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Hey Rob welcome. Take it from my experience that if you hang out here long enough and prove yourself to be a responsible person and rider the stigma of starting on a larger bike will fade and you will be looked at as simply someone trying to ride as safely as is possibly. Of course an R1 is at least a jump and a half up from my GT1000, even further from the beginner bike neighborhood, but with the right approach it certainly can be done. Also just because we may have started on larger bikes doesn’t necessarily mean that we endorse it as the way to go, just that doing it, if certain prerequisites are met, might not be the death sentence that some might presume.

As for whether learning on a larger bike retards your progress, again it is different for everyone. However, I made it a point to ask all of the coaches I had in both my BRC and ERC. I asked them to be brutally honest about just that question and to a man they all said that my skill level was certainly above average for someone with my amount of experience. No, not a motorcycle god, simply a rider who was learning at a good clip and applying that knowledge in a mature, conservative manner. Again, not endorsing mine nor the OP’s approach, just saying that the standard response of “you’ll kill yourself” or “you’ll learn slower” might not be true in all instances.

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I’m not really a cruiser fan, but that Hyosung is definitely an impressive looking bike; kind of like a baby VRod.

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We don’t have many lights where I live, actually only one in the entire county. However this year I’ve ridden around a good portion of the Northeast and this was a serious PITA. The thing about the protected right is that if you’re in a dedicated left hand turning lane it means going across at least one, maybe more, lane. The closest I’ve come to making a very serious blunder came when sitting, sweating and getting frustrated in a left turn lane near Albany. Cars where whizzing by, but nobody else wanted to make that left turn. When I realized the light wasn’t going to turn, I had read about this but this was my first experience, I figured the best thing was to get to the next lane, go straight and make a left at the first intersection where I saw a car already waiting. However the situation was so new to me and I was so frustrated that I almost took off with just a quick look in the mirrors rather than a full head turn. If I had pulled out all I can say is I wouldn’t be here typing this morning.

I know from one previous experience many yeas ago in my car where a light wouldn’t change for a ridiculous amount of time that the cop didn’t want to hear about why I blew the light the fact is I blew the light and he was going to write me up.

This isn’t a daily problem for me so I just kind of forget about it, but for some of you guys it must be something you are constantly dealing with. I’ve heard that the little magnetic devices they sell are pretty worthless. Seems like there has to be something that could be done to make lights sensitive enough for motorcycles. It is a safety issue, does anyone know if the AMA considers this an issue and is trying to lobby to rectify it?

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One thing I got very used to up here was bumpy curves. In general the roads here are very twisty-obviously a good thing-but the harsh winters and freeze thaw cycles tend not to be kind to the road surfaces. Personally, if possible, I will always avoid the rough spots at the expense of taking an imperfect line through the turn. However if you don’t have time to alter your line or if the entire width of the lane is a mess just roll with it. Try to scrub off a little extra speed before you hit the rough spot and as Munch said, relax, and once you’re on it roll on the throttle a little just as you would on smooth pavement. If your speed is reasonable and you’re not dealing with serious gravel or an edge trap it shouldn’t do much but shake you up a bit.

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Welcome from Vermont. Much the same story here but I was 45 last year when the bug bit me.

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First, my skin is plenty thick and I’m no way insulted, just some back and forth.

The thing is the guy comes on and asks some very reasonable questions about getting a first bike and your response is “go ride a bicycle”. It’s like someone going to buy a house and you tell them all they need at this point is a tent. Maybe it’s true but it in no way answers the question and is so far off from being usable advice that it serves no purpose.

As far as elevating bicycles to a higher level in the US, thinking of them as a major means of transportation, it may be a good thing but you’re talking about a major cultural shift. This country has had a love affair with the open road, “Baseball, hot dogs, Apple Pie and Chevrolet,” and that’s not about to change. How we negotiate that open road better change, we certainly can’t go on the way we have been, spewing poison into our atmosphere. I won’t deny anything you’ve written about bicycles, however to think that we’re going to hop on bicycles and pedal the 40 miles to our jobs just isn’t being realistic. More efficient, lower emission vehicles will sell, bicycles will never be more than peripheral transportation for Americans. That isn’t to say that they shouldn’t be encouraged in urban environments where they would be the ultimate low emissions vehicle. However to think that they will become a primary form of transportation here simply seems a bit too idealistic to me.

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I’m with Psycho on this one. No, two years does not make you an expert, but it’s not like the kids coming on here saying they want to ride before they’ve ever driven. Some people become very competent drivers in a few years, some-driving texters for example-never will.

His attitude, at least in the way he presents himself online, seems to be in the right place, and honestly I’d have been offended if I was told to “burn fat not fuel.” Certainly bicycles have their place as both a means of exercise and transportation but to tell someone not to ride, implying they’re lazy, is pretty damn insulting. Bicycles and motorcycles both have two wheels, that’s where the similarity ends, different tools for different jobs. Again, I’ll come back to one of my pet peeves, it is NOT a matter of when you’ll crash your car or bike, it is a matter of IF, and I think to say that “without the experience of dealing with stupid driving behavior, your survival rate on a motorcycle in public roads is very slim” is being alarmist, and in a way elitist-“THIS is how I did it, this is the way you should do it or you’re probably going to DIE”. You also seem to think that if you haven’t crashed a car you don’t know how to drive? “until you do crash, you have no clue what you might be doing wrong.” That is truly asinine. With experience you learn what you’re doing right and wrong without necessarily putting it into a wall. I’ve been driving for 30+ years, had a few minor accidents in my teens and 20’s from which I probably didn’t learn a whole lot and have been totally accident free, including fender benders-with probably about 50,000 of those miles in NYC-for the past 25 years or so. Did my early accidents have anything to do with that? Absolutely not. Maturity, a willingness to learn, and a little luck all come into play. That’s not to say you cannot learn from a crash but to say that’s the only way to learn??? No way!

Look, nobody is going to deny your main point, that the more experience that you have on the road the better. Most of us probably won’t even disagree that most-though not all-17 year olds are probably not ready for a motorcycle. However making ridiculous statements like “your chances of survival are slim”, “you can only learn from crashing” or that a 6’2″ 255lb. 17 year old needs to burn fat, does nothing but destroy your credibility with the OP and the rest of us, leaving us to discount the sensible advice that your post may contain.

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I believe he mentioned in a post that he was going to be out of touch for a bit. I don’t remember exactly what he said but I’m pretty sure I remember him saying he’d be riding a Segway.

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As I’ve stated a few times on this board, for the most part I’m not really drawn to most Japanese bikes, but that Kawasaki Z1000 is a beautiful bike, definitely tempting. Did I read that they’re going to stop offering it in the US due to disappointing sales?

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Very true, though they seem to be my second choice in most categories. Seems like most European manufacturers have a relatively limited product line, but Triumph, much like the big 4, seems to have a top notch performer in just about every category of motorcycle.

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Years ago, right after college, a friend bought himself a used 911. He’d ride down the highway in his Porsche reading Penthouse. Wonder whatever happened to him? Oh yeah, he’s a doctor.

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Since watching that episode I don’t know how many times my wife has semi screamed at me “Enough with the Futa Pass already!”

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SCR and David, those are two things I thought about. When I was caught in traffic before I got downtown I saw how convenient lane splitting would be-never considered it as I’m almost certain it isn’t legal in Quebec. However, as convenient as it would be it looked like it would be a pretty scary ride, certainly until you got used to it. Downtown I don’t think it would have helped much as there weren’t any lanes to split, more like masses of cars crammed together heading in the same general direction, but at every angle possible. As for a scooter, the downtown portion of the debacle certainly would have been a little less unpleasant on my scooter with CVT and having about 200 fewer lbs to hold up, bit it still wouldn’t have been fun. One day I’d like to ride my scooter in NYC but the logistics of getting it there make it pretty unlikely, however, I am planning a trip to Italy in the next few years and certainly plan on riding a Vespa through Rome.

Speedy, lived many years in NYC, but long before I rode. My guess is that sometime in the next year or two the Ducati will find itself on the streets of Manhattan, if only because so many of my friends who’d have to have an evacuation order to leave the city, want to see my bike-more precisely they want to see me on the bike hoping to be lucky enough to see me do something embarrassing.

To add to my initial post, this is how exhausted I was. Although I didn’t really make this detail clear, didn’t want the post to go on forever, part of the reason we rode so much in the city is that before checking in to our hotel we wanted to go to a specialty food store and pick up some things to bring home. Right next to the store a brand new shop had opened, Ducati Montreal, and I couldn’t muster the energy to even poke my nose in, just wanted to make it to the hotel before I passed out.

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…we have a winner. Flying toilet paper missiles definitely qualifies as a crazy thing to encounter on a ride.

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Can’t stress enough your last point. Go out there with the confidence that if you ride within your ability that you will never crash, however, dress as if you’re going to high side every time you squeeze the brakes.

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