Riding Motorcycles is GOOD for you

[Freebird]

Sent to me by an old friend from the MTA. I think that man of us knew this though.

 

"Riding a motorcycle every day might actually keep your brain functioning at peak condition, or so says a study conducted by the University of Tokyo. The study demonstrated that riders between the age of 40 and 50 were shown to improve their levels of cognitive functioning, compared to a control group, after riding their motorcycles daily to their workplace for a mere two months.

Scientists believe that the extra concentration needed to successfully operate a motorcycle can contribute to higher general levels of brain function, and it’s that increase in activity that’s surely a contributing factor to the appeal of the motorcycles as transportation. It’s the way a ride on a bike turns the simplest journey into a challenge to the senses that sets the motorcyclist apart from the everyday commuter. While the typical car-owning motorist is just transporting him or her self from point A to point B, the motorcyclist is actually transported into an entirely different state of consciousness .

 

Riding a motorcycle is all about entrance into an exclusive club where the journey actually is the destination.

 

Dr Ryuta Kawashima, author of Dr Kawashima’s Brain Training: How Old Is Your Brain, reported the outcome of his study of “The relationship between motorcycle riding and the human mind.”

 

Kawashima’s experiments involved current riders who currently rode motorcycles on a regular basis (the average age of the riders was 45) and ex-riders who once rode regularly but had not taken a ride for 10 years or more. Kawashima asked the participants to ride on courses in different conditions while he recorded their brain activities. The eight courses included a series of curves, poor road conditions, steep hills, hair-pin turns and a variety of other challenges.

 

What did he find? After an analysis of the data, Kawashima found that the current riders and ex-riders used their brain in radically different ways. When the current riders rode motorcycles, specific segments of their brains (the right hemisphere of the prefrontal lobe) was activated and riders demonstrated a higher level of concentration.

 

His next experiment was a test of how making a habit of riding a motorcycle affects the brain.

 

Trial subjects were otherwise healthy people who had not ridden for 10 years or more. Over the course of a couple of months, those riders used a motorcycle for their daily commute and in other everyday situations while Dr Kawashima and his team studied how their brains and mental health changed. The upshot was that the use of motorcycles in everyday life improved cognitive faculties, particularly those that relate to memory and spatial reasoning capacity. An added benefit? Participants revealed on questionnaires they filled out at the end of the study that their stress levels had been reduced and their mental state changed for the better.

 

So why motorcycles? Shouldn’t driving a car should have the same effect as riding a motorcycle?

 

“There were many studies done on driving cars in the past,” Kawashima said. “A car is a comfortable machine which does not activate our brains. It only happens when going across a railway crossing or when a person jumps in front of us. By using motorcycles more in our life, we can have positive effects on our brains and minds”.

 

Yamaha participated in a second joint research project on the subject of the relationship between motorcycle riding and brain stimulation with Kawashima Laboratory at the Department of Functional Brain Imaging, Institute of Development, Aging and Cancer at Tohoku University.

 

The project began in September 2009 and ran until December 2010, and the focus of the research was on measurement and analysis of the cause and effect relationship involved in the operation of various types of vehicles and brain stimulation. The study measured changes in such stimulation over time by means of data gathered from a long-term mass survey.

 

The reason for Yamaha Motor’s participation in this project is pretty obvious and not a little self-serving, but further research into the relationship between motorcycle riding and brain stimulation as it relates to the “Smart Aging Society” will certainly provide some interesting results. The second research project was divided into two time periods throughout 2009 and 2010 compared differences in the conditions of brain stimulation as they related to the type of vehicle and driving conditions. A second set of tests measuring the changes in brain stimulation over time involved a larger subject group.

 

Yamaha Motors provided vehicles for the research and made its test tracks and courses available for the study. What the study revealed is that what you’re thinking about while you’re riding – and your experience on the bike - changes the physical structure of your brain.

 

Author Sharon Begley concurs with Kawashima’s findings. In her tome, Train Your Mind – Change Your Brain, Begley found much the same outcomes. “The brain devotes more cortical real estate to functions that its owner uses more frequently and shrinks the space devoted to activities rarely performed,” Begley wrote. “That’s why the brains of violinists devote more space to the region that controls the digits of the fingering hand.”

 

Source: http://www.motorcycleinsurance.com/this-is-your-brain-on-a-motorcycle/

 

[Squidley]

Well DUH!!!

[buddy]

Tokyo come to Oklahoma

see how we deal with those Texans

[deepforkriver]

:sign yeah that:

[Rick Butler]

Yeah Don,

 

This is a little too deep for me? I came across a similar article several year ago that explained why we ride, which I have kept around for moments like this:

 

Why We Ride:

The Joy of Motorcycling

By Stephen M. John

 

What is the allure of motorcycling? One lifelong devotee attempts to explain the inexplicable . . .

 

What attracts people to motorcycling? When faced with the numerous personalities of both riders and motorcycles, there may not be a single answer. Despite the differences between touring rider and hill climber, chrome-encrusted cruiser and nimble Grand Prix race bike, there are some universal attributes that get under the skin of the motorcyclist and feed the desire to ride.

 

Freedom is often cited as an attraction, but what does this mean? Compared to driving a car, riding a motorcycle offers freedom from the constraints of four-wheeled physics. When a car negotiates a turn, it leans to the outside of a corner, struggling to maintain its former direction of travel. A motorcycle leans into a corner.

 

This may not sound like much, but until you've experienced both you can't understand the superior grace and simplicity of this mode of travel. Cornering becomes a symphony of precise movements instead of an awkward wallow, working in harmony with the road instead of fighting it tooth and nail.

 

The Sense(s) of Freedom

Once freed of your steel cage you are thrust into the world to experience a broader existence unfettered by HEPA filters and climate control. Your nose will get a vivid introduction to skunk roadkill and diesel exhaust, but will also revel in bread baking and plants blooming. Your body will feel the thousand tiny impacts of raindrops and absorb the buffeting of the wind. Your skin will feel the gently warming temperature as you crest a hill and drop to the valley floor below. You are no longer huddled behind a wheel disconnected from nature. It's Lawrence of Arabia in Cinerama versus a daguerreotype of a camel.

 

Wrap all of this freedom in a lovely ribbon of performance, and you get what experts call fun. Not the fake hood scoop, chrome wheels and racing stripe school of performance. Picture instead a carrier launch and you'll be in the right neighborhood, and you don't even have to pledge seven years of service. Best of all, this astounding performance is dirt cheap. For less than half the cost of most commuter pods you can buy a stock motorcycle capable of 9-second quarter miles.

 

Don't bother figuring the cost for a production car with matching performance, because you won't find one. AMG teamed with Mercedes to make the CLK-GTR capable of a 9.4 second quarter mile, and it's a steal at a measly $1,000,000. Performance cars do have the edge in aerodynamics and top speed, but to use them you'll need lottery winnings and the Autobahn.

 

All of this freedom and fun doesn't come without a price. First of all, you have to learn how to ride. Given the right training and the right attitude, the skills can be acquired by just about anyone. Want proof? One of my first forays was on my dad's 1975 Honda CB125S, a ride so mild it's hard to believe it could burn gasoline.I was so overwhelmed I couldn't remember how to stop, and ended up using a conveniently located pickup to do the job. Fortunately the Motorcycle Safety Foundation runs well-organized classes where you can safely learn motorcycling in a pickup-free environment.

 

Motorcycles? Practical?

What about practicality? Over the years I've carried a turkey, two-by-fours, a dozen roses, crutches and a bookcase on a motorcycle, but even I haven't tried transporting an infant or a major appliance. But how often do you really use the cargo capacity of a four-wheeler? Not often, judging by the throngs of single-occupant vehicles choking the roadway, wasting gas and time hauling around a sluggish, three-quarter-empty steel box.

 

Finally, there's the favorite of mothers and fathers everywhere: danger. On a motorcycle you are more vulnerable and you'd better accept that fact and ride accordingly. I always ride as if I am invisible to the sea of cars around me, because all too often it's true. I wear a helmet, jacket, boots and gloves regardless of the temperature or length of the ride. You might think it's a hassle just to reach the corner store, and it does take more time than slipping on a seat belt. For me it is an important ritual, a reminder I am about to engage in an activity with a fair amount of personal risk. Donning my helmet triggers a pre-recorded message telling me I better be alert if I don't want to end up as a hood ornament.

 

Risk is inherent in motorcycling, but it can be managed and turned into an advantage, one that I think is the real long-term attraction of riding. A new rider must first gain experience, since at first everything you have is spent just keeping upright. Gradually shifting gears and scanning for Dozy Joe Auto blowing through a stop sign takes less effort, as your brain adjusts to a new sensory plateau.

 

Engaging the World Around You

While motorcycling you are still fully engaged with the outside world, but the rest of your brain is free to explore paths otherwise unavailable. With your mind free of rigid supervision and self-awareness, all sorts of problems get solved in the background and tension evaporates. Exactly the opposite happens in an automobile. Driving makes so few demands on our minds and bodies we go on autopilot. How many times have you driven to a familiar location, and arrived only to realize you don't remember large parts of the journey?

 

Need another rationalization regarding the two-wheeled wonder? Motorcycling is a resounding social plus: reduced traffic and parking congestion, better fuel economy and fewer noxious emissions. Motorcycle ownership should be a Green party litmus test. Sadly, these benefits are lost on the majority of Americans, whose opinion of motorcycles seems to have been forged solely by watching Marlon Brando tear up a small town in The Wild One. This shared sense of being outcast and knowledge of how much fun we're having leads to a sense of community among riders. Have you ever seen two automobile drivers wave to each other because they were driving? For me, waving to a fellow rider is nearly a daily occurrence. The horror, the horror.

 

Freedom, fun, a clear mind and a clear conscience. These are all powerful reasons for staying in the saddle. But an even simpler truth about motorcycling keeps me coming back for more: I always feel better after a ride than I did before.

[Mike G in SC]

Does this just apply to metrics?

[Condor]

I knew that.... But there's still no help for those under 25 as they are already brain dead.... and it has the reverse effect....