What's the scariest thing that's happened to you that wasn't a crash?

Madlad

Madlad

Absolute Madlad
Howdy y'all, today I almost exploded a bird with my face while on the highway (I hope to god I got it on camera).

What's the scariest thing that has happened to you, or that you've seen while riding, that wasn't a crash or a bad tank slapper? :)
 
CafeBrakes said:
A fox literally jumped in front of my bike and I managed to swerve out of the way. Caught it on film too
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Damn that would be pretty scary, I don't see much wildlife on the roads where I live. Which is kind of surprising to be honest o_O

The bird just startled me more than anything, but it would have been bad if I HAD hit it with my face at 120kph LOL

Also I did end up getting it on film, although it looks less dramatic than it was (since Gopros tend to do that :p)

https://imgur.com/a/q2K8Plk
 
My top 5 so far in the nearly 30 years of riding...

Riding across black ice on a highway bridge in the desert in the middle of nowhere - pucker factor 10

Riding off road and back on road from being too sleepy - pucker factor 8.5

Realizing in real time while blowing through a red light due to too much speed that a rear brake only bobber is not all that - pucker factor 8.7

Having oncoming drunk driver swerve into my lane - pucker factor 9

Having a driver pull a gun on me while I was riding - pucker factor 9.5
 
Riding down a city highway at 5am-ish in the morning. The sun is far from up. Riding in the cruising lane, with a concrete barrier on my left. Up ahead I see a smudgy shape in the space between my lane and the concrete barrier - about 3 feet , or 5 feet between my bike and the solid wall. As I move closer I see it's a full grown German Shepard walking down the highway next to the barrier in the opposite direction I'm gong. I manage to swerve to the right section of my lane and pass it without a problem, but it's the damnedest thing Ive ever seen. Had I not been focused on the road, I may no the here now.

The memory still haunts me from time to time.

- Wolf
 
No.1 I was riding from Norwich to mid Wales and whilst skirting around Shrewsbury bypass an old man driving a ford KA shot through the red light cutting just in front of my front wheel and he ended up underneath the trailer of a lorry in the lane to my left. I never pass lorries on roundabouts because they tend to cut up the lanes and that is the only reason I wasn't hit by the car and pushed under the lorry too. That was probably the scariest thing thats happened to me as it was essentially pure luck that I wasn't killed.

No.2 A wasp got stuck inside my jacket while riding and if that wasn't bad enough after freeing the wasp just as I pulled out of the layby a BMW car coming the other way decided to overtake and essentially forced me off the road.

No. 3 My friend lowsiding his bike mid corner in front of me and somehow managing to dodge him, his bike and the small boulder his bike displaced from the stone wall it hit before the bike also bounced back into the road in front of me.

No. 4 My chain fell off at 60mph on my 125 because I didn't maintain it properly... lesson learned!
 
I was on a two-lane mountain highway last weekend going about 50-60 as per the speed limit when suddenly the cars in front of me slammed on their brakes. I went into emergency brake mode myself, kicked in some ABS, and swerved to the left brake down lane anyway (fortunately) as was highly fearing getting rear ended (I knew a big F-150 was behind me).

As that unfolded for me, two cars back you could hear their tires screaming to a screech, and then the third person back swerved and stopped behind me in that break down lane. I held my composure pretty good, yet was astounded by the close call and took awhile to process what happened. Traffic slowly began moving until I found out there was a random crash up out of sight up ahead that caused the slow down; then we all were back to 50-60.

I know many of us have close encounters like this. It was my scariest / closest one yet in my first year of riding. I'm thankful it worked out okay for everyone involved (no crashes at all), and we could all go home with normal days. I was definitely thankful I've practiced emergency braking and have kept my escape route training.

I've slid out from gravel / ice a few times and kept the bike up, too, but low speed / only me involved.
 
humes said:
I was on a two-lane mountain highway last weekend going about 50-60 as per the speed limit when suddenly the cars in front of me slammed on their brakes. I went into emergency brake mode myself, kicked in some ABS, and swerved to the left brake down lane anyway (fortunately) as was highly fearing getting rear ended (I knew a big F-150 was behind me).

As that unfolded for me, two cars back you could hear their tires screaming to a screech, and then the third person back swerved and stopped behind me in that break down lane. I held my composure pretty good, yet was astounded by the close call and took awhile to process what happened. Traffic slowly began moving until I found out there was a random crash up out of sight up ahead that caused the slow down; then we all were back to 50-60.

I know many of us have close encounters like this. It was my scariest / closest one yet in my first year of riding. I'm thankful it worked out okay for everyone involved (no crashes at all), and we could all go home with normal days. I was definitely thankful I've practiced emergency braking and have kept my escape route training.

I've slid out from gravel / ice a few times and kept the bike up, too, but low speed / only me involved.
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It's always scary when that happens... especially with vehicles behind you, with drivers who are unlikely to be paying attention, especially on the highway. I had similar happen to me about 8 years ago - I wasn't so lucky though and got rammed by a car who failed to stop behind me. The only good thing to come out of it was that my bike wrote their car off, but my bike (1200 Sportster) was repaired!

Ice/snow is always fun, but only if you are expecting it. Otherwise, like diesel, it's horrible - like many people I used to commute on my bike in all weathers, and many times it snowed while at work and then I had great fun riding home. Reminds me of offroading when I was a kid, although there is no way I bounce so well these days!
 
Man, in all my years I've had quite a lot of pucker factor moments. This one was the worst though:

Out in Colorado a few years ago, my brother and I were running east on Rt.160 towards Monte Vista in the rain at nightime. We were under the speed limit due to the rain but it was warm and not too bad, when suddenly our bikes just completely lost all traction. It was like we were floating on the road, both tires felt like they were simply gliding all over the pavement for a span of like ten seconds, and then just as sudden as it started BAM they grabbed again and we were fine.

It scared the living crap out of us! Lucky it was a straight section of 160 because if it had been a curve we would have gone down for certain. In 34+ years of riding we'd never felt anything even remotely like that before, and we've both experienced hyrdroplaning and riding over fluids plenty of times. We actually pulled over and walked back to see what the hell was on the road to cause that, but there literally wasn't anything odd or unusual, and the road felt fine to us. Ten seconds of utter terror and horror. To this day we don't know what happened, it must have just been some freak hydroplaning event or something.
 
I watched my wife , on her bike in front of me, swing in front of a car that had their signal light on to turn right on a four lane street while she was turning left and the guy never turned. He came straight at her and hit the brakes barely missing her. It was early on in her riding career and my heart sank. I wondered " what have I gotten her into?"
 
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