Accidents happen... don't they?

Yes.

..but not to everyone. What, then, separates "us" from "them"? Obviously we want to be on the non-accident prone riders. In fact, it doesn't matter if you've had an accident or not, you don't want to have an accident in the future, so it's irrelevant if you have or not. You want to be with those who never will.

How?

Well, what is an accident? It's a situation that hurts us, and/or the bike. Can you have an accident without consequences? A "hit" that doesn't leave a trace? Sure, but let's say you can't, just because we don't care about those cases.

What causes an accident? Changes that the people involved did not foresee. Not all unforeseen changes cause an accident, but all accidents happen because of unforeseen circumstances.

Well, obviously we can't foresee everything, thus we can't ever be 100% certain we will never get in an accident. Well, that sucks. What we can do, however, is foresee enough so we reduce our chances of being in one, to something so small, that it never happens to us.

How?

You can make up for other people's distractions and mistakes. But surely, there is a limit to the amount of attention you can put into something! You can't possibly know what everyone is up to, at least around you. How about consciously focusing less on some things, to free up some consciousness? That's what controlling your machine is about: doing enough exercises (or riding long enough) that you don't need to consciously think of anything about it. You know how to swerve, brake VERY fast and effortlessly glide through the asphalt. You become one with your bike when you stop thinking about it, when it does what you want without you having to think how. You become so good, that riding through traffic is just like walking through a crowd.

Oh, but surely walking through a crowd is not as dangerous. There is no gravel in a curve, no person crossing the double yellow into your lane. After all, if someone is on a collision course with you, you just walk around. Even if you do bump into someone, obviously it's not fast enough to hurt anyone. Most times, anyway.

It is the same thing. What changes is that you're going too fast to be able to act in time. I don't mean "always go as slow as possible", I mean that if there is a blind curve, go at a speed where you know you can stop or swerve IF someone is crossing the double yellow or there is a giant boulder or gravel just around the corner.

Let's use another example of making up for other people's mistakes: Two of the most common hits are when a driver does an oncoming U-turn without seeing you or pulls out of a driveway, again, without seeing you. The first case is the easiest, as you surely can see someone is about to turn and you have to assume they haven't seen you. Thus, you go slow enough that you can either brake or swerve (of course you know how much space you have around you to swerve, right?). The second case differs in that you might not know even where there is a driveway, as surely if you see a car intending to pull out, you have to assume it will without seeing you. Then you still have to ride slowly enough, and far enough from the curb that even if someone pulls out without you noticing but at the last minute, you can swerve or brake.

That is the golden rule of speed: Don't ride faster than you can foresee, since the future will put you (by inertia) somewhere unknown to you, and it could be a bad place like the grill of a truck, which you didn't see.

Getting distracted is then your worst enemy: you see much less. Maybe you miss that car stopping right in front of you because you're looking at street signs at night. Maybe you see it, too late, and you can't control your bike well enough to make it stop without locking the front wheel. If this happens, you were riding faster than you could see ahead of you, and you didn't know your bike well enough to stop without skidding.

Note that "ahead" not just means "physically in front of you" but also "in the future", like the moment when that car blows a red light without seeing you.

Push the limits, and you risk going over them. Can you avoid accidents AND have fun pushing the limits?

The answer is YES but that's for another post.

How fast is too fast, seriously? Well, how fast can you go AND brake if a kid runs in front of you in a residential area? That speed is close to the speed limit, probably. It could be less, or more, but somewhere there. What about the highway? What about a pristine, straight line, perfect visibility highway, under perfect mechanical conditions and light conditions? Well, that speed is as fast as the bike can go then, assuming you can also foresee where a cop might hide. Then yes, what is stopping you?

I'm not condoning speeding. Officially, I'm not. The point is, if you can't see a cop hiding, you deserve that ticket. The lesson being, it could have been something WORSE which you fail to see and maybe even pay the ultimate price.

Pay attention. Focus. Concentrate. Look ahead (of time and space). Don't go faster. Pretty easy.