Happy #MotoMonday!
In my last post, I had just purchased my very first motorcycle, a Kawasaki Ninja 250, and Josh was helping me get it home in the back of his truck. You might remember from my last post, that I very much wanted to be the first person to put miles on my new motorcycle. I also wanted to be the first person to drop it. See, in college I had a friend, Kris, who bought a beautiful new Suzuki GSX-R. He was showing it off to several of us classmates, when one of them asked if he could ride it. Kris obliged and the guy took the bike for a spin around the block. As he was pulling back up to where we all standing, he came to a stop and then just dropped the bike. Kris ran over horrified. Thankfully the guy wasn’t hurt, and the bike was only a little scratched up, but not broken. Kris later admitted to me that he wasn’t mad at the guy for dropping his bike, but disappointed that the first scrapes to his new baby weren’t caused by him, but by someone else. That always stuck with me. So when buying my bike, I made a point of telling my friends, like Johnny and Josh, that they were welcome to ride my motorcycle once I drop it.
So back to bringing my motorcycle home. Josh and I unloaded my bike, and I put on my gear. We fired her up and went about 1/2 a block to a relatively empty parking lot so I could get some practice on my new wheels. I was so excited and took things slow just like I had learned in my Motorcycle Safety Course. Finally I could feel my confidence building and began to accelerate! As I neared the end of the lot, I started to look to the right and prepare for my turn. Then I got nervous, braked hard and fell over! “Well that didn’t take long,” I said laughing to myself. Josh helped me lift it back up (something I soon learned to do on my own) and I asked if he wanted to take her for a spin. It’s funny how much smaller my bike looks when he rides it. I am glad I was the first person to drop her though, it made me not feel so protective when someone else rode her. I got a lot of great practice in that day, and it was yet again another moment where I felt so grateful to have a fellow rider there to encourage and support me as I learned. Please enjoy the photos bellow. While I do not have any of when I dropped her, if you look closely in the last photo, you’ll see my right break lever is bent from when I fell!
Did you feel strongly about being the first person to ride and or drop your bike? Or do you have your own special things that mean a lot to you when it comes to your bike? I would love to hear!
PS: Don’t forget that we are having a sale right now! 10% off your order to Celebrate my 10 years of riding! Enter code YAY10YEARS at checkout for your discount!