Motorpsycho

A week since my last post? Holy crap time flies. I’ve been up to a lot, though.

Including taking a motorcycle class through the Motorcycle Safety Foundation.

My first class was last night, and our instructors Steve and “The Dude” (yes, really) took us through all the classwork. Tomorrow we get to jump on the bikes and start rolling. It looks like they’ve got Honda Nighthawks and Rebels, which are about as small as street bikes come (engine-wise) and thus they make good training bikes. I picked up a pair of riding gloves, but I’ll have to mooch a helmet (regardless of your personal feelings about such things, both are required to take the course).

The good news about the course so far is a lot of it is common sense. I understand the reasoning behind wearing a lot of the protective gear, I understand how bike visibility works, and I’ve been shown around the workings and controls of a bike before. I’ve been told about coutnersteering, but it’s one of those things I’ll probably have to get a feel for before fully understanding it.

So why learn now? I’ve been asked several times if it’s a mid-life crisis, but no, I don’t think so. I’ve wanted to learn to ride for a long time, I just didn’t know how to go about doing it. When I found out it’s only $20 to take a 20-hour MSF course in the state of Illinois, and that I’d be learning safety and proper riding techniques rather than just how to control the bike, I jumped on the opportunity. I hoped to take it earlier, but the class filled up extremely fast.

The next question is usually “What does your wife think of it?” Folks are usually surprised to hear the wife and I originally hoped to take the course together. While her family is full of motorcycle riders, she never actually learned herself. We’ll probably get her signed up ASAP, especially if we do decide to buy a bike.

So why learn at all? The wife’s family is a big part of it. Her aunts, uncles and cousins have a few Harleys between them, and I’ve been asked to ride along a few times. It kinda sucks to drop that sheepish “Erm, I don’t know how to ride…” excuse. On top of that I always thought bikes were pretty cool, and my father-in-law recently purchased a used Honda Gold Wing and is loving it. Even if I never get one of my own — or, I should say, the wife and I never get one of our own — I’d like to be able to jump on one from time to time when the opportunity presents itself.

Hell, even renting one for a weekend sometime might be a lot of fun.

But what really sealed the deal is the gas prices. We dumped our car, and while it hasn’t impacted our lifestyle at all, it would be nice to have something handy to take a ride into town and still leave the other vehicle for the wife in case she has to run out and pick something up for the kids, or take the kids somewhere. Between the gas, insurance, and maintenance, it wasn’t worth keeping a second car around, especially the way most models depreciate.

A bike, meanwhile, would have far smaller payments with the price range I’m looking at, gets far better gas mileage, and I was surprised to find even the insurance costs are less. Once or twice a week I have a six-mile commute, so a cheap Rebel, an older bike, or even a scooter would do the job nicely. I’m not sure about maintenance costs, but two car bills I’ve paid in the past on two different vehicles were damn near as much as a decent used bike. How bad can it be?

Which leaves safety. Yeah, I know it’s dangerous. But so are a lot of other things. The idea behind the course is to make it as safe as possible, which is exactly why Illinois has gotten behind the program and funds it with portions of license plate and driver’s license fees. I’ve also checked out the Hurt Report, a study of over 3600 motorcycle accidents.

This finding gave me a lot of hope:

 24. The motorcycle riders involved in accidents are essentially without training; 92% were self-taught or learned from family or friends. Motorcycle rider training experience reduces accident involvement and is related to reduced injuries in the event of accidents.

This will give me an advantage over a lot of the riders in the accidents, and apparently over a lot of other riders, period. My days of pushing a car to 110mph or so on the highway are behind me, too.

I’ll be up front with something else: for all I know I’ll get on a bike tomorrow and it’ll scare the shit out of me. Sure, I can ride a bicycle, but a motorcycle moves a hell of a lot faster. There’s also a lot of coordination involved in the controls, and you’re not exactly sitting in an enclosed shell engineered to increase your chances of crash survival. From what we were told, it’s not unheard of for people to decide a motorcycle’s not for them and simply not finish the class. I don’t expect I’ll chicken out, but that’s easy to say of a lot of things when you’re sitting on your ass pecking at keys.

All I can do is take the ride and see how it goes.