Hello all, my name is Ken and I have been riding since I started riding trail bikes when I was eight years old. I'm now 48. I've had friends die on their bikes and I have had friends paralyzed for life on their bikes, almost all caused by someone else's negligence. I never thought it would happen to me. I had almost 40 years experience and always watched for the unexpected while riding. I owned all types and makes of bikes in my forty years, but never was able to afford a Harley, until one day I came across a sweet deal on a 88 Sportster. It was all chromed out and a dream bike for me. I borrowed the 3500 dollars from my employer to get it. Three months later, in April of 07, my fiancee and I had been riding all day, just enjoying the open road. Around five o'clock, she had to go home to get ready for work. I decided to take one more quick ride before I put the bike up for the day. I was kicked back in the seat riding down this country road where I live, doing 30mph, listening to the rumble of my Harley. I was heading toward a 45 degree curve and I saw an SUV coming across the ridge flying, but assumed that he would slow down before he got to the curve. I slowed to 25mph and hugged the right edge of the road going into the curve, giving the guy I knew was coming, plenty of room. When I went into the curve, I lost sight of him for a few seconds. In the middle of the curve, I saw him again and he hadn't slowed any. He was in my lane sliding sideways, heading right for me. The last thing I remembered was the second before impact. I woke up the next day in intensive care at UK hospital in Lexington Ky, with my left leg nearly severed, broken ribs, cracked pelvic and a punctured lung, and in the most intense pain I had ever had in my life. I found out later that they had AirCared me to the hospital after I was hit. They said that I was thrown through the windshield of my bike, and slid across the ground for twenty feet before I stopped. The SUV drug my bike for 66 feet according to the police reports. They estimated him at doing between 50 and 60mph, in a 25mph curve. When asked why he hit me, he told the cops that he was talking on the phone and dropped it on the floorboard. He was bent over trying to find it and when he looked back up, there I was. In Ky, we have the no fault law, which means that if the cop doesn't see the wreck, then nobody gets charged with anything, even though it is clearly somebody's fault, like it was his. The guy was underinsured, and didn't have enough insurance to pay even a quarter of my 200,000 dollar plus, hospital bills. I was in the hospital for two months, while they did four operations on my leg. They cut a stomach muscle out of my abdomen to fill in the huge hole left in my leg. They saved my leg, but it never fully healed. I walk with a noticeable limp and it hurts daily. My leg and my stomach are deformed now, but I consider myself really lucky. I have my life and I still have my leg, even though it is crippled. And I can still ride. It took me over a year to recover where I could start limping without crutches. After leaving the hospital, I was bedridden for a few months. I wanted to ride so damn bad, but couldn't at the time. I started writing about riding and that helped take my mind away from the pain and isolation I was feeling. At least I could ride inside my own mind, something that nobody could take away from me, like the guy took from me the day he plowed me down. After almost two years of scraping to get by financially, I finally got approved for disability last week. The writing I did while recovering, ended up being a book and my fiancee encouraged me to send it off to somebody. I did, and the book got published last fall, called 'Thundering Hearts:The Razor's Edge' I don't know how it's doing yet, until my first royalty check in March. I am donating ten percent of royalties to the Bikers for Babies campaign, which is near and dear to my heart. The book is a suspense thriller biker fiction, although I did put a lot of true things in it, like my wreck. Jack Lawford from bikerhotline.com read a copy of it and loved it, and invited me to the Easyriders V-Twin Expo in Cincinnati a couple of weeks ago. He did a review on his site about it. Enough about that though. The guy that plowed me down didn't have anything to sue for, and he didn't get charged. It makes me wonder what kind of laws do we have that would let someone run down a biker, almost killing them, then let them walk away like they had done nothing at all? This guy stopped my life as I once knew it, and I will pay for his actions until I die, but he gets to go on with his normal life. The laws are really screwed up when it comes to the rights of a biker. It seems that in most places, we just don't have any rights at all. I wonder if bikers will ever have the rights we deserve to have. The guy's insurance company did pay me double for what I had in my Sportster, and I took all the money and bought a WideGlide. People thought I was crazy spending what money I got on another bike when I couldn't walk or ride at the time. I told them that I deserved another bike and that someday I would ride again. That day has come and I'm riding. I look back on my wreck to try and see if there was anything I could have done differently to avoid it. The only thing I could have done was to pull off the road when I saw him coming, instead of assuming he would slow down, but if we pulled off the road everytime we saw someone coming, then we would be stopped most of the time instead of riding. No, there was nothing I could have done, but I will keep riding until the day I die. Someone asked me if I wasn't afraid now of getting killed on a motorcycle. I told them NO, IF I DIE ON MY BIKE, I DIE A HAPPY PERSON........

Keep the faith, riding is either in your blood or it's not. Glad to hear you got back on. Cat

My name is Larry Ritchey. I lost my left leg above the knee in an automible accident on May 22 05. before the end of that summer I was building me another bike from myt wheel chair. and on crutches.Everyone thinks I am crazy. They are right. I have been crazy about riding for 50+ years. I am 67 yrs old and I want to ride every birthday for the next 20 yrs. The only unhappy thing about dying on my bike is wrecking a good bike. I am working with people here and in the UK to help people like me ride. Ride on 2 wheels that is. I have a side car on my bike but that is for my wife and my dog. Not me. I MUST get back on 2 wheels. Take care and keep riding even if it kills you.

Larry