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Motorcycle Safety and Awareness
Welcome to think bike, the podcast about all things motorcycle and the voice of motorcycle safety and awareness in Alberta. Your host is Liane Langlois.
Liane:Hey, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of Think Bike. I am joined this week by Scott Sherlow who is, representing what is called the rolling barrage. I know that this is something that a lot of people have seen or heard, but some people, a lot of people probably haven't as well. So we're gonna talk about this cross country ride, the significance behind it, and more importantly for us, what safety measures do they put in place?
Liane:Because it is literally a coast to coast journey. I would like to welcome Scott to our show. Hello, sir. How are you?
Scott:I'm doing really good. Thanks, Sam.
Liane:I'm happy to have you here. So let's first tell everybody who Scott is and what got you into riding.
Scott:So I did thirty years as a first responder in Jasper. I was on fire department. I attained rank of captain on my sort of on the tail end of things. And as most firefighters do, you do some things and you see some stuff. And I had a friend of mine who is a firefighter at Whitlam.
Scott:He heard about the rolling barrage, and he did a short stint. He did a couple of legs in British Columbia, and he told me about this and said I needed to get involved. And I didn't have a motorcycle at the time, and I solved that problem. And then he the ride came to Jasper that year, the following year, and we rode from Jasper down to Vancouver. And, you know, there's couple of stops on the way down there, just overnight, and then back on the bike first thing in the morning, and got out to the coast, stayed at his place for a few days, kind of decompressed, went to go, you know, some rides around in the Lower Mainland, and every year I've done more and more of the ride, usually starting in in Jasper or further west or further east.
Scott:Then in 2023, I did the full pull, which was Saint John's, Newfoundland, all the way to Vancouver. And that is it's a tough slog because it's it's a marathon. It's every day. You know, there's very little breaks, and it just you you meet people at the very beginning, and, you know, you're strangers. About midway through Ontario, you become fast friends.
Liane:Yeah.
Scott:And that's that's something that's you know, when I left the fire department, you sort of lose track of you know, you become somewhat isolated because you've lost that family with the fire service. This has become a new family and fast friends.
Liane:So is that literally what got you into riding? Was your buddy in Coquitlam saying you need to get involved with the rolling barrage?
Scott:Yeah. I oh, I I had a motorcycle when I was a little younger.
Liane:Yeah.
Scott:Of course, you know, you start raising a family and things like that, and you gotta diapers cost money, so you sold the bike and I knew it was gonna be a while before I got that thing back again, but my first motorcycle was a July Honda Sabre.
Liane:Nice.
Scott:And it had some bags on it, a fairing and you know, riding around in Jasper was a blast on that. And then the next one that I got was a 02/2008 Honda Goldwing, and that that's been my that's that's been the dream of of my, you know, my motorcycling life, to own one of those. And that thing performs I you know, I'm sure there'll be some people listening that think that, you know, Goldwing, you know, it's an old man's bike, But boy, oh boy, that thing can get up and honk when it needs to.
Liane:Yeah. Our my my co founding member of AMSS and and former VP, retired now, he's a he's a big Goldwing guy. We're big Honda fans. I ride Triumphs, but we are big Honda fans here at AMSS. They're very supportive of what we do.
Liane:As a Jasperite, outside of the Edith Cavell Road, what are some of your favorite places to ride?
Scott:You know, Believe Lake is always, you know, never disappoints. Going along Medicine Lake, you know, there's some nice nice twists and turns through there. I will go down the Icefields Parkway, I mean, Highway 93 is arguably one of the best rides in the world. The scenery is constantly changing. I will regularly go to Nordet, to the miners cafe for lunch, and then turn around and come back.
Scott:And every time you take 93 a, you'll see something different, and I live there. So it's you'll see different colors. You see different scenery. You see different you know, just the way the light hits places, it it's always a different ride every time.
Liane:I say that to people all the time. If you're gonna ride the Icefields Parkway, you have to do it both ways because it's a completely different ride in each direction. Yes. But but you would also agree, and and mostly for safety reasons, timing when you get onto the Icefields Parkway is very important.
Scott:Oh, yes. Yeah. You're you're fighting with tour buses and tourists, you know, the Drive Canada motorhomes are, you know, a necessary scourge, but, you know, when there's groups of them that are like a Peloton and they are nose to tail like couple of elephants, it's tough to pass six of them at a shot with another group of six of those elephants coming towards you. It you have to go early.
Liane:Yeah. Get on there early. I mean, the tour buses have been I've experienced a couple different things with the buses, which is sometimes they're gracious enough to somehow advise you, the road is clear. You can get by me or there's wildlife ahead. I think my biggest annoyance on the Icefield Parkway is there's a deer on the side of the road.
Liane:And I guess to me, I mean, growing up also in a national park, deer are a dime a dozen, elk are a dime a dozen, you know, even bears, it's great to see. But the amount of people that slam on their brakes and like block the entire road. Oh. And then shove their kids closer to the bear for a better picture. But I I digress on that.
Liane:Let's get back into the Rolling Barrage. So when did this start?
Scott:It was originally created by Scott Casey, who is, an ex Bosnian, Herzegovina, veteran. He was finding that an awful lot of his friends from that era were all dying by suicide.
Liane:And
Scott:he didn't want to see that happen again. And it started this is gonna be the ninth year. There was there were six of them that all rode out to Newfoundland or Halifax is where it started. They would dip their tires in the Atlantic Ocean, and then they turned around, and they drove back and went to the Pacific. It started with six of them, and they thought he was crazy.
Scott:And he says, you know, we're gonna have to do this next year. And they all thought, you're nuts. And the next year, there was 14 of them. And then every year, it's just gotten bigger and bigger and bigger. The year that I went, there was we started with 50, that was 2023.
Scott:And last year, because it was an abbreviated a different ride, we're there was the Rolling Barrage was supposed to stop in Jasper, and they diverted up to Bonnyville and spent two days there. So nine years ago, Scott Casey came up with this harebrained idea, and it just got bigger and bigger and bigger. We're hoping in 2026, as the ten year anniversary, we're hoping to have a hundred full Polar riders going from the East Coast to the West Coast.
Liane:What is the primary mission for the Rolling Barrage then to for mental health for veterans or
Scott:So it encompasses all first responders. So veterans, RCMP, firefighters, EMTs, paramedics, nurses, also prison staff, prison guards. You know, anybody who has basically a motorcycle and has been involved in any way serving their country or their community is for lack of a better definition.
Liane:Mhmm.
Scott:And it's all branches of service and you can join in for the full poll or your province or two provinces. Some people are still, you know, gainfully employed and they can only get a certain amount of time away. So they come for what they can.
Liane:Yeah. And I've heard of that before because I know when the Rolling Barrage is coming through Alberta, there's always like, hey, the Rolling Barrage is coming through and and this is the route and meet up with us anywhere and ride with us for a bit. So it's really welcoming to everybody. Correct?
Scott:Definitely. We're we're looking for any forms of support that we can get. We put the route out on our website, and we've had people just standing on the side of the road waving Canadian flags when they go by, and it gets everybody from little kids to moms and dads, grandparents. I remember going past seeing people in wheelchairs from an old folks home, and they were waving their flags at us, and that sort of support is is huge. When you when you've been riding as long as you have across Canada, every time you see those little things, it just you you kind of you realize it it's making a difference.
Liane:I think that you could probably somewhat equate that to Terry Fox running across the country and having that support on the side of the road. That encouragement.
Scott:Yeah. Definitely. You know, Terry Fox is arguably one of the, you know, best forms of Canadian Canadiana that I wouldn't I wouldn't want to take anything away from what that man did, but, you know, we stopped at the Terry Fox Memorial in Ontario, and when you think you're having a bad day, you just look at that monument and it's like, nope. Everything gets an awful lot easier from there.
Liane:Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. I can't imagine, like, that long of ride, though. When do you guys start?
Liane:Like, what's the start date for this year?
Scott:August first as in every year. And then I think it's eighteen days. All all twenty days across Canada. We typically if in Newfoundland, there's some gay rides, we've had some huge sponsors, big freights based out of Steinbeck, Manitoba, they have a tractor trailer that they'll pick up 20 motorcycles and take them across Canada for us for free.
Liane:Wow.
Scott:And when the motorcycles get to Vancouver, they will take whatever motorcycles have to go east, they'll do that as well. It's phenomenal. The support that we've had from them is terrific.
Liane:That would be a big support because I mean for you living in Jasper to ride all the way out to Halifax than to just ride all the way I mean it's a great adventure. Don't get me wrong, but it takes it takes your toll. It takes a toll on people. Even if you have a big couch like a Goldwing, it still
Scott:Yes.
Liane:Still takes a toll on you.
Scott:Yep. Oh, it's usually, when the barrage starts August 1, but people will arrive several days before. Some people have had their bikes shipped, so they've been without their bikes since mid July. So what they do is they do a bunch of little day rides to some places. So you you get back on your bike, you start thinking bike, because you've unless people have multiple bikes in their garage, that's their their bike has been shipped across Canada, so you've been without it for a while.
Scott:You get the shakedown. You make sure that, you know, tires are all pumped up and your signal lights work, and you make sure that your bike is capable of making it all the way back across Canada. But they go out to some little places in Newfoundland, just the day rides, and you get to see certain things that you wouldn't normally see.
Liane:Mhmm.
Scott:And then we started a hope the host hotel in the parking lot, and there's the safety briefing, and we'll break up into smaller groups. We call them detachments. Each detachment has a lead bike, and then we also have our our lead rider, Jim, the big the big mean Jim. He heads out. He does the they've done the route, and Jim Gordon leads us all out.
Scott:Mhmm. And we'll go out with smaller groups behind them, and the smaller groups allow the possibility of a car coming into the middle of us without disrupting an entire pack. Know? Yeah. So we break into smaller groups.
Scott:It's it's amazing to see as we all the big snake comes out. Every so often you have to turn around and look at, you know, what depending on where you are, you can look back and see a mass of bikes behind you, and as you go up and down the hills, you get to see the mass of bikes in front of you.
Liane:And now you're talking a lot about what is music to my ears in the safety aspect of everything because it it is such a long ride. How many hours do you do in about a day or how many kilometers do you go in a day roughly, like average?
Scott:Some days vary. Probably in the neighborhood of five to 600 kilometers a day. We also have there's a a law enforcement coordinator on our board of governors that will coordinate with each province. We now have the backing of the RCMP all the way across Canada.
Liane:Wow.
Scott:So the RCMP will send motorcycles out in front of us, cars, we'll also have motorcycle cars behind us, and they run their lights the entire time. So as we get through different provinces, different provinces have their own motorcycle units. They do traffic control for us and intersections and things like that. And, you know, we are fully sponsored, I guess, would be the the word, by the RCMP all the way across Canada. So that kind of security blanket is is huge.
Scott:You know, when the RCMP pull through with their lights on, they all understand everybody coming into the onto the highway realizes that there's something of substance with them.
Liane:Yeah. Definitely draws attention when you can get an intersection blocked off and then a boatload of bikes goes by. But I imagine because of the length of the ride and and the amount of kilometers per day that you're all very respectful in the way that you ride. I'm sure that like, tell me a little bit about your safety briefings and are they every Yes,
Scott:they're every morning, and if we have a significant number of new riders joining us, let's say in the middle of the day, we'll take those riders aside and Jim will give them safety briefing. Our safety briefing starts off with we want we all drive single or staggered formation, we don't travel knuckle to knuckle, staggered formation allows everybody the ability to get out of their lane pocket so that you won't be able you won't be touching tires. They you we give ourselves a one second time frame between the rider beside us and a two second time frame with the rider directly in front of us. And those those gaps will sort of, there'll be a slinky effect. You try to keep everybody in the positions that they are and keep the formation tight because there's less chance of a car coming in and breaking up an actual detachment group.
Scott:So every day that that safety briefing is pounded into us, and people that have been on this ride before understand how this all works. The new riders, if people haven't ridden before in a tight group, they are asked to go to the back of the pack where the tail gunners will give them all the room they need. And we also have all the two wheelers up front, and trikes and the Can Ams are allowed to take their own space at the back because they will they need more width. They'll they'll get their own space at the back and they usually travel single file.
Liane:Yeah. They need like the whole lane almost just because of how wide they can be. Especially the Pan Yeah. Yeah. For sure.
Scott:The spiders, trikes, and all of those guys, we have them in their own detachment and they're usually at the back. We don't like to intermix trikes with two wheelers just because of the space that those guys need. We give them their own group to to ride with.
Liane:Yeah. It really does throw off that formation, that staggered formation when you when you throw a three wheeler in there. And so I think I think that's pretty smart because it keeps everybody similar together which has different maneuvers, emergency maneuvers, and safety precautions with them. Like, debris on the road, we just swerve around them. It's different when you're on a trike of any sort.
Liane:You need more space to do that. Do you guys receive any financial support to help fund this ride? Like, you've mentioned a few sponsors. I mean, it totally makes sense the RCMP are on board because it really is for that demographic. So it makes sense, but do you like, this costs money.
Liane:Like, how does that work?
Scott:So most people are are funded by Visa. Unfortunately, Visa wants their money at the end of the ride. But it's You had
Liane:me there for a second. I'm like, what? Visa? Oh, awesome. Okay.
Liane:So yeah. But, yeah, they wanna be coming back.
Scott:I was sponsored by our local branch thirty one Legion. They did a fundraiser for me. The fire department gave me a stipend for fuel going across Canada. We do have sponsored fuel stops and the numbers of those are getting there's more of them as we go across Canada. So they don't sponsors inland.
Scott:They give us a truck that we pull a trailer that's filled with water and other we have a merchandise trailer. An awful lot of the fundraising we do is through the merchandise side of things, and also, you know, we do receive money from places that we stop at, you know, they'll give us a cash donation, which doesn't go we'll usually buy fuel with that. Most of the times, this is all self funded.
Liane:Mhmm.
Scott:We every night we stay at a hotel, we started off with getting, you know, we would be blocking rooms, and now we're blocking entire hotels.
Liane:Jeez.
Scott:And every year when we come, the hotel does things for us. We get when we pull into Cranbrook, there's a pig roast dinner in the back, and that's by donation with other anybody that wants to come, but everybody in the barrage, that meal is covered.
Liane:Yeah. That that totally makes sense. So the Rolling Barrage as itself then is I'm I'm just looking this up at the same time. So it is a non for profit business.
Scott:Correct. So
Liane:are we are we also raising money then for PTSD or like because they're the just the vision of this rolling barrage going from coast to coast is is something to see. But is that like, the purpose is to raise awareness and funds?
Scott:Correct. Yes. We all we will write we'll give money to organizations like CanPraxis, which is an equine therapy for first responders. There are other places across Canada that we will give them donations on the behalf of the Rolling Barrage, and that allows people to, you know, first responders in that community to go to these facilities and have it covered. So it it helps in their therapy outside of, you know, professional therapy, psychologists and occupational therapists and stuff like that.
Scott:So, yeah, the money that we bring in, we send out to other organizations that help with first responders.
Liane:Love it. One last question and probably the most important one. If somebody wanted to either donate or get involved with the Rolling Barrage, how can they find information?
Scott:The websites that we have is the main focus of all of the incoming funding. There's contacts on there. The there's emails on there that they can go to. And also with the route being on there, as we come through your community, if we we have a stop scheduled for that, that would be the time to come down and meet with all of the all of the people there, and if they have, you know, a cookie jar full of money that they want to give us, we'll gladly take that and we'll give it to the person, you know, our treasurer. We'll take that, and we thank them kindly for their donations.
Liane:That's awesome. And for those of you listening, it is the rolling barrage Com. We'll have all of the information on there. Scott, thank you so much. I've actually learned a lot.
Liane:I knew I knew a bit about the ride, but I've really learned a lot more about it. I appreciate your time. I appreciate the ride's focus on safety and making sure you guys get across the country and home again, you know, safely. That's super important to everybody and helps promote what you guys are doing in an even bigger, better light. So thank you so much for your time.
Scott:Thanks a lot for having me, being part of this. I'm looking forward to seeing more people all across Canada. This year, I start in Saskatoon, and I'll be headed headed west, but every year we go from coast to coast raising awareness and funds for PTSD and other occupational stress injuries of our first responders.
Liane:Love it. Thank you. So get out there, check out The Route, and, support these guys as they make their journey across the country. Thanks again, Scott. For everybody else, stay tuned for the mixed bag.
Liane:On today's mailbag, Meredith sent us an email asking us for a discussion on airbags. Not for cars, for us as motorcyclists. While we are going to look in to see if we can do a full episode on this, the quick note would be that Air Tech is not just for MotoGP anymore. It's actually getting to be more affordable for us common folk. We're gonna look into the Alpinestars Tech five, Tech seven, or Tech 10.
Liane:Now they all offer a different amount of coverage with the tech five being the quote lowest and tech 10 being the highest. But be aware that feedback from our local top road racers, while they all agree the most coverage is the best with the tech 10 as it does cover your hips as well, there have been issues with it not deploying or deploying when it shouldn't. Therefore, most of them are running the tech seven. That is just a vest with arms, short sleeve arms on them. When you're looking at the AirTex system, you're looking at about a thousand dollars for these airbags, but it could also mean the difference between a very long recovery to a shortened one, or paralysis versus being able to walk again or more.
Liane:So much so, it's something that I'm getting into this year and something everyone should really consider. And that's our show for today. To make sure that you don't miss out on any of our upcoming podcasts or listen to previous ones, make sure you click on subscribe or follow wherever you get yours. If there's a topic you'd like us to cover or a guest you think would be great on the show, or even a question for the mailbag, let us know. You can connect with us on all the socials, email us at infoab amss dot org or reach out through the website at abamss.org.
Liane:Thanks for listening to Think Bike. From us, always remember to ride smart, ride safe, and think bike. See you out on the road.
Bryn:Welcome to think bike, the podcast about all things motorcycle and the voice of motorcycle safety and awareness in Alberta. Your host is Leanne Langlois.