F9 truly has no business being this good. Their previous video [1], about hub-center steering, has an absolutely fantastic oner where Ryan gets heckled by not one but two kids on scooters passing by, and still manages to finish the 3 minute take discussing path dependence and fitting a Robert Frost poem into a motorcycle review video. That segment starts around minute 7.

[1]: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JtBgv-SJEQg

Getting a motorcycle license was a very good thing I've done for my life. Cruising on long roads, beautiful views, wild camping and meeting other people in a like-minded community. It really heals your mind and body.

But obviously it comes with higher risk as you are more exposed and higher demands on your abilities. And good gear can help, but if it is not combined with training and of course a sound attitude, you may sooner or later find yourself in an undesirable situation.

Go to refresher courses. I do it every year to update myself and get an idea of my current limits. It really helps.

To see what I meant about attitude, just go on Instagram and check for motorcycle reels, you'll see soo many examples of how to not act in traffic or what to do on a motorcycle.

I've come off two motorbikes in the UK. On the first occasion I wore a leather jacket, on the second I had a synthetic jacket on (because it was more comfortable in hot weather).

Both were completely safe. On both occasions I slid along the tarmac for about 10-15 meters, I was travelling at around 30-40 mph. I still wear the same leather jacket 30 years later (not for riding) but the synthetic jacket was a right-off.

On both occasions I really smacked my head: don't mess about with sub-standard crash helmets.

So even though leather is better, we're not racing the TT, we're just going from A-B and if you want to wear synthetic you'll be fine at normal speeds. So if you can't wear leather, for whatever reason, don't let that stop you.

F9 produces such a consistently and ridiculously good, cool, fun, and educational *social media content*; that it is installed permanently as a cognitive dissonance in the back of my mind.

I love FortNine, they always manage to be both funny and informative at the same time. And the way they do really long takes in their videos is really cool. Even the segment about the sponsors is well integrated into the video.

The first video I saw from them was about the different motorcycle engine types: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOTz0Ol8fLA

One of their latest videos (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpVMsqSW6pk) contained a teaser about a documentary they're going to release in December: around the world in 17 days. Can't wait to see it.

This summer I got into electric scooter riding, and along with that I have been interested in finding appropriate gear for my riding. My go-to so far has been to wear a fairly cheap half helmet that I used to wear longboarding, and a pair of well-padded cycling gloves. Wearing more protection sounds nice, but: at the speeds I'm going < 20 mph / 30 kph, and impact protection (from cars) is more important than sliding to me, and I'd also like things that are easy to get on and off and carry around at my destination.

I've been thinking about getting a nice, full face helmet (helmets marketed for mountain biking seem like a good fit), but they seem like a pain to deal with at my destination. A lot of times I'll just loop my current helmet on my scooter completely unlocked, because it's cheap enough that I'm not really worried about it being stolen. The full face helmets I have been looking at are an order of magnitude more expensive though, and I wouldn't really feel comfortable just leaving it unlocked by my scooter. Does anyone have any recommendations on this? Or recommendations on other appropriate safety gear for my kind of riding?

In my experience, working with plastic surgery offices will certainly impact your desire to get a motorcycle. Wear helmets and gear up, everyone.

Also this is a truly well done video. Entertaining, week executed, witty dialogue.

I was terrified for his head. Great review though, as someone who's been mulling over getting a bike licence and struggling to wrap their head around gear ratings, this was eye opening.

Not only is Ryan good, but he has brought on additional staff who are equally good. Incredibly impressive creator and team.

How far along are developments with natural leather alternatives based on fungi like mycelium or mushrooms?

My understanding is they are not quite there yet, but coming along and looking promising.

Is there a difference between leather performance? Like genuine vs top grain vs full grain? Would a very thin genuine leather still perform better than synthetics?

I am not familiar with textiles in this area, but they don't make bullet proof vests out of leather last I checked... I presume there are good synthetics (better than leather?) out there?

I think that we haven’t reached the insulation to weight ratio of down feathers, so that’d be another example where artificial fabrics haven’t reach some qualities of natural materials.

it does not matter that much. only thing of importance here is that the leather will be still usable whereas the synthetics are "one crash only" type of thing. leather does not breathe either. i am not arguing for one or the other, that is an endless debate, i am merely saying there is no "best". each has its positives and negatives. if i would be riding a sport bike on a track or doing high speed freeway riding, leather is a no-brainer. anything else, synthetics will be more user friendly. also, understand the difference between nylon and polyester. one is tough and rough(ie. cordura), the other is soft and weak. most cheap product use polyester that provides very little protection so they layer it whereas nylon(like cordura) will be much safer choice.

PS: if you crash, for the love of anything holy, do not slide but roll(ie. be active during the event, not passive). it is better to get bruises rather than getting your skin peeled off.

Humorously, I have less than nothing to do with motorcycles but find the sponsor's product relevant. I never knew such a product existed but it makes perfect sense that motorcycle people would create it for those reasons. Kinda expensive though.

A silent upvote does not do this video justice, it is simply amazing.

Wow that slide was much longer than expected. I had always assumed it's good for a second maybe two

FortNine is a hidden gem of a YouTuber. Many of his videos are just showing his passion for riding and interesting facts like "different ways to mount a motorcycle" and are entertaining to watch him climb up the back tire and hop onto the bike. But then some of the videos are actually highly educational and he incorporates tested science and studies and explains why things are they way they are like the science of different leaning styles while riding and their science.

The video that has always stuck with me is when he explained the science behind how motorcycles are hard to gauge their speed and distance and related it to how pigeons see. It showed me that a lot of why drivers have a tendency to pull out and cut off riders is more to do with not being aware that it can be very difficult to calculate the distance and speed of a motorcycle the same as we do with a car. With that knowledge as a rider I have actually changed my driving and really make sure I fully check both directions before pulling out. I also, as a rider, pay attention to side roads and driveways and always assume the car is going to pull out. I have never almost pulled in front of a rider but I can say I have many times avoided cars by riding defensively.

This is one of the few articles where F9 makes statements not supported by any science or experiments. Cow hides are strong, but they were not built for the purpose of protecting people from road rash. I had slides on asphalt at 60 km/h in textile suits (Klim) and I am still wearing that suit as a secondary one, it got stitched back and partly cleaned and it is just fine, it just has the scars to tell the stories. In 20 years on bikes the only leather items I bought are gloves and boots; this is because this is the only option (not talking about MX/enduro boots that are mostly plastic). Never had a problem with textile equipment and never felt the need for leather. Modern Cordura and kevlar layers are fine.

[video]?

The final segment starting at 6:00 makes me think that he can wear as much leather as he wants protecting his body while sliding over asphalt when he's anyway intent on braking with his face and chin.

  “There are many things you can point to as proof that the human is not smart. But my personal favorite would have to be that we needed to invent the helmet. What was happening, apparently, was that we were involved in a lot of activities that were cracking our heads. We chose not to avoid doing those activities but, instead, to come up with some sort of device to help us enjoy our head-cracking lifestyles. And even that didn’t work because not enough people were wearing them so we had to come up with the helmet law. Which is even stupider, the idea behind the helmet law being to preserve a brain whose judgment is so poor, it does not even try to avoid the cracking of the head it’s in.”