My older brother loved motorcycles. When I was seven years old he turned 16 and bought his first motorcycle – a Honda 305cc. It seemed like an enormous machine (even though it wasn’t). He liked to tinker with it. I remember him removing the caps on the front forks. He removed the first cap without a problem, not knowing that the two caps held the forks together. As he removed the second cap, the fork assembly exploded upwards as the powerful springs in the two forks instantly expanded. The rocketing fork assembly put a hole in our garage ceiling. Fortunately my brother wasn’t bending over the forks when they exploded.
As my brother got older he bought newer, larger motorcycles. Once when he was riding his Yamaha 360cc he tried passing a vehicle that was pulling a flatbed trailer. As my brother pulled out to the left and overtook the trailer, the vehicle pulling the trailer turned left. My brother had no time to react, so he laid the bike down and slid underneath the trailer while it turned left in front of him. Fortunately none of the trailer’s wheels ran over him.
Notwithstanding his near misses, after a few years he sparked a motorcycle interest in me. First I bought a Honda 90cc and then a Yamaha 250cc Enduro. I had some near misses too, but I always wore a helmet and was fortunately never seriously hurt. I sold my Yamaha 250cc in 1978 – and I have only ridden motorcycles occasionally since then.
About 10 years ago my brother invited me to meet him at Sundance, Utah, where the annual Sundance film festival is held. He put me on his big BMW bike; it had a boxer engine. I’d never been on a bike that large. He gave me no instructions on how to drive it. He and I and one of his friends took off on a long ride along a two lane mountain highway. The faring on my bike kept the wind down and the bike was so heavy that it felt like I was floating on air, skimming along the top of the highway. It was a wonderful feeling, unlike anything I’d ever experienced. After a while my brother took a 90 degree right hand turn followed by a quick left turn. I followed him into the right hand turn with no problem, but when I tried to turn left the bike didn’t respond (I knew nothing about counter-steering). I came to the edge of the road, looked over the embankment and saw a barbed wire fence at the bottom. I instantly recognized that if I didn’t get the bike to respond I’d be sliced to ribbons when I rode through that barbed wire fence. Fortunately, at the last moment I got the bike to respond and avoided going over the embankment. I immediately started manipulating the bike to see how I could better control it. I stumbled onto counter-steering – when I pushed down on the left handlebar, the bike turned left. After discovering counter-steering, things went fine. We had a marvellous ride that day.
Since that ride I’ve mediated a number of personal injury cases involving motor vehicles. Doing this kind of work changes your perspective. Last week I was on a city street when a big red motorcycle raced up behind me, splitting the lanes. It took the front spot at the intersection waiting for the light to change. This street bike was in pristine condition, with a large rear tire and a much smaller front tire. The rider seemed comfortable and completely absorbed in his riding. For the first time ever, I looked at that bike and thought “There’s a five- million dollar package driving down the road.” If that motorcycle rider ran into trouble or got hit by a car, the value of the personal injury case wouldn’t have anything to do with the replacement cost of the motorcycle, and would only have little to do with missed days of work. The real value of the case would be based on the marvellous medical procedures available to patch up this rider – along with the cost of future medical and related care, pain and suffering. That’s where the costs – and the money – would be.
So these days, like most of us, I see the world differently in part because I now know what happens and what may can happen to a motorcyclist that runs into trouble. Back in the days of teenage motorcycle freedom I could have never anticipated this kind of a motorcycle perspective. But with a substantial numbers of years under my belt and a wealth of life and legal experience, things look different.
After 30 years of litigating cases Robert Jacobs signed up as a neutral with Judicate West. He serves as a mediator and arbitrator in personal injury, employment, business, real estate, construction and trust litigation cases. Reach him at [email protected]