5 Motorcycle Safety Myths That Need Debunking

• Table of Contents
• 1. Only the rear brake is necessary
• 2. One drink wont hurt you
• 3. Ride like everyone is trying to hit you
• 4. Helmets won't really save your life in a crash
• 5. City streets are safer than the highway

When bikers get together, it's only a matter of time until the conversation navigates to motorcycle safety. Sometimes the common-sense evaluations of riding safely can be true and worthy of listening too, but other times the collective wisdom of riders can be made up of misconceptions, false assumptions and riding guidelines that are outright wrong.

Dear rider who is reading this, please use your head. In this article we wanted to clear the air on a few common misconceptions on the dos-and-don'ts of safe riding so the right information can be in the riders hands and hopefully the dangerous riding mistakes can be reduced. Here are the five myths one hears the most:

1. Only the rear brake is necessary

This riding foul is becoming less common thanks to education. It's usually reserved for new riders although using both the front brakes and rear breaks when making a controlled stop can still escape an experienced rider who was fell victim to this bad habbit. Learn to master applying the roughly 70% of your bikes stopping power from the front brakes, along with your rear brakes, when making a stop. This goes double when under pressure and a quick stop needs to be made.

2. One drink wont hurt you

No matter how confident you are(let's not forget they call it liquid courage) to ride after only having one beer, riding with alcohol in your system is a risk you don't need to take. Plain and simple. To ride a motorcycle is dangerous in and of itself. With convenient transportation services such as Uber now-a-days there is really no excuse to drink and operate any kind of vehicle.

3. Ride like everyone is trying to hit you

While defensive riding may be helpful, often time this misconception comes down to one thing: visibility. The last thing another driver wants is to hit a motorcyclist, but this doesn't mean they can see you. There are many variables such as blind spots, glare, the roof pillars of a car or other things on the road and of course not all drivers are even making the effort to see you.

To make yourself visible, wear bright colors and plenty of high vis. You can buy a jacket and helmet with high vis strips sewn in or/and put strips of high vis on your bike. This along with properly distancing yourself from other drivers to ensure you are visible makes all the difference.

4. Helmets won't really save your life in a crash

This one is a doozy. All the information is out there and people who say this couldn't be more wrong. Studies have shown that helmeted riders suffer fewer neck injuries when they crash. Furthermore, the numbers say that riders using DOT helmets simply survive crashes more successfully than those without them. Any one with a good noggin' worth protecting is probably smart enough to figure out riding with a helmet is in fact safer than without.

5. City streets are safer than the highway

They say that slower is safer, and this may be true after the accident begins however this ignores that the risk of an accident is significantly higher on the busy streets than on a controlled-access highway. Consider this, all traffic is moving the same direction on the highway, there are no side streets, and no pedestrians. While Riding on a surface street there are many unexpected and unpredictable situations that can occur which may result in a crash.