Heard this a few days ago...

There are two kinds of riders.....the ones who have layed down (dropped) their bikes, and the ones who haven't......yet

Larry

Larry:

I've always heard that as:

There are two kinds of riders, those that have been down and those that will go down.

That has always given me a kind of creepy feeling. Now, I'm wondering if the one or two times I've dropped my Burgman roadside count as "having been down" and I've met my quota? And, how many riders do I know that have never been down?

There has to be some positive to this.

Tom H. Burgman 650
Antioch, CA

Well, Tom- It happened the other day...my first laying down of the scoot! Luckily, it was just getting on it ( taking it off the center stand, so I was standing beside it ) it started leaning my way, I thought, no problem as this has happened before, I just straighten it out....not.....it just kept coming..leaning further and further, like in slow motion. All I could do was try to make it as comfortable as possible, all the while thinking of the new dents or scratches!!! But I guided it to rest on the handlebar grip and it turned out fine! (prayers do work, heheheh) coz I was praying all the way down. The only time it did go the other way (leaned away from me) was in my garage and thankfully there was my car next to it and the scooter mirror stopped the fall and rested on the car with no damage to either.....maybe you can't really call these laying it down because each time it was choreographed with no real damage....I know the day will come when it does lean the other way and I am on the wrong side to do anything but watch as it goes down.

What kind of damage (scratches or dents) happened to yours (or anyone's) when the scoot did lay down the opposite way? Is it bad? Or does it all depend on how it lands? Is there a defense, like trying to make sure the handlebar grip touches down? Anyone who has had experiences like this write a reply and let us know your experience, as we will all experience this sooner or later.

GTLarry,

My TipOver was pretty much the same as yours, except that I was in a parking lot that had a light layer of fine gravel. As I turned the bike around to point out in my chosen space my foot slid, and there we were, in slow motion going down, ever so slowly, but down, down, down, farther and farther, until I no longer could keep it up. I just gave up and tried to lay it down gently. A couple of pieces of tupperware show very faint scratches. If you've done it once you can identify those scratches on other bikes, and you know what they experienced. My first reaction, once the scoot was down, was to look around and see if anyone witnessed it. There didn't seem to be anyone that would own up to seeing this, so I picked her up, and said to my self, "Well, that was stupid." ...and that's my story.

--Dave

Two come to mind for me. One stupid ..... and funny. The other also stupid and scary.

The first one: I went out in front of my house one day to get on my Helix and for some reason, I stood aside it and swung my leg over it like it was a motorcycle. The only problem was, I had a Givi top case on it. My foot hit the top case and the bike went right over on it's side. I landed right on top of it. Since the Helix was already scratched up, I don't know that I added anything to it. And, only a couple of kids across the street saw me.

The second one I've told before. It occured while ridding back from Oregon on my Burgman using a long, winding two lane mountain highway. It's a long story but basically, I let some yahoo in a pickup truck push me too hard and when I finally ditched off to the side of the road to let him by, the roadside was covered in pine forest duff and the front wheel slid out from under me the minute it left the tarmac. The Suzi went down on her side although I was unharmed. There are still a series of scratches on the left side lower tupperware from that little fiasco.

You think I would have learned too. I almost dropped it on our recent coastal ride above Jenner when I made and abrupt left turn across the highway onto some soft road shoulder. The whole group saw me barely catch and then recenter the bike that day.

Yeah...I'm surprised it doesn't happen even more often. We're looking at several hundred pounds lying in the balance. And when we are still, or going very slow, it's a matter of dumb luck and skill. I've had to use every ounce of strength in my body to keep from laying it down so many times, I can't remember! So we are all actually very lucky it doesn't happen more often......or does it??? Come on....everybody 'fess up!' Most of us have dumped our bike, either something out of our control, or more often because we did something dumb to cause it....We three here have been brave and swallowed our pride to tell our stories here...and there should be many, many more stories here, so come on, it's ok..tell us your story- they are amusing to read! (and you know you've layed ur bike down-you know who you are) heheheh...