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I wanted to get some perspective from other motorcyclists.
No, I didn't crash. One of my friends did. He's fine. A little bit of road rash.
Ok, this guy has had a motorcycle in the past. I know he's got thousands of miles of bicycle seat time. However he's out of shape and doesn't seem to take things as seriously as he should.
He was going 25-30mph downhill on a straight road and a truck was trying to enter from the right. Weather was clear and sunny, road was dry. The truck started to creep out into the road with it's left turn signal on.
He takes the center of the lane so the driver will see him. Driver keeps coming out. Bicyclists panic brakes, locks up the rear, and crashes.
Now my friend called the cops. He REALLY thinks it's 100% the truck drivers fault.
I didn't really say it to him but I think he's got a decent amount of blame.
If the brakes on a road racing bicycle are maintained correctly and are not faded from an extreme mountain descent, you can stop the bicycle in like 20ft from 30mph. Considering he saw the truck like 100 yards ahead of time and he locked up the rear I think he's partly to blame. He didn't start slowing down when he saw the truck, he continued pedaling.
Bicyclists seem to believe it is 100% the cagers fault even more than motorcyclists.
Just curious what you guys think. If he had stayed upright under maximum braking and hit the side of the truck I'd have a different opinion. It just sounds like he saw the truck so far in advance that he absolutely would have stopped in time if he actually got on the brakes correctly.
He also had free space between the truck and the centerline and didn't take it.
Ben