Use BOTH brakes...

[peanut]

So I've had my bike for 2 months now with only 1 close call. It happened last week riding to work. I was coming to a 2 way stop intersection. A 2 lane road (1 lane each direction) crosses a 2 lane (1 in each direction with a turn lane) road. I as turning from the turn lane of the 2 lane w/ turn lane onto the 2 lane, which also happens to be the parking lot of my work.

It's a 55 MPH road and semi's use it all the time since its by a chemical plant and 2 refineries, but its really not bad. Actually its almost a luxurious stretch of road! Anyway....

I was in the turn lane to go left while a pickup was on the 2 lane and wanted to turn left across me. Well either he thought I would take the turn faster or didn't want to wait for the semi that was coming from the other direction, he started coming. My reaction was good and I slammed on the back brake and eased on the front... you experienced riders probably see this coming now... My back tired started coming around and he ended up coming through the lane and stopped just before the turn lane, so I let off the back and straigtened out and got to work fine.

A fellow rider was out smoking and told me that I actually smoked my back tire! I guess I locked it up, right? The saving grace was I put engine bars on a couple weeks ago and slammed on the foot brake to make sure there the bars wouldn't interfere, so I knew the back tire would come around like that. She also said that she only uses the front brake. It's been a few years since I took the MSRC here, but isn't that unsafe?

Moral of the story: Both brakes together and equally
Possible Moral: Extra underwear in the saddle bags is OK :biggrin: