just a thing I try to do in my head, but if I'm feeling confident and actually riding the bike a bit I like windy back roads, but - there are a lot of driveways and trees blocking views through corners - so, in my mind if I can't actually see where I would stop 100 percent of the time, I'm going too fast. for me, this makes corners a bit of a technical effort, and you really don't change that much how you ride doing this, but going around corners, depending on visibility - I'm going to start letting off throttle if I can't really see enough pavement where I could stop easily. maybe it just times the corner a bit different for when you throttle through the corner, and as the visibility opens up, it is timed with the visibility more so than the speed and how hard you are cornering, for me anyway. the limiting factor on how fast I can go, other than the speed limit, is visibility, which is way slower than I could ride say on a track - strangely on back roads around here, this sets the pace right around 10 mph over the speed limit, which is fun, but you're not likely to get a ticket. Once you kind of just know the road, you can pace it with the MPH and just ride it, and as long as you remember the tighter corners or the ones you can't very well around, you don't really need to think very much, just tune out and ride, don't have to think about controls or whatever, it just becomes involuntary and you forget the bike is there, you're flying. You don't have to go a million miles an hour to enjoy that feeling.
I don't know if this is true - or if I just do this, but cornering to the left is a bit safer than cornering to the right as far as I can tell, but never asked if anyone else does this. I figure if I skid out on sand or take a corner a bit wide, turning left I'm going to maybe run out onto the dirt shoulder a bit - and the risk is a granite mailbox or maybe a tree depending on how messed up whatever happens is, but - there's less obstacles there than - what could happen if you skid out turning right and there happes to be traffic as you skid out into the other lane, and there's no shoulder to the road over that line - so, I think a couple years back when I was learning I passed an auto turning right kind of at a fair pace, safe - but, since then that car or truck you can't see - drop at the wrong time and there's nothing anyone really can do. If my memory serves me correctly though - accidents are more common from going too fast and too wide and hitting the shoulder - so, maybe that evens it out - but for whatever reason, maybe I just feel better about cornering left because in a wooded area the visibility is better turning that way.
a bug in an open face helmet is more dangerous than you might expect if you drive through a swarm of something or other. amazingly I've never dropped my bike, came close in my garage once, but the closest I feel was getting a few very active flies in my helmet and kind of panicking a bit as I pulled over to stop and take my helmet off, and it was on kind of an uphill, so - I moved back a good 3 feet when I pulled my helmet off, my feet were on the ground, not the foot brake, and it wasn't that close, but - some guys were a ways behind me and slowed down and were like, hey buddy are you good? just cause it looked real bad I'm sure and I've found and appreciate there are a lot of people out there like that who also probably ride, cars are dangerous, but - not quite every last one is out to get you.
hold your mouth closed around dusk riding with an open face helmet or anywhere by a road that follows a river. they sting a bit at 40 or so, but will just stick right in your teeth if they hit just right.
ear plugs are good - don't need them, just like the volume down a bit, makes riding better to me.