As motorcyclists, we wear our heads on swivels, as at every twist and bend, there’s a new danger that could put us in harm’s way. There’s gravel midway through a corner that’s just out of eyesight, a Tesla on autopilot with its owner staring directly at their phone without their hands on the wheel, truck drivers who’ve been on a long-haul trek and haven’t pulled over to sleep, and countless other potentialities that could soon end our riding careers. Or even our lives.
So as riders, we scan not just two or three cars ahead, as is drilled into car drivers going through driver’s education, but rather 15 to 20 cars up. We watch like hawks, we turn our entire heads through corners, and we try and guess what the chaos up ahead will be like as we move through traffic. It becomes instinctual, almost second nature, and this behavior moves with us even while we’re driving cars.
Yet, despite all that, the world is inherently unpredictable. You could be following the rules of the road, paying expert-level attention to your world around you, and ensuring that you’re using best motorcycling practices—and you could still find yourself on the wrong side of a car driver who wasn’t paying attention. They could also just decide that they aren’t going to follow the law and run a red light. This was the case with Jacob Groover, who, despite the police finding he was likely the most cautious motorcycle rider who’s ever entered an intersection, still found himself being struck by a driver who ran a red light in their car.
