Adventure Bike Rider

I was speaking to a guy the other day who owns 70 Yam XT's – a combination of R's and Z's. He also owns70 barkbuster guards which are lying idle in one of his sheds. And here's why.

The guy has been running off-road and gravel road tours in Namibia for the past 20 years and in that time has experienced just about every accident it's possible to have many times over and has decided that it's far safer to ride without guards.

The accident which convinced him to strip the guards off the bikes happened to an experienced enduro rider who's hand slipped off the throttle and between the guard and the bar; the bike went one way and he went the other, the result was his hand hanging by a strip of skin and a couple of veins.

He was only travelling at about 15mph at the time and was the last of many such (not as serious) accidents involving handguards. As Ralph the owner of the bikes told me; better to have busted knuckles than a severed hand.

Tricky one....

I feel that guy was very unlucky. Sounds like a one in a million accident but alas, it still happens.

I'm one of those who's had his hand saved a fair few times by good solid hand guards (Rally pro, barkbusters etc). I've been clipped by cars a few times. They glanced off instead of catching my handlebar. lucky ??

I've got a large rock shaped crack/hole in one of my old Acerbis guard from a spat up rock from a truck in Colombia. I'm sure it would of broken by hand. My headlamp didn't fare as well lol.

I've lost count of how many brake/clutch levers I've saved too. But sure, they're replaceable.

'Brush' guards are perhaps a good compromise. They save your bike becoming tangled on undergrowth and and keep the weather off without being solidly attached to the end of the bar. Like the stock ones on my 955 Tiger.

I guess you make your own decision based on how n' where you ride...

*Touring Ted* wrote:


+1

This reminds me of the Motorcycle Trials & Scrambles scene in the 70's. Nearly everybody used Dunlop Industrial Wellington Boots with the shin & ankle reinforcements & "STEEL TOECAPS" (ToeTectors).

Apparently somebody had their foot crushed in a pair & the steel toecap collapsed & cut the guy's toes off.(Must have had an argument with a stem roller)
How true this was I don't know but everybody carried on using them & Steel Toecaps seem to form part of the current Industrial Boot Standards.

I think like all protective devices there are exceptions, but they probably save more injuries than they are alledged to have caused.

These are my winter trail wellies.
Dunlop Purofort.
Stainless Steel Toecaps & Inner Soles
Insulated down to -20 degrees
= DRY, WARM Safe Feet. (SUZUKI colour co-ordinated.


Brian.

picos mestizo wrote:

Was that you at Chiltern then? someone had yellow wellies on.

You got me Itchy.
I do have some serious MX boots. But believe me these are better & they do come in other colours. The forces alpine troops use the white ones with blue soles.
At least they're a conversation piece - "Who's the old prat in the yellow boots"

I can remember back in the 70's (as a wee bairn honest) when Jimmy Saville did his "Clunk Click before every trip" campaign as it became mandatory to wear a seatbelt while travelling in the FRONT of cars....the naysayers were out in force then too, citing miracle escape stories of when mighty oak trees landed on cars in stormy weather and the occupants were only able to escape as they weren't wearing seatbelts

Thats got to be a 1 in a 1,000,000 accident.

On the other hand, The number of trees that I have twatted whilst riding, and hand guards have saved me....I'm on the other side of the fence.

It hurts like hell when you hit a gatepost without guards on too
Read somewhere about hard knuckle protectors in gloves were some guy hit his hand so hard the protector compressed so much it severed his fingers.
I have been lucky i guess as i have done the full half pike and triple forward roll over the bars a couple of times but ejected cleanly the above scenario dont bear thinking about

Ive heard loads of horror stories about rap around hand guards when I was into motocross, so there must be something in it.
But like everything you have to way up the risk of something happening to the chances of something happening.

I like rap around guards because they protect my levers in silly falls. Nothing worse than cutting a day short because you bike fell over.

At least loosing a hand is a good reason to cut the day short.

Think on balance I will stick with mine as I too have had a fair few whacks from trees and a 4x4 in one instance. Same could be said for screens off road, I saw one contact the bridge of a guys nose thru his mx style helmet, luckily just a bit of blood and black eyes but could of been yucky.

Since my accident in December I now ride off road with knee braces and to be honest i'm getting fed up hearing "oh but now you'll just transmit the force elsewhere and break your femur"

But you know I can't find any evidence where this has happened, I suspect again it's a case of it's happened once and suddenly it's an urban myth. Of course if it did happen, there's no reason to know if they would have broken their femur anyway without a brace?

Although I accept that in the handguard incident it would seem to be the cause. I once dislocated two fingers punching a tree whilst riding, so personally i'll stick with mine.

as an experienced ex-motox rider, whenever ive come off, the first and best thing to do is part company with the bike big styley, an accident is totally unique and every one is slightly different, this guy was very unfortunate to get caught up with the bike :-/ i feel for him.
our hobby is risky shit, but thats why we do it, adrenalineeeeeeeee

I snapped the end off a finger (literally came right off and was just held on by a flap of skin) when I got caught up in my hand guards. I did this on my 2 stroke gas gas enduro bike.

I now use 'flag' type hand guards on my little proper dirt bikes that I do more technical riding on, but still use aluminium wrap around guards on my xr650r as I like the protection to the bike and my hands when the heavier bike goes down.

We ride dirt bikes off road. It's dangerous. You may well get hurt.

As a result I ride wearing good body armour, knee braces, a back protector, a neck brace, a good helmet and I always keep my goggles on as I'm particularly fond of being able to see. I've seen as many people hospitalise themselves and having really bad injuries in something and nothing situations at a couple of miles an hour as I have in fast crashes. You're as likely to hurt yourself on a 'gentle' trail ride as you are racing an enduro. I think riding big bikes off road opens you upto the possibility of getting really hurt really easily just by having the bike land on you, something that isn't as much of an issue with dirt bikes

What I do feel is that the legs are more vulnerable to serious injuries that take a long time to heel (and cause long term problems) compared to the arms. Knee ligament damage, spiral and multiple compound fractures, broken femur. All really nasty.
If you look at professional riders they pretty much all use top spec highly protective MX boots and rigid hinged knee braces that pretty much protect your leg upto Half way up the thigh. BUT hardly any of them wear upper body armour (apart from neck brace and helmet, I bet if someone created an effective shoulder/collarbone protector they would use them)

I got a bit off track there, sorry!

I have to thanks my hand guards for their recent altruistic offering ...

Seriously ... who puts a dry-stone wall that close to a VERY muddy trail ?? #