How We Will Do This
The Program
On an average day in the United States, 17 riders die and about 240 are injured — and that has been true, decade after decade. Our aim is to drive those numbers toward zero. This page explains how.
Start With the Real Cause
Motorcycles have never been safer. Brakes, tires and electronics have all improved enormously, and yet the crash statistics have barely moved. That tells us the machine was never the weak point. The rider is the part nobody ever finished training.
Most riders in the US are effectively self-taught — a weekend course to get the license, a few tips from friends — some of them wrong, and passed down for generations — then years of trial and error on public roads. So the program goes after the rider's skill, deliberately and in order.
Riding is fun and studying is not, so most riders never do it. ThrottleWise is the first effort built to fix this on purpose — by making the learning itself fun, convenient and rewarding — and the first that will measure whether it worked.
Ride With the Best Teachers — Including in Person
Brand new to riding? Start in person. Take the MSF Basic RiderCourse — hands-on, on a real motorcycle, and in most states it is how you earn your license. Find one at msf-usa.org.
If you can make the time and budget for in-person coaching, do it. Nothing replaces a great coach watching you ride. We are glad to recommend the schools we admire: Total Control's Advanced Riding Clinics — whose founder's book helped shape our own cornering lessons — the Yamaha Champions Riding School, California Superbike School on track, and the manufacturers' own programs: Harley-Davidson's Riding Academy, Honda's Rider Education Centers, the BMW U.S. Rider Academy, and Ducati's Riding Experience. This list is nowhere near exhaustive: there are excellent schools and coaches all over the country — find one near you and go. No school pays to appear here; we name them because they make better riders.
ThrottleWise is the free path for every rider, whether you can do in-person lessons or not. The truth is most riders have not taken advantage of in-person classes or even the many excellent books on proficient riding. It is just so much easier to jump on the bike and ride! That’s one of the main reasons the crash statistics haven’t changed over decades. ThrottleWise is the free, convenient, and fun solution to help every rider become the best they can be. And when all riders are their best, those terrible statistics will head toward zero!
Is ThrottleWise a replacement for in-person training?
No — and it never will be. In-person courses put a coach's eyes on you, and that is irreplaceable. ThrottleWise is what the sport never had: the free, simple and convenient way for every rider to get the best proven techniques and ways of thinking about riding on public roads. And a heads up about common bad habits that have been passed down for generations.
Explain, Demonstrate, Practice
Every skill is taught the same way, as a video lesson in three parts, chosen from the best sources in motorcycling. First we explain the skill and why it matters. Then we demonstrate it done properly, close up and at real speed. Then we set you up to practice it on purpose, rather than hoping you happen to get it right on the road.
The lessons build on one another, so a brand-new rider and a rider with thirty years of habits both have somewhere sensible to start.
See it for yourself. Here is rung 1.1, the first lesson of the ThrottleWise Ladder, exactly as every rider gets it — free, complete, and nothing held back. This one teaches a basic skill, from the beginning of the series — the lessons progress all the way to advanced skills.
And here is the practice assignment that goes with it — the drill, the setup, and the exact standard to pass, ready to print and take to the parking lot: the rung 1.1 practice assignment (PDF).
Feedback While You Practice
Watching a lesson is not the same as executing it. That is the gap the technology is built to close.
Coming next: the ThrottleWise app will read what your bike's sensors record during practice and coach you — "improve this point" or "you nailed it, next lesson" — so any rider, anywhere, can train on their own schedule, without needing an instructor beside them.
This is the part that has never existed — anywhere.
In the whole history of motorcycling, no one has ever measured whether training actually builds skill. Not the schools, not the manufacturers, not the insurers — nobody has the data. Our technology will produce it for the first time: proof for every rider that their practice is working — and, published as open research, evidence the entire world of road safety has never had. Riders, researchers, insurers, and policymakers all gain from what we measure. And one promise stands over all of it: your riding data is never sold. Ever.
Free, for Every Rider
Every lesson is free to every rider, and always will be. A free rider account, when it arrives, will hold your practice logs and progress history — no account gets better training than any other.
How It Is Paid For
ThrottleWise, a nonprofit, funds one thing: free rider training for everyone, paid for by donations, grants and corporate sponsorship. The training is never locked behind a payment, never sold, and never held back for a paid level.
What the $1.5 Million Funding Goal Goes to
Free training still has to be built. Here is what donations pay for, and why the goal is the number it is.
The goal, in stages — each one a finished thing
- Stage 1 — a complete, free Level 1. About $30,000. The first two months of production: ten lessons in slow-speed machine control, released one a week. This is the smallest gift that finishes something.
- Stage 2 — every lesson of the Ladder, live by the end of summer 2027. About $134,000 in all. Eight months of production: Level 1 live when the 2027 riding season opens, the rest released week by week through the season. Venue, insurance and equipment are the small part; most of it is pay for the two people who make the lessons — our instructor on camera and our editor.
- Stage 3 — the practice-feedback app, on off-the-shelf sensors. $150,000–$300,000. Proves the whole teaching loop with real riders before we spend a dollar on our own hardware.
- Stage 4 — our own sensor unit, only once riders have shown us what it needs to do. Up to $1.1 million for the technology in total. The hardware alone is $250,000–$750,000, which is why it comes last.
- Keeping it running through 2028 — about $250,000. Hosting, day-to-day operations, and a reserve against a hardware estimate whose own range spans half a million dollars. Not yet quoted line by line, and we say so.
These are early estimates, not firm quotes. $3,000 films one lesson, $30,000 a level, $134,000 finishes the Ladder. Every stage stands on its own: money that stops after Stage 1 still leaves every rider in America a free Level 1.
Producing the teaching series. Filming and editing every lesson — the skill explained, demonstrated at real speed, then turned into a practice assignment you can go out and do. Free to every rider, permanently.
Building the practice-feedback technology. This is the single largest cost. It is three pieces of engineering: the app on your phone, the system behind it that holds your practice history, and a sensor unit on the bike accurate enough to tell good technique from nearly-good technique. That last part is harder than it sounds — a simple tilt sensor cannot read lean angle (how far the bike is leaned over) on a motorcycle that is actually cornering, because the forces in a turn fool it, so it takes precision GPS and motion sensors working together. Planning estimates put the whole technology effort at roughly $400,000 to $1.1 million, with the hardware alone at $250,000–$750,000.
Keeping it free. Hosting, ongoing maintenance and the people who run the organization — costs that never stop, for training that is never sold.
We are spending it in a deliberate order. Rather than pour donations into custom hardware first, we are building the app and proving the whole cycle of lesson, practice and feedback with sensors you can buy today — roughly $150,000 to $300,000. Riders get working lessons sooner, and we only commit to building our own hardware once real riders have shown us exactly what it needs to do. It is the least expensive way to do the job right.
At the top of those ranges the technology alone approaches $1.1 million. That leaves about $400,000 of the $1.5 million goal: roughly $134,000 to produce the teaching series, and about $250,000 to run the organization through 2028. Here is what each is.
Producing the series: about $134,000. Eight months of production so that Level 1 is live when the 2027 riding season opens, the rest follows week by week, and every lesson is live by the end of summer 2027; most of it is pay for the two people who make the lessons — our instructor on camera and our editor — plus venue, insurance and equipment. If the money arrives later, the same series gets made by volunteers for a few thousand dollars in cash, and simply finishes later.
Running the organization through 2028: about $250,000. Hosting, day-to-day operations, and a reserve against a hardware estimate whose own range spans half a million dollars.
An important note. Board members are never paid for serving on the board. Donations pay only the people we hire to build and publish the teaching series and the technology behind it — and as of today, no one, the founder included, has drawn a salary. When staff pay begins, it is set in advance by the board’s independent directors using the IRS’s recommended process, and it is reported publicly on our annual IRS filing.
For operating costs and other incidentals that come up during the completion of the technology build and teaching series, we would rather say "we do not know yet." Those costs have not been quoted line by line, and until they are we are not going to invent figures to make a total look tidy.
And if it costs less, nothing is wasted. If the technology lands at the bottom of its range, the goal was simply conservative. The difference does not disappear — it becomes more lessons, more riders reached, and more time before we have to come back and ask again.
These are early estimates rather than firm quotes. Real numbers will differ, and we will say so plainly as they come in.
What Happens Next
ThrottleWise launched publicly on August 4, 2026. The teaching series comes first, the practice-feedback technology follows. Your donations will fund the completion of the technology to coach every rider, and complete the teaching series, and keep it always free for every rider. Your support will help us change the way things have always been, and save lives!