Growing up in the computer industry in the ′80s I remember when I got my hands on the first true WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) desktop publishing software. Back then it was a revelation of how direct, unobstructed vision of what you were doing could transform your ability to create art. Similarly, having direct, unobstructed vision on a motorcycle could mean the difference between life and death. It’s interesting to note that virtually all riders from newbies to MotoGP racers struggle with maintaining proper vision in a corner. The reason for this is our eyes evolved over millions of years to deal with potential hazards based on our maximum running speed.
Currently the fastest human alive is Usain Bolt who has been clocked at just over 27 mph in the 100-meter dash. Because we can far exceed that speed on our motorcycles, we need to retrain our eyes to look much farther in front of ourselves than what seems natural. This is the only way to identify potential hazards early enough to deal with them effectively. The main reason for vision being so critical is that you go where you look. You’ve probably heard this before. The reason has to do with our biological makeup.
Although we don’t normally think of ourselves this way, biologically speaking, human beings are predators. As carnivores, specifically, we have binocular vision where our eyes are set close together in the front of our heads. This is optimal for tracking moving prey. In the wild, humans are at the top of the food chain, so this kind of vision helps us. Unfortunately, on the road motorcyclists are at the bottom of the traffic food chain. That means we have to stop seeing like predators, and learn how to start seeing like prey.
Spotlight vs. Floodlight
What you are able to see is based not only on the amount of light available, but also on the types of things upon which you choose to notice. Much like a MAG light with its adjustable beam, we can illuminate a wide area with little detail or a small area with high detail, based on how narrow an area we focus our attention on. Most human beings have no problem spotlighting on things. Unfortunately most of us have lost much of our ability to use our floodlight vision effectively because we no longer have natural predators in the urban jungle.
So humans, like all predators, primarily use spotlight vision. On the motorcycle we call this target fixation. A perfect example of target fixation is a cheetah. Once it has locked its vision on a target such as, say, a gazelle in a herd, it will not stop until it reaches its intended target. In fact, even if a slower or injured gazelle crosses the cheetah’s path, it will literally jump right over it and continue on until it reaches its original target. This is how hard-wired into our DNA this predator vision is. It’s why when we see a pothole or a patch a gravel 30′ in front of us, we often run right into the very thing we’re trying to avoid, even though we know intellectually we should change our line. In other words, target fixation is normal for humans as it has survival value in the wild. Unfortunately, it has the opposite effect in traffic.
In the American education system, much emphasis is placed on discovering life’s details. We use microscopes and telescopes to examine things both near and far. We use computers to analyze the world by breaking it up into micro-sized bits. We have, in essence, been trained to rely on the spotlight and forget about the floodlight. By contrast, prey uses primarily floodlight vision, what a biologist would call “environmental awareness.” They try to always have a sense of where potential predators are (or could be lurking) in their area of influence. We need to be able to use both types of vision. For instance, we use spotlight vision to pick out specific reference points. These include things like corner entry and exit points, and braking points.
Growing up, the only floodlight-type training I received was in driver’s education class. Some of you might remember the Smith Driving System developed in the 1950s. In that system, one of the tenets of good driving was to “get the big picture.” Actually, Smith was right on the money. Using your vision as a floodlight slows down your “sense of speed” and allows you to be aware of more potential hazards and opportunities.
Sense of Speed
It’s important to make a distinction between your actual speed and your perceived sense of speed. Your mind can play tricks on you when you rely on your spotlight vision while operating a moving vehicle. For instance, if you look at the ground directly beneath you while riding at even moderate speeds, it can seem like you’re moving crazy-fast. If you then change your focus and look at the mountains in the background, it feels like you’re barely moving at all, even though your actual speed hasn’t changed.
When you’re riding over your head, you develop a similar sense that things are moving too fast. This occurs when you narrow your perspective to the spotlight view. The solution is to widen your perspective to the floodlight view because the bigger the viewing area, the slower things seem to move.
Widening your viewing area certainly takes practice, but the farther ahead you look in a turn, the better chance you’ll have to make an evasive maneuver and avoid a crash. Remember, what you see is what you get.
Lee Parks has been riding and racing motorcycles since 1982, and won a WERA National Endurance Championship in 2001. He is one of the top motorcycle safety experts in the world and testifies in motorcycle personal injury cases through his motorcycle forensics firm www.compasskinetics.com Mr. Parks is also the president of Total Control Training, the largest independent motorcycle training company in the North America with over 500,000 students trained since 1999. It is based on his best-selling book Total Control. Additionally, he is the president of Lee Parks Design, an American-made motorcycle glove manufacturer.