"Riders of supersport motorcycles have a death rate that's three times as high as the overall average for motorbikes,..."

...

"...Rates for other motorcycles were much lower. Cruisers and standards had a death rate of 5.7 per 10,000 bikes in 2005. The rate for touring motorcycles was 5.3 per 10,000...."

http://money.cnn.com/2007/09/11/auto...fety/index.htm

I find this "interesting" because it's commonly quoted as "fact" that cruiser riders have the highest death rate.

 

It's interesting that this article said nothing about age, I believe that age plays a big role in what you own and how you ride it.

 

Like most statistics, it's all in how you spin it. You'll probably find there are far more cruiser riders than crotch rocket riders, so the actual numbers of deaths is higher. Your quotation is probably the better stat as it is per fixed number of riders. An even more accurate number would be per so many miles ridden. That could go either way, you could say cruisers are ridden longer because they are more comfortable, or that the numbers are skewed by the $20K and 20 mile riders.

 

We have far more sports bikes in the UK than cruisers and there is a large amount of deaths amongst the born again bikers. They had one in their youth then get to their 40's & 50's and think they can just jump back on one and ride the same as they did years ago.

On average at least one middle aged sports biker gets killed in our area at least once a week. I had a break from bikes for quite some time but went to Riders Edge for a back to bikes course before owning my Harley and they taught mequite a lotof techniques for safe riding.

 

very good point.

a cruiser sitting in a garageprobably doesn't cause too many deaths per year.

of course i see harleys riding in inclement weather, but from what i've witnessed, i see a LOT more sportbikers out in the rain and cold than harley riders.

but it could be that there are just more sportbikes where i live, i really don't know...

i guess what i'm saying is that the numbers don't mean squat since we don't know all the variables.

 

There ya go....put your armor on and your helmet then go rip'em up doin 100+ and throw in a wheelie for good measure....there goes the argument for a helmet law.....there shoul be an Idiot Law. If youre an idiotwho is caught ridin or drivin recklessly, youre done.....

 

It's mostly young guys that ride sportbikes. If you banned sportbikes from the market these guys would find another type of bike to kill themselves on. The sportbikes are perfectly safe bikes, it's the riders that are unsafe.

 

At least someone is starting to parse the numbers and recognize some basic reality. We all know there are more deaths caused by the young and reckless, regardless of bike type. It's really the same with cars. An 18 year old can kill themselves pretty effectively in a Minivan as well as an Eclipse. It's just that the Eclipse has enough power and speed to be a more reliable death machine.