Bike/Car Drags - why do you bother?

In aus.motorcycles on Tue, 18 Nov 2003 20:13:02 GMT

No one knows where it came from.

It's really unlikely to be an acronym, cos those require modern levels of
literacy and were mostly used in radio communications in WWI and later.
Very rare before then, so pretty damn unlikely in the early to mid 1800s.
Before the 20thC, most abbreviations were just that, abbreviations.
The whole word with the vowels left out, or just the first and last
couple of letters used. Easy to see if you look at court records and
parish registers and so on. Any acronym explanation for a common word
(like For Unlawful carnal Knowledge) is almost certainly wrong[1], although
they appear in lots of places.

As far as I know, it's probably rhyming slang from pomegranite/immigrant,
but no one knows for sure.

Zebee
- who can't talk about cars, so has to be *completely* irrelevant in
crossposts....

[1] there were acronyms in the ancient world, INRI and SPQR are the
obvious ones, but by the time you get to more-or-less-modern English,
they are a 20thC thing.

 

Shane, I'm shocked that you would do or say this!
It's damn dangerous to travel in any ones blindspot!

Ron

 

Backing up what Zebee said, the notion about 'pom' coming from 'Prisoner of
Mother England' has been well established as apocryphal - mainly because
there is no evidence at all of that term being used by anyone, ever, for any
reason, let alone as an acronym. The English government exclusively used the
term 'convict' for a start, which should mean that the English are called
'coms', not poms. There is no clear consensus as to the origin of the term
'pom', but the most like candidate is a contraction of pomegranate, for a
variety of reasons - do a google search and you'll find dozens of websites
on this topic.

Manning

 

I don't know Shane or know anything about his experience but I'll back him
up - he didn't say 'ride in the blindspot', he said 'ride just backwards of
the blind spot' - ie, in the place where the driver can actually see you.
I'd have to agree that it is a reasonably safe position to be in.

When in traffic I *personally* prefer to be a little further back than this,
but from the position Shane identifies you would certainly be able to
respond to all of the driver actions.

Obviously no experienced rider is going to suggest riding in the blindspot.

Manning

 

Well, it does help if you're already on the same level!

Damien (what, you mean cagers AREN'T all the same?)
GPX250 (stolen) -> CBR600

 

Oops, missed the "I found to ride was just backward of" !

Sorry Shane.

Ron

 

You have GOT to be kidding sunnyboy.
If you can't get your facts right with that statement how can we trust
you to police (hahahahahahaha) our roads?
I got more friends in ausmoto than you have in the whole state revenue
commission. (new name for the highway police)

 

Nah, mine's a truck not a van! ;-)


BTH

 

Baron Von Rotter wrote ...
....snip...
| No matter what a bike rider tells you, through a mountainous twisty road its
| nearly impossible to pass and blow off a motivated, and well sorted high
| performance sports car, sure you can walk away on the straights and out of
| corners but they make up for it in sheer cornering speed available. Ive had
| a little Toyota GT4 corolla hound me through the twisties once, definately a
| lesson well learnt.

It doesn't have to be a mountain road either, I was held up by a group of bikes
on the old Pacific Highway between Mooney Mooney and Gosford one day.
This stretch has lots of tight corners and the bikes simply couldn't cut it.
I wasn't driving a Porsche either, just a VL turbo with modified suspension
and very good rubber. I closed up on the bikes and after several slow corners
it was obvious the bikes were slower than the VL through the tight stuff so I
overtook them by late braking into a corner and pulled away. After the twisty
bits ended and the road straightened out, the bikes came storming back doing
well over 160kph as they overtook me.
I let them pass because my radar detector was beeping, anyway they were faster
in a straight line.
I had to laugh though, as soon after I drove sedately past the same group
of bikes that had just been pulled over by the cops !


So why do bikers bother to hold up faster cars on twisty roads ?
Just let the faster cars overtake, you can always catch up when the
road straightens out !

 

Gym gears were in my carry bag of course. Point was I had extra
luggage/weight with me too (remind self to clarify things in future,
otherwise *rseholes will think I've just watched "queer eyes for straight
guys")

 

the question was a troll, and was basically 'why do you all do x stupid
thing'...

hardly that legitimate really, though it could certainly have been asked
better.

Charlie

 

Shane is of the opinion:

How did you come to the belief that I was discussing the original post?
There is such a thing as thread drift - I was responding to the words I
quoted, and nothing else.

And in the case in question, yes, the car was incredibly close behind me -
it stopped about 2 inches behind my arse (and about 2 metres below me, by
the point in the operation).

If you'd like to know the full story, I've got pictures and words at
http://www.hezmatt.org/bikewreck/.

- Matt

 

<snip>

It wouldn't have anything to do with the bikes wanting to see through the
tight corners before charging in, would it?

Or maybe they didn't know they were in a race with such a talented driver?

Conehead

 

I didn't say ride in a blindspot actually. I said just *backward* of a
blindspot which is behind the vehicle and I still reckon it's one of the
safest places to position your bike. You maintain eye contact with the
driver and have plenty of time to take evasive action. The driver *can* see
you because you've positioned your bike where he/she *must* see you. You sit
higher than the driver and usually react much earlier than them as well. I
travelled in the heaviest Sydney traffic for five years, from one side being
Sans Souci( General Holmes Drive) to St Ives (via Cahill Expressway and
Harbour Bridge) each and every single day. No crashes, no close calls that I
can even remember due to lane changing or stopping issues. Worked for me.



Shane

 

No probs. Some may still suggest it's a little hairy back there but it
certainly worked for me. By being too far backward of the vehicle you're
starting to lose contact with the movements of the drivers in front of that
vehicle. Brake lights, indicators, head movements, you lose eye contact with
shop fronts - early warning (reflections etc) and the list of conscious and
even the involuntary calculations are therefore affected. I think riding too
far behind is boring and it leads to your senses going on holidays too
much. All of this is still dependant on what's happening behind you too. I
didn't mention this as gospel on behalf of what I even trained people to do
because as you know everything changes as the seconds go by. If I saw a
trainee sitting in the very position I just described he would have to have
a very good reason for being there. Any of the above reasons may be a good
one though Cheers.



Shane

 

I resemble that last comment!!!!


Shane

 

Some drivers do the same thing, for the same reasons.

Hi, Manning. Oh, and hi, Al! Long time no see.

Two anecdotes for ya:
1. A guy at work drives a Pulsar Gtir 4wd turbo. Not much mods, but
a quick car. Pulls up at lights next to a bike. I was 3 or 4 cars
behind, and watched the whole thing. Biker turns and looks at Pulsar,
nods, and when the lights changed, they blasted off. Yeah, the bike
won, but who cares? First 10-15m were pretty close, and it was a hoot
to watch the guy lift his wheel, too! My workmate thought it was
great!

2. A very long time ago, my brother came up alongside a Lamborghini
Countach on the freeway, driving his Mk1 Cortina rally car. Looked
over at the Lambo, gunned it a bit. The Lambo had a bit of fun, just
stayed level with him up to about 130kph or so, and then nailed it.
My brother was telling everyone about that for years! Same sorta
thing, really.

Sometimes it's just fun to watch the other guy take off hard...

Cheers,
Steve

 

'Thread drift'? )))))))))))) I've heard it all now )))) Ok, given that
we may have experienced a bit of 'thread drift' I still don't see how the
original point about wanting to be in front of a'cager' is necessarily safer
than being behind them? Wasn't your incident a classic example of why you
should want to be either in front of these dickheads or out of their way?
BTW, I didn't say anything about riding offset to the flow of traffic, I do
it all the time. You say you'd have been better off being half a dozen cars
further up the roadway.........what if the car behind you further up the
roadway didn't stop either? I think that's a matter of chance you're talking
about now. Your risk factors are on the rise the moment you leave your
driveway, your fate is only partly in your hands from this point onwards.
Your chances of being hit can be markedly reduced by riding defensively and
being alert BUT I'd rather have a vehicle with a driver less alert then me
and in a vehicle with much poorer braking performance in front of me rather
than behind me.

Errrkkkkk, that's too bad. Nice bike. Still, got to imagine what may have
happened if your bike was one vehicle behind this guy? It's all about chance
and being alert to the max. BTW, I'd get that 'thread drift' thing seen to
if I were you. Perhaps a steering head issue or maybe your tyre pressures.



Shane

 

I reckon he's probably Hammo.

-----sharks

 

and maybe they were just slower... I guess that's not a possibility
though eh?

Charlie