I was riding home from work and was doing about 35 mph.  I guy drove out in front of me and stopped.  I hit the breaks and fish-tailed toward him.  He threw it into reverse and I saw an opening so I let off the brakes to maneuver.  The bike flipped over and I went over.  Luckily I never made contact with the car.  His insurance admitted liability and will pay for the repairs.  

The driver looked right at me and said he couldn't see me because of the angle of the sun.  Then he mentioned a black bike, a black jacket, a black helmet, and a newly tarred road.  That is great camouflage!!  My next helmet will probably be white...

No personal damage other than a bruised up left leg that probably banged up against the bars on the way over.  The helmet has some road rash.  I was wearing a nylon tour master jacket with some plastic "armor" on the arms.  I landed on my right elbow and there wasn't a bruise, scratch, bump, or anything else.  I don't think I would have gotten a bruised up leg if I were wearing the riding pants I own (which are too hot in the summer).

So...It's off to the motorcycle safety course for some pointers...  The jacket and the helmet really made a difference in the accident and especially to my wife who cares for me and depends on me to come home every night.  The cops said that I would have been really banged up without the jacket and helmet.

I really have the itch to get the bike out of the shop.  I wish the insurance companies had a rental like they do when there is an auto crash.

It was a good wake-up call...  

Glad you made it through with no serious problems. One important factor and you will learn it in the course. When you lock up the rear brake do not let off it, keep it locked. When you let off after locking up, the rear end will try to straighten out violently and you will be thrown off. You can let off the front and should if you lock that but never the rear.  

Wow, glad you came thru it OK.  It is good to see that the gear you were wearing did its job.  

What you did is called "high-siding". When the rear tire is locked up, sliding and out of line, releasing the rear brake allows the tire to suddenly acquire traction again. This tends to throw the bike, catapulting the rider into the air. Even if the back end of the bike is only a few inches out of line when the tire grabs, it can throw your butt up into the air, leaving you doing a handstand on the handlebars and hoping you come down on the bike instead of in front of it. That tends to severly limit your ability to continue whatever evasive maneuver you were attempting to perform.

It takes practice to recover, once that rear tire breaks loose at highway speed. You have to get the bike completely straightened out and upright again, before releasing the brake. In an emergency situation, you probably don't have either the time or the room to do that. That only leaves the alternative of releasing the rear brake before the tire gets out of line at all, which takes even more practice.

regards,
Joe  

Thanks everyone.  That's what one of the cops said.  He was a motorcycle cop for 8 years and he was pretty sharp.

I'm glad I stopped when I did because I would have hit the car if I skidded another foot - even if it was by hitting the ground.  I definitely need that course though.

That's really scary about getting tossed in the air and coming back down on the bike.  I'm thinking about wearing a titanium cup when I ride now.  

Glad you made it thru with bumps.

BTW,
While their insurance company may not volunteer the info, they will pay to replace all of your safety gear with brand new stuff.
Think about it, you wearing it saved them thousands... they will pay.
A friend of my niece had a spectacular highside. His insurance paid for the helmet, jacket, jeans, and dermabrasion (jeans lasted 5'...skid didn't).

BTW, in 8 years, I locked the front once (oww, went down), and the rear once (what a ride, glad I wasn't going faster). I responded by getting a bike with ABS.  

Oh yeah, ABS is great stuff. I wish I'd had it on my Harley, when I was riding between the ice storms from Texas to Virginia back in December 1981. I'm still waiting for them to make it available on the cheap bikes though :-)

Until that day, I'll continue to practice my emergency stops, complete with locked up wheels front and rear. If you choose to relax braking because you have room to do so, that's one thing, but when you need to stop just as short as you can, if the front tire doesn't slide the last 8 or 10 inches, you should have been using more front brake.

regards,
Joe  

Its very sad to know that topazdog got an accident,by the way he his safe now with out getting any damage to his body.And topazdog is doing good thing by selecting a white helmet.
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meshil

North Carolina Treatment Centers  

Here's one of the few areas that I disagree with the MSF course. Helmet color. White is the most "visible" color, but, it's not the most noticed color.
Indulge me for a minute, I'll give 2 examples of why it's different.
1) Your helmet is the highest part of you and the bike. The white is at the top, and under some conditions will end up being processed just like the white fluffy clouds in the sky.
2) I can dig it out if I have to, but in AMA magazine about 2 years ago, they talked about a study. The subject was given a series of tasks on the sideline of a basketball court. While the subject was doing their task (and on videotape), they sent out various people on the court. One was a woman, dressed in white, who opened a white umbrella, closed it, and walked off court. 50% of the people with complex variables to keep track of it never saw it.
They also had someone dressed in a red gorilla suit walk out, beat their chest, and walk off. Only 30% of the people missed that.

BTW, my jacket is yellow and black...people kid me about being the bumblebee. I wear a bright red helmet... wineberry is almost as bad as black when you hit shadows.
They used to kid me that I was the ugliest biker they ever saw, then they admitted the last time they saw me, I was almost a quarter mile away.
Personally, I think I just hit the stoplight center of the brain Red over yellow.