Why We Ride

At the Track

First, I've never ventured onto a motocross or other type of off-road racetrack, so these are observations and experiences from road-racing circuits. Second, I'm not talking about watching a race, but rather a particular type of racetrack activity unknown to most people, probably even most motorcyclists. Some sport-riding clubs rent tracks for special events called "track days." Members ride the course, honing their skills but not actually competing (at least not in any official way). Similarly, rider- and/or racer-training operations, often featuring famous ex-racers, hold riding schools at racetracks with varying levels of supervision, classroom instruction, and individual attention. Any of these events may last from one to several days. Facilities require whoever puts on an event to provide on-site medical services (e.g., one or more ambulances) and to staff the course with flag-bearing observers at key locations to signal riders on the track about emerging hazards; it's not a matter of just letting a bunch of riders go crazy.

Ironically, racetracks may be the safest places I've ridden fast, and they can be quite beautiful. They're certainly the places where I've learned the most in the least amount of time, though sometimes I would have learned even more if I hadn't been so intent on racing my ego.

Wrecks

December 1996

What's even better than spending time on a racetrack? Introducing your friends to the experience. Not only do you get to enjoy their exhilaration vicariously, but you also may be inspired by their fortitude, and you can celebrate their triumphs over trepidation and mishap.

My friend Bill went down. He ran wide exiting Turn Two, the wheels of his Honda Hawk GT slipping suddenly out from under him as gravel replaced tarmac beneath those precious tiny contact patches. It wasn't a very dramatic crash; Bill was up and walking it off before the trotting corner workers reached the scene, and the bike sustained only mild cosmetic damage. The medical crew recommended a trip to the local hospital for x-rays, just to be safe, and Bill's day of track practice was over after just thirty minutes of seat time. He returned later in the afternoon with the official news: he had a broken collarbone, but not so much as a bruise anywhere else. The worst of it was the goofy harness he would have to wear for the coming six weeks; it looked like backpack straps without the backpack. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief-me, most of all, because it had been my idea to get him out on the track.

After months of coaxing and cajoling, my two main riding partners finally agreed to join me for the Southeastern Sportbike Association's track practice at Talladega Grand Prix Raceway (the road course, not the NASCAR oval). I had started making such pilgrimages the year before, visiting four different tracks in the process, and I came away from each experience a more enthusiastic and better rider. Bill, having just started riding a few years ago, resisted my urging to try out "the track" until this past spring, but after he got his first taste at the wonderfully winding circuit at Mid-Ohio, talking him into Talladega was actually pretty easy. Dave, on the other hand, was ambivalent up to the last moment. He'd only recently returned to riding after a lengthy hiatus, still had fresh memories of two street get-offs, and was trying very tentatively to get acquainted with a newly acquired pristine Ducati 750SS. Dave eventually surrendered to relentless persuasive efforts, his fate being decided by something like democratic process within our little riding trio.

About a dozen of my local riding buddies descended upon Talladega the night before practice, and we retold all of the usual riding stories over dinner. I might not have noticed, but Dave pointed out afterward that the vast majority of the tales told had to do with crashing. This conversational bias was not lost on a track virgin who was already apprehensive about losing his cherry-red Ducati (or more) in some riotous orgy of uninhibited speed. As I tried to come up with a verbal antidote for the queasiness Dave had contracted at dinner, it occurred to me he wasn't the only one nervous about the next day's potential for trauma. All of those stories he had just heard were actually attempts at inoculation.

Each rider had taken one of several approaches. The most popular tactic was to catalog all of one's own errors, reviewing the lessons learned and reaffirming one's own invincibility in the process. Another strategy was to tease fellow riders about all of their respective mishaps, with the implicit conviction that such disasters occur only in the lives of others. A third group paid their respects at the altar of famous racer crashes, thereby invoking some celestial blessing on their endeavors. It could have been the evening before a perilous expedition or the locker room before the big game. The details vary from one setting to the next, but, generally, human beings trying to manage collective anxiety tend to do so in these ways.

Dave went on to face the dreadful beast and conquer it; by midmorning, he was all grins after each practice session, despite his concern about Bill's spill. By the end of the day, he was asking about how soon we could return. Bill, too, was undaunted by his fall. He said his greatest pain was the disappointment of having to end the day so early after riding quite well, at least up until his unplanned sampling of Alabama soil. He wanted to get back out and master that Turn Two exit! He had analyzed his mistake and couldn't wait to try a different approach (no doubt we'll hear more about this at the next pre-practice dinner). But, alas, we all must return to our workaday lives between motorcycling events. And it is there that we encounter another set of crash stories . . .

"How'd ya hurt your shoulder? Oh, you wrecked on a motorcycle? Friend of mine had one of them things. Ran underneath a train at 350 mph with his wife and kids on the back. All of 'em burst into flames and died instantly. Killed some people who weren't even there when it happened. They're still finding pieces of that motor scooter all the way across the state line. You'd never catch me on one of them things. Death traps, I tell you! Where'd you crash? On a racetrack? Are you crazy? Foolish thing to do, a man your age out racing around on a suicide machine like an irresponsible teenager! Did I tell you a friend of mine had one of them things? Got run over by a Greyhound bus in his own driveway. Broke every bone in his body. Terrible thing! Nurse friend of mine says the same thing happens to somebody in town every eleven minutes. What? You wanna go back again? What are you, some kind of daredevil or just plain stupid? Didn't you learn your lesson? Did I mention a friend of mine had one of them things . . . ?"

We've all heard the stories. It seems that everyone-and I mean just about everyone-who hears that you ride a motorcycle always knows someone somewhere who had some hair-raising, awful crash that either prevented the person from ever riding again or convinced the rider and all of his or her friends, neighbors, and relatives that motorcycling is the most surefire way to incur extensive physical injury known to man. And they feel compelled to tell you about it. Again and again. Punishment for youthful exuberance comes swiftly, surely, and severely-if you believe these stories. Which I don't.

Sure, motorcycling is a dangerous activity, and accidents really do happen, sometimes with very serious consequences. But that's only part of the story. Non-riders tend to leave out (maybe because they never heard) other important factors, such as the seventeen beers ingested immediately prior to the ride of death, the absence of appropriate riding gear, or the lack of good training and experience (or common sense and maturity) on the part of the rider. Nor is there any accounting for the millions of people who do not instantly detonate upon contact with the doomsday device supposedly lurking within each and every motorcycle.

For most who offer their unsolicited horror stories about a friend of a friend, the facts about motorcycle safety won't mean a thing. Try as he may, my friend Bill will be wasting his breath explaining that he really wasn't hurt that badly and that he gained a very valuable learning experience on the way to increased mastery. It won't matter that he hasn't had a wreck on the street in nearly four years of riding, or that the racetrack is by far the very safest place to practice and improve one's skills (no oncoming traffic, medical crew at the ready, mandatory full leathers and track-worthy machinery, same corners over and over, and so on). And he had better not even mention anything about the exhilarating freedom, grand camaraderie, and thrilling adventure that make the expenses, risks, and injuries all worthwhile. They'll have none of that, thank you. Which is too bad.

Just as the litany of crash descriptions repeated by the riders prior to practice managed their anxieties, the stories told by non-riders manage theirs. But the typical anti-motorcyclist's anxieties aren't about risk, damage, and injury; they're about missing out on life. You see, they need to reassure themselves that taking chances always ends in disaster; this is the justification for all of the "safe" conventions they've adopted. Never mind all the lost opportunities for enriching experiences, the important discoveries about one's own abilities and limits, or the bonds that form between people who face challenges together-what they want is certainty, safety, and...