When I shouldn’t ride?
Angry, hungover or over-confident. Time to have a quiet word with yourself…
GETTING ON A bike when you’re not in the right frame of mind is foolish. This sounds obvious, but lots of riders do just that and then wonder why they’re riding badly, or even dangerously. One aspect a lot of us ignore is over confidence. If the sun’s shining and everything seems right with the world, beware. Over confidence can take you that little bit further than the point of common sense, particularly on a sportsbike. It’s then that you can start to assume nothing’s going to pull out in front of you, which can end badly. If you feel slightly nervous and apprehensive before getting on your bike, that’s probably about right. There’s no shame in that. In fact, research has shown that’s far better in terms of your performance than being completely chilled – if you’re too relaxed you’re not concentrating hard enough. Then, as your stress (psychologists call it arousal) increases you perform better up to a point where you’re at your peak – you’re focused, alert and slightly nervous, but that’s not detracting from your performance. Your body is relaxed, your brain is working at warp speed and you’re in complete control. This is the state racers try and hold. If you go past that point, the physical symptoms of stress start kicking in and you go into flight or fight mode. This response is incredibly powerful, and it directs blood away from the brain into the muscles, so you really can’t think straight and won’t make good decisions. Some of us will know that feeling of having a near miss and instead of calming down, we ride even faster. It’s because our brains aren’t working properly. The next risk is that after the adrenaline subsides, you’ll get tired very quickly, and again risk making poor decisions. This holds true if you’ve been out the night before and are still feeling secondhand when getting on the bike – not advisable.