New Florida Rider

Closed Thread Subscribe

Thread Tools

Search this Thread

Apr 25, 2010 | 02:13 AM

markimus

Thread Starter

Intermediate

Joined: Apr 2010

Posts: 29

Likes: 0

From: Florida

New Florida Rider

Hey all, my name is Mark and I ride a Harley Davidson Sportster 883. I recently retired from the Army after having spent over 20 years there. Before my Harley I rode Kawi Ninjas in Germany on the autobahn back in the early 90s. The old timers that I was stationed with tried to convince me that I needed a Harley and not a rice rocket but I just knew that I wouldn’t break 155 MPH on the open autobahn on a Harley, and I was right. It wasn’t until I got back from Germany that my Grandma told me that my Grand Dad raced Harleys and Indians in Daytona back in the 30’s, but seeing as I went and bought a bike already she said it didn’t matter if I knew now or not, since the only reason she had not told me was because she did not want me getting a bike (go figure).

I know now what I did not know then, that v-twins are the only way to ride. I love the sensory overload that I get when the bike roars to life. My youngest daughter is my riding buddy most of the time and really enjoys the whole experience with me and I am glad that I can share it with her.

I had to take the motorcycle safety course twice within three years because I did not know that Florida had changed their licensing rules until after the fact. Florida DMV will not endorse you with a motorcycle license now unless you have a motorcycle safety course card less than a year old when you go to apply for your license, so I went and took the course again in October of 09 to meet this requirement. I was a little ticked that I had to go through the course again since I had already gone through it about a year and a half before and done it before I had my own bike. I was being optimistic that my better half would see fit to allow me the pleasure of once again saddling up one day after 15 years of love, commitment, and kids.

Long story short, I went through the course again and loved it! The coach offered me a job on the spot because I rode well he said, talk about a boost to the ego! More importantly though, two weeks after I had my license and had nearly racked up a thousand miles of riding I was hit by a car. It was the typical scenario I later learned after doing some research as to why the car never saw me. It was night time and I was doing the speed limit traveling at 45 mph with the right of way when a lady in a 1983 big-and-heavy made a left hand turn in front of me at about 35 feet. I remember thinking that “I can’t believe that this is happening” and “this is really going to hurt” as it was going down. The next few moments are a blur though; I made my emergency swerve to the right, which put me directly in front of the lady’s car. Because of the closing distance it was my only option I felt, otherwise I t-boned her car. As I passed in front of her the left front part of her bumper hit the left rear of my bike. I do remember the impact and thinking that the Sportster had some heft because it felt like I was barely kicked by the impact. I had been hit in Germany from behind on my ZX-7 and it threw me all over the place because it was a lighter motorcycle.

I kept the bike upright and brought it to a controlled stop only to watch the lady turn down a side road. I thought that she was taking off because she had no tag and did not even check to see what the result of the accident was so I went after her, as it turned out she was in shock and pulling into the parking lot of the store that she worked at which was less than 300 feet from the accident sight, and as far as her tag, she had a temporary tag in her rear window that I did not see because she was from out of state.

I had the chance to talk to the lady after the accident, which is not always the case when a car and motorcycle accident occurs. I asked her specifically if she saw me or not and she told me that she had not seen me until she hit me. I was shocked since I had my orange high visibility vest on as required by the military and I was in the correct lane position too.

I mentioned that I did some research about accidents after mine because this was my 3rd motorcycle accident involving a car, (two counting this one were serious one was not too serious). As I mentioned this was the typical scenario that exists between cars and motorcycles when an accident occurs and in most of the cases the driver of the car says that they never saw the motorcyclist until the moment of impact occurred. I was really bummed out because I had my youngest daughter on the back with me just before the accident. Because it had started to get dark I had my wife come and get my daughter with the car. Five minutes later I was hit; I can’t tell you how thankful I am that she was not on back when the accident occurred because it would have been a different outcome if she had been. I had no injuries and minimum damage to my motorcycle (about $500); if she had been on back her leg would have been very near where the car’s bumper hit my bike.

The night was not over for me though at this point. The car driver and I called the police and our insurance companies to report the accident; the officer that responded said she was surprised to see that there was not a mess for her to clean up at the scene. As the officer filled out the accident report she noted the damage that I sustained was to one saddle bag which was scuffed and torn from its zipper mount and a partially crushed chrome drag strut, (I later saw that my rear fender had also sustained some minor damage which was missed due to the darkness). After the police report was complete and the driver and I had exchanged our information I took a back road to get home which was less than ten miles away, (this was another statistical factor that played into the common profile of car and motorcycle accidents that I researched).

Literally moments later another car was pulling out in front of me and almost plowed me! I pulled up next to the driver’s side window at the stop sign and saw that the driver was on her cell phone talking to her husband. She rolled her window down and apologized repeatedly to me saying that her husband rides and she rides with her husband all of the time. She continued to repeat that she did not see me. I told her what had just happened to me moments earlier and she was credulous and sincerely sorry for the close call and promised to pay better attention to the road.

I have since been very selective on when I take my kids riding and even more cautious when they are on board with me because of this night of reality checks that I had. My wife was ticked because I had convinced her that I would be okay on another bike twenty years after having owned my last one that had been hit by another car before it was put away into storage. My Motorcycle Safety Course coach was glad to hear that I had successfully applied his coaching techniques to this situation and lived to tell the tale. I installed a prismatic light diffuser onto my headlight (it diffuses light out in multiple colors into the peripherally fields of vision) to increase my visibility to cars and also bought a pulse modulator that I might install later on.

I am passionate about motorcycles and riding and happy to finally be here on HD Forums. I hope that my story wasn’t too long but I thought it would let you know a little about me. Later.