Surviving your first year on a motorcycle: part two

Get your gear right
There are a few things you need to know about motorcycle gear. Crucially, it is all passive safety gear. That means it doesn’t actually do anything until you’re sliding or tumbling down the road.

Also crucially, nothing you wear, be it a full leather race suit you paid $3000 for, or a povo-pack bargain-bin jacket with some questionable armour in the shoulders and elbows, is going to do anything about mitigating crush or impact injuries.

All motorcycle gear is designed to do is prevent you losing your skin as you meet the bitumen. If you meet a car, a tree, or a bus stop, all bets are off. This is why racetracks have run-off areas. The racer can slide for hundreds of metres and walk away without any injury because he hasn’t impacted with anything.

Also understand leather is generally better than textile in a slide. Textile is generally warmer and more weatherproof than leather. But nothing is really waterproof. Gloves, boots, jackets – not matter what you pay for them, eventually they will let water in, even if the only place it can enter is via the neck-opening. Some gear is better at keeping you dry for longer, but if you spend eight hours riding in the rain, you will get wet.

Most of the time, you get what you pay for with motorcycle gear. A $1000 jacket will be better in many ways than a $200 jacket. You will only find this out if you crash in it, but that is exactly the right time to discover that triple-stitched seams are always better than single-stitched seams.

Oh, and just a word about those very popular Kevlar-impregnated jeans. Yes, they are more robust in a slide than normal jeans. But sliding causes friction and Kevlar burns are quite unpleasant. And do bear in mind that jeans, Kevlar or not, can and do ride up your legs in a slide. It’s the nature of jeans, and it explains why you see so many pictures of riders from the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s with their pants tucked into their boots. But that’s not a cool look in 2017. And fair enough.

Seriously, it’s best not to fall off and keep your riding gear passive, but don’t skimp on it when you’re buying it.

Ideally, you’ll have a good leather jacket for most of the year, a warm winter textile unit for when it’s freezing, a pair of summer gloves and a pair of winter gloves, two pairs of boots (you will have to dry a pair eventually), and two pairs of pants. Go the leather in preference to textile, go the textile in preference to Kevlar jeans, and go the Kevlar jeans in preference to normal jeans.

Now buy a helmet that fits. That’s the most important thing. All helmets sold in this country are deemed to have passed a host of government-mandated tests. So on paper, they are all as “safe” as each other.

As a rule of thumb, buy the lightest helmet you can get. Yes, it will cost more, but the lighter it is, the more comfortable it will be and the less inertia it will provide on your neck in an accident.

People’s heads are all differently shaped and some heads will fit better into Sharks and some will fit better into Arais. Shop around, and once again, leave your poverty at the door.

Remember how we spoke about this motorcycle riding as not being an economical thing? Oh, and once last thing. Your helmet is not suddenly useless if you drop it on the ground.

General principles
Ride all the time. No matter what the weather, ride. No matter what the road conditions, ride. Long distances, short distances, medium distances – ride them all. It’s the only way you’ll get better at riding, which is very much a learn-by-doing thing. It then follows the more you do of it, the better you’ll get at it.

But be aware of well-meaning comrades. Most people don’t ride very well at all, and since you’re new to this, you could very well pick up bad habits which you’ll then carry until they bite you, or someone with a clue actually corrects you.

The only people you should be listening to are accredited riding instructors, and even some of them have been known to offer dumb advice.

Self-styled ‘mentors’ you find on social media riding groups are an abomination and really only good to hit with massive law suits from your hospital bed. They mean well. Their intentions are good, but you know the road to Hell is paved with just those intentions.

Please understand you are riding alone all of the time. No-one can ride your bike for you, and no-one can see what you’re doing or not doing if they’re in front of you or behind you. You are on your won. Even when you’re in a group of other riders, you are riding alone.

And for your first formative year, you would be better served riding alone for the most part. By all means go on group rides, if only to appreciate the full horror of what they can be like, but always ride within your comfort zone. Yes, it’s a cliché, but it’s a cliché because it’s true.

You’re not going to learn much of anything trying to follow experienced riders even when they tell you to follow them and they’re gonna take it easy. Their idea of “taking it easy” may well not be your idea of taking it easy. And the next thing you know you’re in a corner way over your head and we’re back in hospital again.

You are your own best friend on a motorcycle. And the only place you’ll get to know your best friend is on the road. So do the long rides. Make the time. Spend three consecutive days on your bike and you’ll be three times a better rider than when you set off on your journey.

Short hops around the city are all well and good, and you should be riding in traffic as often as possible, but it’s too easy for that to become all the riding you do. The routes are the same, and soon complacency will set in. You’ve ridden this road a hundred times, after all. There are no surprises, surely? And then there are. And then you’re back visiting with surgeons. See how this works?

So ride new roads, take the paths less travelled. Every kilometre you do is a kilometre of experience you can notch onto your belt.
Your first year on a motorcycle will be the most thrilling, fulfilling and enthralling year of your life.

Until the second year. And the third, and so on. It’s entirely up to you to see you make it through.

Related reading: Surviving your first year on a motorcycle: part one