Ever wonder what the underside of the R1200GS looks like?
From the oliepeil.nl website (in Dutch).

The ride to the dojo was particularly difficult due to Friday night traffic before a 3-day weekend. I was sufficiently rattled by the traffic that I did not go through my normal dojo arrival routine which includes locking the bike. Still, there's no getting around it, I'm an idiot who didn't lock her bike's steering or disc-lock the front wheel. Some scumbag tried to paddle-walk off with my bike.

Bike thieves are the lowest form of life.Thanks to Jenny, a quick, clear thinking and brave member of the dojo, my bike is fine, only missing the plate around the ignition. Jenny saw the guy mount my bike and paddle off. She wasn't sure whether it was my bike or Amanda's but she knew it belonged to one of the women at the dojo. Jenny got in her car and chased the guy down the block yelling out the window, "hey, that's not your bike!." She intimidated the guy into abandoning the bike. At least he put the kickstand down before he ran off. Not only did she make the decision to intercede, she did so with great presence of mind - she kept herself safe by staying in her car, and keeping a safe distance from that bike-thieving rat on two legs. The bike and I were lucky. One person can make a difference; Jenny is an angel. Yes, I got the message - I'll be more careful.

Another dojo member, Ames, had called the police. I filed a police report. In Berkeley, you have to file the stolen bike report before you can file the recovered bike report. I asked if it was possible that I might get pulled over on the way home by an eagle-eye cop who was up on the latest stolen vehicle reports. Officer Raab gave me his card with the report number, and instructed me thus, "If you get pulled over, get off the bike slowly, keep your hands in front of you, stay calm even if the office has drawn their gun, and look the officer in the eyes. When the officer stops yelling and gives you a chance to answer, ask him to check the report again and look for the word 'recovered' in the report." I was not to reach into my pocket to get Officer Raab's card without asking permission first. I didn't get stopped on my way home, thank goodness.

While Officer Raab was making the report, a fellow on a bicycle was hanging around within hearing distance. He kept out of the interaction, but I didn't like the fact that he was close enough to hear me give my name, phone number, and address to the officer. I was concerned about identity privacy. I learned later that in Berkeley, the community "witnesses" interactions between police and citizens because sometimes the interactions don't match the community's notion of "protect and serve". I understand this mindset; I was 14 when the Kent State incident occurred. It has taken me years to get to a neutral frame of mind when dealing with law enforcement. When I see a person of color pulled over, I always wonder if they are guilty of a traffic violation or just guilty of DWB (driving while black, or driving while brown). On the other hand, and maybe it is a function of getting older, I'm actually happy to see a strong Highway Patrol presence on New Year's Eve, and Thanksgiving, two evenings notorious for drunk drivers. And I sure as heck wish they were around when some self-important numbskull scofflaw runs a red light, but I don't want them around when I'm pushing the speed limit.

* * *

Lock your bikes, folks. And remember the Power of One.

Tom Nash's Excellent Adventure in Eastern Europe

Here's a treat for all of you. Tom Nash is an American living and working in Denmark. He finnagled a tour of Eastern Europe from his employer and wrote about it in Motorcycle Daily. http://www.motorcycledaily.com/07june06_europetom.htm, or here's the article in .pdf format for when the link to Motorcycle Daily goes stale.

Like every writer / blogger, I enjoy knowing that people are reading my stuff. As a blogger, I can check my web site statistics which give me an idea of how many regular readers I have, and what you all are reading or looking it. Today I discovered that someone has created a web page for pictures of naked females on motorcycles and called it by an imaginative name "http://www.motoriders.info/naked-girls-on-motorcycles/index.php". Is my site listed? Yup. And by my referencing that site, we have achieved a full circular reference. At least this way, all of you who clicked on the link will work your way through the sites, and eventually get back to this one. Devilishly clever, don't you agree? And now that you've found your way back, I'll tell you that I found mostly clothed women riders, not the advertised special.

Am I guilty guilty guilty of manipulating my blog content for the sole purpose of messing with the webstats? Or am I merely running a scientific experiment to test the repeatability of the phenomena where my web status increased from 3,000 hits per month to a one time occurrence of 4,000 hits per month for January 2006, all because I posted links to pictures of nude women on motorbikes. Tell the truth, could you resist the temptation of being mildly irresponsible in the name of science?

Visit to the Honda Rider Center in Colton, CA - MSF Dirtbike Class

Last July when Peter and I rode across the United States, I came to appreciate what a good friend traction is to people riding on rubber wheels, and how little I knew about how to keep good traction under changing circumstances. Highway surfaces need to be maintained which often means scraping off that nice bitumen emulsion surface that my road tires like, exposing miles of dirt and gravel road bed. It became painfully apparent that my riding skills were insufficient for these conditions.

Everyone would slow down when the road would change to dirt. One of us had to slow down more than others. She got tense, nearly bit through the inside of her lower lip, and stagger-steered the bike like a bee that has left its stinger elsewhere. To make matters worse, these dorky cruisers guys would pass me. How could they ride like that, with their elbows up and out, using an extended leg to steer with? These were body positions that would you would never see at a race track. Still, they were managing on dirt a whole lot better than I was.

The map of the Alaska Canada highway has been pinned to my office wall for months. Riding to the Northwest Territories, into Alaska and back home to Northern Calfornia will be a six to seven thousand mile ride. No matter how much incense I burn, some of those roads are not going to be nicely paved.

* * *

My birthday falls on a day close to the end of the year. We normally ask each other about holiday gifts and Peter normally asks, "What do you want for your birthday?" I didn't hear this question although I vaguely recall the discussion of exchanging holiday gifts. Last fall I brought home a copy of Friction Zone which had reviews of various schools offering the MSF dirtbike class in California. The Honda Riders Education Center in Colton stood out as the best facility for new dirt bike riders. [Friction Zone doesn't make its past articles available online. Here is a review of the center from the American Motorcycle Association.] My 49th birthday gift was a certificate for the MSF Dirtbike Class at the center in Colton.

Never heard of Colton? Neither had I. Colton is next to the San Bernadino foothills.

Summer temperatures in this part of Southern California typically hit the triple-digit mark. I signed up for the 3:30 afternoon class to avoid the heat. My teachers were Charity, a vivacious dirt-only rider with five years experience teaching newbie dirt riders, and Jeremey, a long-time moto-cross teacher, recently certified to teach this class. As such, he was the demo dolly.

The only gear the center does not provide to dirt bike students is underwear and socks. The facility's gear locker looks like a store - they have everything you need and in every size. They can outfit small children to large adults with all the outerwear and protective gear needed for the class.

Speaking of small children, I arrived at the center early, and watched part of the morning class of five kids and an adult. The lesson was how to ride over a length of 2x4. Jeremy and Charity placed two 12-foot long 2x4s about twenty feet apart. Jeremy demonstrated how to ride over them. The first person in line was a kid who looked to be about seven years old. I thought about how unhappy I would be to see a length of wood like that lying in the fast lane of highway 101 as I approached at about 80 mph. That little kid, the kids after her, and the adult rode over those lengths of wood gingerly at first, then with confidence. Whatever technique they had just practiced, I wanted it. If those kids could do it then I could too. I later found out the kids were little girls - blessings on their parents for investing in starting them out right.

I was given an alien machine called a Honda CRF 150F, a 4-stroke single cylinder bike weighing about 216 pounds. The lowest seat setting is 32.5 inches off the ground. I had about as much ground contact on this bike as I have on the R1200GS - not much. I was hoping that I might get a bike that would allow me to have both feet flat on the ground, but it appears that unless I'm willing to lower the suspension of a bike, or buy a cruiser, the heels of my boots are going to be very clean.

Compare the wheels and tires. The dirt bike's wheels has spokes to better distribute the load, and check out the knobby tires. The wheels that are currently on my bike have "designer" spokes; if I get serious about riding off-road, I'll need to get the wheels with the real spokes and put knobbies on them.

The dirt bike boots were much stiffer than my street boots - they offered much more protection - and much less flexibility.

The dirtbike helmet is another alien accouterment - the dirtbike lid has a jutting chin and a neanderthal brow. My full-face helmet looks like a golf ball that has had liposuction to remove the dimples. Typically one wears googles with the dirtbike helmet.

The MSF dirtbike class started with the same fundamentals that I remember from my MSF street class: leaning throttle control, shifting and braking first riding in a straight line.

So, a little flashback to 2003 - Peter and I were at the Streets of Willow track taking class with Reg Pridmore. They do the same MSF street bike class braking exercise to teach the rider the different behaviors of the front and rear brake. If you ride a bicycle, the behavior is similar. Like many street riders with no dirt experience, I rely primarily on the front brake. When it was my turn to run the rear brake exercise, I confidently accelerated, guaged my distance, and firmly put the left foot down on the ..., umm, wait, the brake is on the right side. The eyes of the teacher widened in surprise at the same rate that I flushed with embarassment.

Street riders who don't have linked brakes have to be careful when they use the rear brake. Ideally, you apply it steadily. Applying the rear brake sharply can result in locking it up, which is often followed by falling over. Most sport bike riders rely on their front brake. If you are a dirt rider, you rely on the rear brake, and rarely use the front brake. I've only started using the rear brake because on the GS the front and rear brakes are linked.

Riding in an oval was the next challenge. Ovals come before circles because the oval offers a straight line followed by a curve on both sides. In general, to accomplish a turn on my street bike, I would shift my weight to the inside of the curve, lean the bike into the curve, and keep my elbows tucked in. For this class, Charity had instructed me to manage turns by rotating my body around the tank so my butt would be off the center line of the bike and hiked out on the outside of the curve. My outside elbow was to be up high and out, the inside arm relatively straight, pressing the down on the handle grip. For this particular oval-riding exercise I was to ride the bike in a standing position, like a jack-knife, on the straight side of the oval, and in the seated position around the curves.

Talk about feeling awkward. As I progressed to tighter turns in a circle I found it increasingly more difficult to fight my street riding body position habits. All my muscle memory based intuitions were wrong. I had to stop myself from reaching for the front brake all the time. Being a street rider, I would only tap the rear brake instead of keeping my foot on it to come to a full stop, when meant my stops were not well-controlled. Because of my leg length, I like to put both feet on the ground to stabilize the bike at a stop. In my street riding experience I've only had to "stand on the brake" once - I was using the front and rear brakes in a panic stop. I did stop the bike in time, and, we both just about fell over immediately after because my left foot went looking for the ground below and found it much further "down" than expected. The right foot was still on the brake. Even so, I was taking this class to acquire new skills, and proper use of the rear brake was emerging high on the list.

The riding course had a bowl with a hill on one side. The next exercise was to ride into the bowl, up the hill, stall out, dismount, work the bike into a position where I could mount it and ride out of the bowl. The hill was small, but when I was given my instructions, that little hill might was well have been Kilimanjaro. Then I remembered that seven year old girl, and figured what's the worst that can happen? I would fall over in the nice soft dirt. Maybe get a stone bruise on my butt. I could deal with that. Heck, I was even supposed to stall the bike. I managed the exercise okay.

Now I was supposed to ride in a circle in the bowl, and along the side of that hill. There were sections of the bowl where the dirt was particularly soft. The bike would dance around but the knobby tires bit into the dirt - the skittishness of the bike under my mishandling never caused me to panic. Riding on a 45% slanting hill reminded me a little of rock climbing - contrary to my instincts, keeping close to the rock or hill is counterproductive. To ride across the slope of the hill, I was to stand on the bike and hike my body out away from the hill, and push the bike towards the hill. Pushing the bike towards the hill kept the wheels in a true vertical position, allowing gravity to work on my behalf.

Riding over the 12-foot length of 2x4 was hugely satisfying.

The final exercise was a "trail ride". The "trail" is human-made - a well-constructed simulation of a variety of riding surfaces that one might encounter in the wild, including corrugated dirt and gravel, stones and dirt, sand, and my favorite, a small stream with rounded river stones mercifully set in concrete for stability. The plants on the trail ride were representative of native California environments. There was a tight turn with a rut that I tried to avoid even though Jeremy had put his bike into it matter-of-factly. Taking what appeared to be the "easy" route resulted in scraping my boot-encased leg against an embankment and throwing me off-balance. I didn't fall off. I did take the rut the next time around.

At the end of the class my brain was fried, my body was tired and confused. And I understood why everyone has been telling me that I would be a better street rider if I took a few dirt bike classes. I get that now. Next step - find a way to take a few more classes a little closer to home.

If you are looking for a great place in Southern California to take either an MSF street or dirt bike class, check out the Colton Honda Riders Education Center [contact information at the bottom of this link]. The teaching staff and the center administration folks were great. The facility is comfortable and set up for exactly what riders and teaching staff need for the MSF courses.

Now, since I just sold the F3, I suppose I should be looking for a dirt bike. Preferably one previously ridden by a 12-year old, that should be about the right ride height.