[kd5ob]

Proficient Motorcycling Second Edition by David L. Hough.

Somewhere on this Forum is a thread which recommended every new rider read this book
and so I have. I would like to talk about it now that I've read it. Not critique it, just talk about it.

David does a masterful job in the first chapter of selling the job of Safety in Motorcycling
to his readers. He approaches this task by many angles including talking about his experiences with motorcycle fatalities, Government statistics, weather conditions, alcoholism, engine sizes, types of bikes, gear worn and common sense to name a few.

It is revealed that David L. Hough was a former MSF instructor and also taught an Advanced Motorcycle riding course via the MSF before he quit. It seems David and I share the same opinion about the MSF and it's weakening standards over the last few years since the 90's when statistics proved accident rates have been going up due to poor motorcycle training or no training. He credits MSF's weaknesses as being due to the Motorcycle industry pushing government to weaken them to make it easier to sell novices a bike and allow them to get their license. He's right about this and he's
also right in his mistrust of the Government and statistics.

In fact, I feel like I know David personally after reading his book. His opinions on government legislation and law enforcement are very similar to mine.

After Chapter One, we talk about the physics of a Motorcycle and how counter steering works and the meanings of various motorcycle terms and their meanings. What makes a motorcycle lean, what forces make it want to straighten up, weights and balances. In fact, David is the only one I've read who covers the GVWR issue with Motorcycles.

He has done a masterful job with this book and I think I will buy some of his other works and read them as well. He has 40 some odd years of experience in this book.

The book also covers Weather, Animals, Sidecars, Tricycles, off road riding, health issues. The book is just a wealth of information.

There are two issues which I feel need some help. One is the handling of Deer and how not to be hit by a Deer. David recommends slowing down to a stop if possible to avoid the animal hitting you. That is good advice. Let me introduce some scientific facts.

#1. If it's daytime, dear will run from you because they can see you, whether on foot, on a motorcycle, a tractor, or in a car, they will run from you. That's because Deer have exceptional good night vision and when the sun sets, a set of headlights or a high power spotlight will cause the animals to freeze. Why do deer freeze? They freeze rather than run because they can't identify the threat. They can't identify the threat because the light is blinding them. So they freeze because they don't know how to deal with an unidentified threat. If they could see it was a human on a bike, they would run rather than freeze. Deer store images in their minds as there is little smell to be had in the identification process in an upcoming collision. Deer use hearing and smell as their primary long distance warning indicators. David correctly mentions that a deers hearing is not like that of a dog. That is to say, deer can't hear ultra sonic whistles and this is true. I have 30-50 head of deer which live just 200 yards from my front door and they can't hear a dog whistle nor that of a rifle going off. Don't be surprised! It's true.
Deer whistles on trucks and bikes don't work because of this. The deer whistle is a wifes tale at best.

Male adult deer might charge an unidentified threat while females will just stand and try to hide being still. But if you turn off your headlights for just 2-3 seconds, the deer will identify you quickly and run. See if that doesn't work for you.

The problem with this advice is another stupid animal, known as a U.S. congressperson, made it illegal for you to turn off your motorcycle headlights. The Congress passed a law in 1974 requiring all motorcycle headlights to be fixed on so you can't turn them off.
It never ceases to surprise me how "Trail Lawyers" can make such hip shots at legislation considering that none of them probably ride motorcycles much less drive their own cars. Most of them don't even shop for their own groceries nor are they fiscally responsible! Yet they legislate to us what we can or can't do on a daily basis.

Anyway, our royalty, made it illegal to turn off your headlights so, David's idea of slowing down or stopping is the only thing you can do. I'm not in favor of stopping on a road way at night wth the possibility of being rear ended by traffic as this same congress who legislated fixing our headlights to ON didn't have braincells to legislate that all motorcycles had to have hazard lights too! My brand new 1300 tourer Star has no hazard light switch. Few motorcycles have hazard lights.

And Hazard lights and flares aren't covered in David's book either.

And #2, trailers aren't even addressed in David's book either. I have to wonder why.
There have been trailers out for some time now. I would have liked to read David's thougths about trailers. Perhaps their covered in one of his other books.

But, overall, David does a magnificent job with this book and I will be looking forward to reading his other works.

Charlie