Sooo... yesterday was a beautiful day in Pennsylvania. It was about 70 degrees, sunny and the leaves were beautiful. We went for a ride on the local twisties through the woods, alongside streams, over the hills, all along the way surrounded by amazing fall color. I couldn't have asked for a better day or a better ride until the following happened...
We were coming through a nice series of twisties, the last one was a righthand curve up a hill. Everything was so amazing and I was feeling so great on my bike that I forgot one of my cardinal rules of riding -- ride within your sight distance. In other words, I was going TOO FAST because I had no idea what was over the hill around the curve...
...a stop sign!!!
I definitely did not have enough time to brake safely before the stop sign. I tried though. I was leaning heavily into the curve (love to lean), so the first thing that happened after I slammed on the brakes was that the bike stood up. Next thing that happened was the rear tire locked up and slid out to the right; I let up on the brakes to unlock the tire and then braked again; rear tire locked up and slid out to the left; let up on the brakes and then braked again; tire slid out to the right; released and braked one last time and ended up stopping before the stop sign but I was on the wrong side of the road (in the lane for oncoming traffic). Fortunately no one else was in that lane. I left some pretty skid marks. The whole thing happened in a matter of seconds. Shook for a while.
Hubby saw the whole thing. Poor guy. He was amazed I didn't dump the bike. He said I smoked the tires twice. Amazingly enough, even though I was scared, I never felt like I was going to dump it.
I am wondering if there is anything I should have/ could have done differently other than RIDING WITHIN MY SIGHT DISTANCE. No question about it, I should have been doing that.
- Any other tips?
- Did I lock the rear wheel because I used too much rear brake?
- If there isn't enough time to stop and so you are overbraking, is it a given that you will lock a wheel?
- Would it have been worse to lock the front wheel?
By the way, after I recovered, we kept on riding -- there was no way I was going to waste a beautiful day inside. All in all I was lucky. I relearned a valuable lesson and the only cost was a bit of fear.