Story by Quinn Redeker | Photos by Justin W. Coffey
Today we are going to discuss the fun and exciting world of flat tires, but we’re going to approach it a bit differently than most articles and videos you might have perused on the subject. See, many discussions related to flat tires begin at the end, when you are safely on the side of the road and the flat tire is already upon you.
I’ve suffered many flat tires while riding, racing, working, and training, and I can tell you there is a mammoth difference between having a flat tire and being in the throes of getting one as you bebop down to Electric Avenue. It’s like the difference between sitting on the tailgate of your buddy’s truck with a freshly chilled Fresca 10 minutes after finishing a marathon; far less eventful than the fear and loathing that took place moments before you tripped past the finish line just shy of your PR. We want to formulate an action plan for that traumatic portion where our feet are still moving.
First off, not all flat tires are created equal. Some are slow leaks, some are blowouts, and some are in between. More importantly, some involve your front tire, and some involve the rear. Not to mention some happen in your driveway and others while battling on a busy interstate. In other words, a flat is not a flat is not a flat. So today I’m going to present you with a few different flat-tire scenarios in the hope that they contribute to your making safer decisions when they inevitably come upon you.
No, I can’t predict and address every eventuality, nor the “best practices” for the flat tire you will encounter next fall because you bought some low hour racetrack “take-offs” on Facebook Marketplace. However, if we can get your mental engine turning just a few rpm quicker, that’s a win.
While a slow-leaking rear tire will result in a flat tire at some point, we will still have plenty of time and adequate bike control to safely figure things out. The key here is to recognize that it’s happening so we can address it. Do you have a tire pressure monitoring system (TPMS) on your motorcycle? If so, it will throw out a warning which will both alert you and provide specific PSI details to help provide a time window to handle things.
In this case, treat it like a fire alarm at your local Denny’s restaurant; take one last bite of your eggs benedict, calmly exit the building in an orderly fashion, and stand by. Simple. Without TPMS, the warning will be a bit later in the scenario and present itself as rear-wheel “wallow” when you execute a turning movement or will cause the rear end to wander as if you were in sand. Still, remember we have a little time, so just stay calm and be thoughtful about moving yourself to a place of safety from which to sort out your flat.
These are trickier because they come on quickly, forcing us to get a plan together sooner than later. TPMS or not, I usually don’t count on having more than a half mile or so before I will experience significant wallow in the rear end, making direction changes and general bike control exponentially more dangerous. I take this short window of time to get off the freeway, off the roadway, or stop in a safe place. I’m looking for shelter (if possible) and minimal traffic if I can find it.
If this happens to you, focus on smooth, minimal throttle, brake, and steering inputs and subtle direction changes, making sure to shift your body weight forward. Also, stay off the rear brake! Count on having just enough time to execute a hasty plan and that’s about it. The longer you continue down the road, the more likely the tire will peel off the bead and significantly ratchet up the risk of continuing.
This little unicorn comes on like a sledgehammer and immediately feels like the back half of your motorcycle just fell into deep sand and can no longer decide where to go. You will immediately lose directional precision and control and must generate minimal inputs in brakes (staying off the rear brake altogether), steering, throttle, and lean angles. If you are on a straight stretch of country road when this happens, buy yourself a lottery ticket because all you have to do is ease off throttle, gently apply some front brake, shift your body forward to unweight the rear end, pull over, and stop.
Sure, the rear tire might come off the bead and generate a rear-wheel lock up at some point, but if we stay out of aggressive lean angles and steering inputs as we slow, we should be able to ride it out. If this happens while you are on a freeway, the intensity ratchets up a few notches because we typically won’t have the ability to navigate over multiple lanes of rapidly moving traffic and grab an exit. Again, we will have minimal steering input and lean angle to work with, so getting out of the traffic lanes is probably the best we can hope for. Which side of the roadway you choose will depend on which roadway edge you are nearest when the gods start their betting pool on you.
Now let’s look at front-tire flats, because there are some massive differences. First, while sorting out a punctured rear tire at speed is not fun or safe, most riders have the requisite ability to pull it off in a pinch, because they still have consistent steering control at the handlebars due to a fully functioning front tire. But a front-tire flat severely compromises this component of safely controlling a motorcycle no matter how fast the tire is deflating. That means we should consider any front-tire leak, fast or slow, to be an emergency that demands we stop the motorcycle.
Over the years I’ve had everything from a slow front-tire leak to a full and complete blowout. The blowout caused the front tire to abruptly peel off the rim and lock up in between my fork legs, sending me over the bars in the process, but even the slower leaks generated rapidly deteriorating conditions with each passing second. With tire wall flex, heavy steering, and loose wheel tracking, I lost directional control, balance, and overall stability in short order. The takeaway? Execute the following sequence posthaste: Shift your weight towards the rear of the motorcycle to help keep the front-end light, stay off the front brake so you don’t spin the tire off the bead (this has lots of bad eventualities), gently roll off throttle (avoid chopping off the throttle), and keep your steering inputs to a minimum. Is it scary? Absolutely. But if you act at the first sign of a front-tire puncture, chances are things will work out in your favor.
Now, in order for any of this stuff to matter, we need to spend some time on our rides thinking about it. That means as we ride around in our day-to-day, we must ask ourselves what we would do in the various tire-failure situations I’ve presented. Since the solution set for a slow-leaking front tire in your driveway is not the same as a rear wheel blowout on the freeway, there is plenty of mind-bending math for us to do.
Will it be hard and frustrating to drill on it regularly? Sure, but we didn’t decide to ride motorcycles because it was the simpler, safer option. So get to work.