Just this weekend I got my first bike - a Honda XL750 Transalp. Winter is coming where I live, so when I saw a blue sky, dry roads and temperatures just over 0, I thought I could have a little ride. But that wasn’t the stupid, even though I forgot the keys after being completely suited up with thin jogging gloves and winter gloves.
There wasn’t any stupid during the ride, although I forgot the keys again after putting on the two pairs of gloves after a little break. Or that I kept hitting the hazard lights by accident, or the high beams.
The stupid was when I got back and rolled into the driveway. I wanted to slowly roll in and park in front of the wall of the garage. Had the clutch pulled and apparently twisted my wrist to get my thumb on the kill switch. The motor revved up so loud it scared the whole family out the house and onto the porch, where they witnessed me rolling towards the wall, bumping into it because I was so startled I didn’t remember to apply the brake and me falling very, very slowly and gently (almost with a certain grace, I hope) to the side.
As far as I could see, there’s only a few scratches on the bar end and the peg. Whew! But, I was told I bumped hard enough that the rear wheel lifted into the air! Hope that the fork and frame are ok!
Was a real downer after the nice ride, but I guess it’s true what I heard, that all riders fall at least once!
Heh, when I lived in the UK I travelled 200 miles a few times to go on advanced courses.
It’s paid off many times for me, as an example last tuesday I came around a blind bend with a bit of speed to find a big fat boar looking confused in the middle of the road. On the advanced machine handling course I did a few years back we covered emergency swerves at high speed (up to 70mph), and I just went around the back of the boar … without that training I’d have probably hit square on.