[Matt]

Don’t get a motorcycle or ATV helmet. It weighs A LOT, and is very hot (it is designed for ventilation at speeds you will not reach on your motorcycle).

I do a lot of mountain biking (all types, XC, Urban, Freeride, but mostly Downhill), trust me when I say you don’t want a motorcycle helmet, not even a motocross one. And most certainly not a full faced.

If you are serious about your head protection, get a fiberglass, kevlar, or CF full faced mountain bike helmet. I personally wear a Mace Hammer ( http://www.macegear.com/ ). I wear it because it fits, is light, and I know it is strong (I am alive today because of one that now hangs in my office). SixSixOne, Bell, Giro, Troy Lee Designs. There are no shortage of good full faced bicycle helmets out there. Find the one that fits you best, and wear it.

Any good mountain bike shop will carry an assortment. Just watch out for ones that use standard bicycle crash foam and plastic liner. These are simply XC helmets (which are just restyled road helmets) with chin bars added and some protection added to the back of your head. The increase in protection they provide isn’t nearly as good as a proper FR/DH full face, but they tend to cost as much.

If you don’t want a a chin bar, look at a protec “skateboard style” helmet. These are becoming far more common on the roads and trails because they aren’t as cumbersome as full faced, but provide excellent protection to the sides and rear of your head that a “normal” XC mountain bike helmet does not. In all honesty, unless you are pushing yourself hard enough that you fear smashing your face, this is probably the best helmet style to wear.

Trust me when I say, overly heavy poorly ventilated helmets can really suck the fun out of mountain biking.

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

I only have experience with its predicesor, the Super Sherpa. My sister used it in the MSF course and liked it. If you want a bike you can take off road, the KLX250 seems to be a good one (if you have no intention of going off road or on dirt roads, might be better to go with a road focused bike).

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

“I could be wrong but I don’t think it’s unreasonable for someone who’s spent a year riding around on a Ninja 250R to move on to one of these older ’90s road-oriented literbikes.”

Not having done it, I won’t say much more than some of the bikes (the 919 in particular) as supposed to be sufficiently friendly that doing that is doable if not entirely safe. I’ve been told the Z750 is a good step up from a ninja 250 (but, in all honesty, that might be what I wanted to hear since I really love the look of those bikes).

Some of the bikes however, it really isn’t true. In particular the first gen FI bikes had wicked tempers with poor fuelling. If you keep her pointed at the older engine designs (carbs) then that would be best.

Other options for a SECOND bike that might sit well with her are the 800cc road going sports. The Honda VFR800 and BMW F800ST come to mind right away. Both are good looking to most people, both are wickedly fast, and both are “friendly” enough that I’d consider them doable second bikes (I really loved the engine from the F800ST in the F650GS I rode, and my Dad with about a years riding experience had no problems handling the 800ST).

If she likes those bikes, you can let her know that the Ninja 250 is a very good primer for them since it has a similar seating position and “feel”.

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

I plan on putting my baby to rest in a heated facility, and getting out the snowboard.

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

Different areas have vastly different insurance rates.
In Ontario, insurance on a Ninja 250 is $800/year for a new rider with MSF.
A Ninja 650 is $1700. A proper supersport is well over $2000.

Makes that $75 seem pretty awesome doesn’t it?
—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

You sure have a winner here

I’m partly with Ben (focus on getting her into stylish race leathers, which shouldn’t be too hard since the few ghostrider and other totally insane youtube videos that don’t end in a bloody crash have the guys in full leathers).

But I’m a stubborn man, and I say keep pushing “right the first time”. Let her know that a two stroke revs faster than an equivilant four stroke, but only twice as much. As a general rule a two stroke is twice as powerful as a four stroke of equal size (go figure, twice the number of detonations per rpm equals twice the power). So a 125cc two stroke is only roughly as powerful as a 250cc four stroke.

This isn’t strikly true, since two strokes don’t have to meet the same environmental standards as four strokes, two strokes are often more then twice the power of four strokes, but not by a huge margin, short of a 125GP bike, a 125 two stroke (such as the Aprilla 125) is not to be a straight line match for a 500cc bike.

So one tactic is to work on the angle that the only bike she has ridden was pretty much the same as a KLX 250 or WR250, and really, not much less friendly than a Ninja 250R. It was most certainly not in the same spectrum as the GS500.

Since she’s looking at the tuner and stunter world, see if you can find any reference to tuner 250Rs or customs…
I’m sure there are 250Rs and GS500s with “Poser Cred” (my new phrase).

I still think, if she hasn’t even ridden pillion one of these monsters she’s looking at, she needs to ask one of her experienced riding buddies to take her for a spin. Tell her, anything he can do with you on the back you can do alone on a 500 (with practice adn experience).
—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

I’m glad I’m not the only person who makes dumb mistakes when working on vehicles… My bicycle mechanic charges double if I try to fix my bike before bringing it to him

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

A guy around here rides an MT-01 (a remarkably similar bike all things considered).

It looks awesome, but it is surprisingly slow and heavy in the corners. You’d think “Muscle Bikes” would be at least straight line fast, but the owner says he only has two options: Nice smooth start, or smoke the tires. But he loves the way it looks, so he rides it like a cruiser.

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

Well, if she really wants, a SV650S is faired, will do track days wihtout any mods, and is more than fast enough to keep up with an 600cc bike on the streets. It is used at the FAST ( http://www.fastridingschool.com/english/index.html ) riding school for sport bike training.

Better, a GS500F. It looks like a GSXR to non riders (personal taste on weather or not it looks good, just don’t tell ShannonG if Lauren doesn’t like the looks). It will keep up with bigger bikes in the real world. This bike will out accelerate any BMW she has driven and most likely any Porsche she has driven. She will not feel the need to upgrade it within a year.

And if she really wants a Ducati, and money isn’t an issue, tell her to get a 695 Monster. Very similar bike (from a rider’s perspective) to the faired SV650. Still not a gentle bike to learn on by any stretch, but it would give her poser cred.

Has she ever rode pillion with her squidly friends?
If she has, remind her that the GS500 will be as fast (quiet possibly faster if the guy driving had any sense about him) as the super sport she rode on the back of – simply because with the extra weight, only a really good rider, or a really stupid one, can push a two-up (where the pillion doesn’t know how to lean, etc) supersport to the limits of a 500cc sportbike with only one person on it.

Also has she ever been in an accident (or almost in an accident) in one of her BMWs? Remind her that learning to bike is the same as learning to drive all over again, only this time, any mistakes she made before that simply ended with her heart racing could end with a trip to the ER. Any mistakes that banged up her Bimmer will almost certainly put her in the Hospital for a week or more.

My 1.9 cents

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

Ninja 250 will handle 75mph without any issue.
The consensus from MSF instructors is that bigger bikes have no advantage in the wind. While the bike may weight more, it also has more surface area for the wind to hit and apply force over. Usually when someone says that bike X handles wind better than their old lighter bike it is a matter of experience – the new bike isn’t handling the wind better, the now more experienced rider is.

The Ninja 250, GS500, and Ninja 500 all handle highway well.

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

I’m against it, but I don’t have a good reason why.
Part of me says “Well, OSC course said never to do it, therefore I don’t”, but more of it I think is my experience on bicycles. I’ll cover a lever when I’m expecting someone to do something stupid, the rest of the time, I want my hand firmly on the grip (not death grip, just all four fingers).

Covering just doesn’t “feel right” to me, and I suppose, at the end of the day, that the only reason I need…

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

I know it wasn’t for me.
But you have to remember that this forum is meant to be a nice safe place for people just getting into motorcycling to visit.

I realize that “fag” is a pretty common word on internet forums.
But a lot of the people who would be getting the most out of this forum are not regular internet forum users. Using offensive langauge (and calling someone “gay” for any reason short of their open homosexual status qualifies as offensive) only hurts the image of this board, and its ability to help people getting into the sport.

We have to come across as welcoming nice people who want to help (which I think we all are). If we don’t, people won’t trust the opinions of this site and will end up going to the “Death Machine 2000R”-pushing salesman and either end up on the wrong bike and not stay in the sport, or simply never get into the sport in the first place.

Think of it like this, all these threads are being read by someone’s Mom (probably lots of people’s moms actually). The more offensive and dangerous we sound, the more that Mom is going to be against her kids ever getting on a bike. The nicer and better spoken we are, the more chances her kids have of ending up on a bike (and the more chance we have of getting Her out on a bike!).

So yea, lets all play nice and keep the foul language for other forums (or PMs if you have to speak your mind to someone).

Signed,
The Forum Stalking Kawi-Tank

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

I dig the blue & black. Double points for the visor. Awesome setup

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

Hey Booze, keep it clean.

Bikes have more limits than just the forward one (top speed). (Almost) Anyone with a long enough straight stretch of road can top out any bike.

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Matt]

Booze, if you read the other threads, he was also looking at transporting the bike to a mechanic’s for inspection. Not something you ride to (since the bike isn’t yours yet).

Besides, close to three hours on a bike for your first ride? Doable, but not the safest idea.

—
“The two seconds between ‘Oh S**!’ and the crash isn’t a lot of practice time.”

[Author]

Posts