfect situation.  But a third mistake and someone is hurt, or worse dead.   This gets even worse when we enter construction zones.  I was at the end of the pack last year in New Mexico, we were under escort and there was an accident that was caused because people were not thinking.  I could go into a lot of other things here, but everyone has to remember one very important fact about Run For The Wall.  We are all going to the same place, the exits we use have road guards at them, and those poor guys do not leave the exit until everyone gets there....everyone. We do not leave anyone behind, and if you get out of line or get off the road 7 or 8 folks are going to stop and check on you.  One final thought if you drop out of the pack take a look at where we are going and then go there.  DO NOT try to get back into the pack, this risks everyone, either follow behind or if you can and there is enough time go ahead.  I would stay behind the pack at anything under 20 miles from the stop.  Remember in perfect situations that pack is 8 miles long, and can stretch out to 16 miles.   For those two riders mentioned above, do not be them, give the trucks as much room as the platoon leader did, do not cut them short.  Just do not do it.  Think about the people behind you that are behind that truck, that have trucks behind them.  You might survive but do you really want to have the death of anyone on your conscience?

So in May I will be headed west, and I will pray that everyone that participates in this years Run makes it safely from home back to home.  Please remember that you control what happens, keep you wheels down, stay upright and visible and never assume that anyone around you can see you  or even cares that you are there.


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