A Long, Long Time Ago

Roughly 10 years ago and not too far away from where I currently reside in the deep south of Georgia, I had my first taste of motorcycles via a ride on the back of my high school boyfriend's CBR 600.  He was the same height as me and had much to learn about shifting.  On our first ride, every time he'd shift my helmet would bang into the back of his and he would fuss at me.  This forced me to get creative with my pillion riding stance... I would put one hand in front of him on the tank to hold me up and then would hold around his waist with my other hand to ensure I could feel him move when he was trying to figure out how to maneuver his bike.  Needless to say, my intimate meetings with the back seat of that CBR left a bad taste in my mouth and made me loathe longer rides (longer meaning over 30 minutes).  When I confronted my boyfriend and told him that I wanted to learn how to ride my own bike, he was not a supporter of that idea, so I decided that I no longer wanted to be a passenger on a bike- nor did I want a boyfriend anymore.

I said "goodbye" to my boyfriend and the backseat of his CBR and signed up for an MSF (Motorcycle Safety Foundation) course through my local Harley Davidson dealership.  I had never been on a 2 wheeled vehicle before, besides a bicycle.  I had never driven a motor vehicle that had a hand clutch, nor was I any good at driving a manual car.  My shifting skills left MUCH to be desired.  The MSF course I took was 4 days long.  It consisted of 2 days of classroom learning after school/work and then 2 full days of on-bike education.  It ends on Sunday with your MSF Test, and if you pass it you automatically receive your motorcycle license/certification without having to go take the test at the DMV.  There was one other woman in my MSF course and the reason she was there was because she was the passenger on her husband's motorcycle when they crashed and now she was scared to ride as a passenger and was hoping to gain some confidence in riding her own bike.  There were also a couple of men there who had crashed and were trying to gain some confidence back.

Our instructors were fantastic!  They really took the time to work with each one of us in the class individually, to give us tips and us out.  We were on Buell Blasts, which are sportbike style bikes, so they were kind of hard for some of the riders to get used to because they were used to cruiser style bikes.  I enjoyed the Blast, though, and had dreams of owning my own sportbike some day.  During one of our drills, which was a right turn, left turn, or stop- based on the instructors hand signals, I dropped my Buell.  We were told to shift up into 2nd gear while approaching the instructor and then whatever signal he gave us we had to do.  I got up into 2nd gear and as I got closer to him, both of his arms went out, which meant stop.  So, I shifted down into 1st, pulled my hand brake and gently stepped on my foot brake, but when I went to put my left foot down on the pavement, I was on a bit of a hill and didn't place my foot securely so the bike started to lean.  I still remember it like it was in slow motion... I fought SO HARD to keep that bike upright.  It just slowly kept leaning further and further to the left and I fought it with everything that I had until the instructor looked at me and told me to let it go and push away from the bike.  I listened to him and pushed away from the bike, slowly falling backwards to land in a sitting position with the bike on it's side next to me.  

I felt like an utter failure and my pride was very wounded.  The instructors came over and told me it was no big deal as all it did was break the corner of the front turn signal, but I was still ashamed and embarrassed.  They took that time to teach the class how to lift a bike by yourself, which was one of the most helpful things they could have done as over the next few months I got plenty of practice in.  There were a few other little incidents from some of the other riders and the instructors handled each with compassion and took that time to educate everyone.  At the end of the class, we all took our tests and we all passed!  The instructors then had a little awards ceremony for us and gave each of us a nickname.  I was given the nickname of "Asphalt Cowgirl" because I fell off the Blast and landed on my Asphalt.  I framed that certificate and have it hanging on the wall next to my desk at home.  :-)

After the MSF course I decided that it was time to start looking for my very own motorcycle.  I joined a local sportbike internet forum and quickly met some incredible friends/mentors.  They gave me recommendations on which bikes I should look into as my first bike and ultimately helped me pick my first bike.  Another forum member was upgrading to a bigger bike that he could use for trackdays, so he was selling his 1993 Yamaha FZR 600.  The bike's "name" was Captain America, as it was the red, white, and blue color scheme.  It was in pristine condition.  For being over 10 years old, it had very low miles on it and had not been run too hard.  I swung my leg over it and fell in love.  I paid $2,500 for "The Captain" and my friend trailored it home for me as I wasn't quite comfortable enough to ride it home on my own.  For the next few weeks I would ride my bike to some local parking lots to meet my friends and do parking lot practice.  I practiced all of my slow speed maneuvers as well as starting and stopping.  My parking lot time was very helpful in boosting my confidence as a rider and on my new bike.  The FZR was a bit twitchy, so learning it in a parking lot was great as I didn't have to worry about getting run over every time I stalled the bike.

Me and "The Captain"

Once I got enough practice in, I started joining in on some of the group rides that the members of our forum put together.  Luckily, I'm within an hour or two of some really incredible twisty roads, so I could slab it for an hour and then hit up areas like Suches, Fort Mountain, and Blood Mountain.  We'd hit the twisties up to Helen (a little Bavarian town in Northeast Georgia), grab some lunch, and then ride some of the sweeper roads back home.  After riding on the roads for a few months, I got the bug to do a trackday as I LOVED turning my FZR, but the mountains just weren't the place for me to try to push my comfort zone.  Luckily, a few of my mentors were big trackday riders/coaches, so I had no problem signing up for my first trackday at Jennings GP in Jennings, Florida.  Less than 6 months after getting my motorcycle license and buying my FZR, I did my first trackday at Jennings.  I did a few more trackdays after that, but decided to give my FZR a break from the hard track riding.

My first trackday at Jennings GP

Now 10 years and many amazing motorcycle trips later, I still have my FZR sitting in my garage, along with my "touring" YZF 600, and soon will have my new 2015 RX3 Cyclone joining the group!  I'm trying to come to terms with the notion that I don't need 3 motorcycles, but both of my Yamahas have so much sentimental value and are hardly worth more than a few hundred dollars, so selling either one of them just doesn't make much sense to me.  Luckily, my husband has a collection of motorcycles as well, so the pressure for me to sell a motorcycle is super low because that would mean he'd have to sell one of his as well.  :-)  

Dual Sporting the FZR for a camping trip

Deal's Gap on the FZR

I cannot wait to get my RX3 Cyclone out on the road and on some great adventures!  CSC just updated their blog with a picture that the owner took of a bunch of ships hanging out off the coast of Long Beach, CA and one of those boats is the Germany, which is carrying all of our bikes.  Here's the link to that blog post:  http://californiascooterco.com/blog/?p=15592  They are saying that the bikes will hopefully be off the boat within a couple of weeks, so I'm hoping to fly out to California to pick up the bike in mid-April.  I'm also planning on joining them in their Baja trip before I ride back across the country, so let's hope the bikes don't get delayed too long!