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How long have you been riding?

  • First Year

    Votes: 78 7.1%
  • 1 - 2 Years

    Votes: 73 6.7%
  • 2 - 5 Years

    Votes: 159 14.5%
  • 5 - 10 Years

    Votes: 153 14.0%
  • 10 - 15 Years

    Votes: 138 12.6%
  • 15 - 25 Years

    Votes: 130 11.9%
  • 25 - 65 Years

    Votes: 364 33.2%
  • 65 + Years

    Votes: 1 0.1%

Riding Experience Poll

95K views 195 replies 130 participants last post by  WutangPanda 
#1 ·
How long have you been on 2 wheels? Both on and off the tarmac.
 
#12 · (Edited)
interesting results so far. with so many highly experienced prospective buyers, yammie out to sell as many as they can make, eh?
odd categorization on this poll, though. 25-65, really?!
 
#6 ·
You gonna make younger? :cool:
 

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#11 ·
hmm ...for 30 years until 3 years ago... dirt/farms/bushtrails and occasionally "this weirdly hard packed 'gravel track' that ran from my house to the nearest bush trail about 3 mins away" .. strange roa.... errrr track that was .. soft angle kerb.... errr gutters... errrrr ummm 'berms' at the edges , all the chicane bends in it to 'slow traffic' at the edge of the suburb ... on a bike there was a clear line about 1.5m wide straight through the centre of the roa.... track! ... slowed me down not a whit!! ... just the edges made any difference for cars .. and now that i think on it .. some really ultra cool engineer type put this big speedhu..... errrr tabletop jump!! about halfway along too.... once i had finally progressed to the old XR350 ownership ... that whole 2min section was just a WOT blast with a little bumpy bit in the middle.... :cool:

.... lucky it was 'just a track' eh! ... and no member of the public or their property was ever harmed or impinged upon! .. :D

ooops.. edit... last 3 years been road riding on my GS500F ... since my knees started to complain loudly about bush track blitzes!
 
#15 ·
As soon as I get the bike home,, the stock tires are coming off and a set of Dunlop Q3s are going on. Next destination......Deals Gap to thoroughly check out the lean angle clearance and drive out of the corners. I've got a friend that owns US129 Photos on the Dragon Photos - Deals Gap Photos - Tail of the Dragon Photos and will see about him shooting some pics of me going through some corners.
 
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#17 ·
Nah.......I'm just a guy that loves riding and Instructing and am fortunate enough to live close to one of the best roads in the entire country.........318 turns in 11 miles should offer some feedback about performance and handling and how the suspension will be stock..........at least for a 195 lb fella.
 
#19 ·
It kind of depends. Weekends obviously have a lot more traffic and "referees" around. Usually after a bad crash or a fatality accident, patrols are stepped up a bit. Weekdays are of course the best times to go up on the hill and of course, Oct. Nov. time frame will get you lots of room to .....ah, ahem, uh........ride a bit more of a spirited ride. I really never ride too hard up there though, as I've explained before.......just one mistake, either on your part or the other guys, and you either go OVER the mountain, or INTO the mountain.........neither of which have a happy ending most of the time.
 
#27 ·
do bmx and mountain bikes count? I just started really getting into motorcycles. picked up an 1982 honda cm450 and made it into a bobber/ street fighter bike. nothing legal about it but it was a blast. that is what drew me to this bike. has that street fighter look and it will be legal and faster. as for two wheels. Ive been riding bmx for 10 years. a few years spent at woodward camp and in the woods riding trails so i feel right at home on 2 wheels.
 
#30 ·
I'm pretty much in the same boat as kmonster. Been mtn biking and road cycling for years, but just started with motorcycles. If a car with manual transmission counts though, I've got about 120k miles under my belt in the last 4 years. When I took the MSF class I had no trouble whatsoever, it felt like second nature for all of it. My 2 biggest concerns for this new bike are 1) the weight - its going to be a bunch more than the 250cc from the class (not to mention my 22lb mtn bike!) and 2) everything else around me. Other cars, animals, bad road conditions and especially deer.
Welcome to the site guys! Nice to have some other mtn bikers on the site! I used to BMX when I was a kid, and just got back on two wheels sans motor with a Cannondale for the single tracks here in central TX. Where are you guys located? ccope, you mentioned deer. Leads me to think you are in a mountainous area.

For the weight, I would not worry about it too much. Manufacturers go through a lot to make sure the bikes are balanced. Obviously I have not ridden one just yet, but I imagine it is going to wear it's weight well. All of the mass in down low, between the wheels, not much up top. You will just have to be careful your first couple hundred miles on the thing, but you will get a feel for it pretty quickly. Carrying some skills over from cycling, you will take to it like a fish to water.

The second concern is really the one that is all on you. There are innumerable obstacles and hazards out there for a motorbike rider. No one can make you safe, but you. That is the beauty of motorcycling for me. It is constant attention that you have to pay the bike, and the roads. You cannot let yourself do anything else while you are on the bike. As soon as you become complacent and stop paying attention, someone will merge into your lane without noticing you at all, and it is up to you to be in a situation where you can escape. If you are somewhere else in your mind, and cannot react soon enough, that is on you. The car will have a dented fender, and you will have a dented body. On a bike you have to be alert all the time, and unfortunately, assume that every car is going to merge into you, pull out in front of you, and act accordingly.

I don't mean to be a downer at all, because it is totally worth it! A bike on a beautiful day is just about as good as it gets.
 
#28 ·
I can tell you from experience that cycling does help with moto skills. Cycling skills helps with balance and lean angles. What you don't get from cycling is the specific hand eye coordination skills needed for braking, shifting and more importantly throttle control.
If you can drive a car with manual transmission, then you can apply those same hand eye coordination skills to learning how to ride a motorcycle.

Sent from my HTCEVOV4G using Tapatalk 2
 
#29 ·
I'm pretty much in the same boat as kmonster. Been mtn biking and road cycling for years, but just started with motorcycles. If a car with manual transmission counts though, I've got about 120k miles under my belt in the last 4 years. When I took the MSF class I had no trouble whatsoever, it felt like second nature for all of it. My 2 biggest concerns for this new bike are 1) the weight - its going to be a bunch more than the 250cc from the class (not to mention my 22lb mtn bike!) and 2) everything else around me. Other cars, animals, bad road conditions and especially deer.
 
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