Lamonster
SpyderLovers Founder
My youngest son Alex has been bugging me to go for a ride for a while now and after working on his mom's computer all day it seemed like the perfect time to get out and stretch our legs a bit.
Alex will be joining his two brothers in the Marine Corp in Sept. and we won't have much time to do stuff like this. For whatever reason his mom is more worried about the boys riding motorcycles than she is about them going to war. Both Lance and Nathan ship out in August for Africa and Afghanistan and I'm pretty sure riding a motorcycle here in the states is safer than going to battle there. Anyway I digress.
I needed to clean the 109 up before we left and I got to tell you that even though I spent more time on the Spyder last year I still love the 109.
I forgot how twichy the throttle was and I need to tear into that clutch and do some adjustments. Right now as soon as you let go at all it takes off and I was getting some of the dreaded wheel hop too. It was still good enough to ride though and it was really nice to be back on two wheels and to feel the torque of the 9 again. My son kept saying how cool it looked following me from behind.
I led the way and headed toward Newport and the plan was to stop there and get some dinner at the A&W. We took the backroads out there and the weather was great. It's all twisties there and I was watching my mirrors the whole way. Alex took to the Spyder just fine and it wasn't too far into the ride where I didn't worry about him at all. There were no cars on the road so that wasn't really a problem. He rides a XR 250 and a KFX700 and he handles them both with great skill.
I was thinking what good fatherly lessons I could teach him when we sat down to eat about riding. I was thinking about telling him to look through the turns and never look into the ditch because that's where you'll wind up. Problem is I already went through all those things with him.
Then as luck would have it I had the perfect lesson to teach him and I got to teach him by example. We came around one turn and at the corner of my eye I saw a DWD (Death Wish Dog). I did what I was suppose to do and that was nothing. I didn't freak out and try and avoid it and I held my line. If I would have seen him coming I would have slowed down and steered right toward him and hit the throttle. That way I become the aggressor and the alpha dog.
As we pulled in to Newport there were a bunch of bikes going the other way. They all gave us the thumbs up and it was pretty cool to look in my mirror and see my son giving the nod to all the bikers. He thought that was pretty cool and got to experiance first hand what the brotherhood of those who ride in the wind is all about.
When we got to the A&W Alex told me how he saw the dog running fullout down hill toward me and how he hit the brakes and skidded across the road on all fours toward me. He said I missed him by about a foot. I knew it was pretty close. That lead into some more good stories I could share with my son about riding and some of the road hazards you may run into.
As we were drinking our rootbeer floats we watched all the peeps checking out our rides. One guy asked if it was okay to take a good look at them and then he came back in to tell us how cool our rides were. We already knew that.
From there we headed back home and the ride back was even more enjoyable for me. I knew Alex was going to be just fine and I had a chance to reflect on what a cool ride we just had. I had him wait at the bottom of the driveway so I could get a video of him pulling in. When I got to the top his mom was standing there waiting for him with much joy to see he made it back safe. I guess that's just a mom thing.
Any way I thought I would share this with my buds on the board.
Alex will be joining his two brothers in the Marine Corp in Sept. and we won't have much time to do stuff like this. For whatever reason his mom is more worried about the boys riding motorcycles than she is about them going to war. Both Lance and Nathan ship out in August for Africa and Afghanistan and I'm pretty sure riding a motorcycle here in the states is safer than going to battle there. Anyway I digress.
I needed to clean the 109 up before we left and I got to tell you that even though I spent more time on the Spyder last year I still love the 109.
I forgot how twichy the throttle was and I need to tear into that clutch and do some adjustments. Right now as soon as you let go at all it takes off and I was getting some of the dreaded wheel hop too. It was still good enough to ride though and it was really nice to be back on two wheels and to feel the torque of the 9 again. My son kept saying how cool it looked following me from behind.
I led the way and headed toward Newport and the plan was to stop there and get some dinner at the A&W. We took the backroads out there and the weather was great. It's all twisties there and I was watching my mirrors the whole way. Alex took to the Spyder just fine and it wasn't too far into the ride where I didn't worry about him at all. There were no cars on the road so that wasn't really a problem. He rides a XR 250 and a KFX700 and he handles them both with great skill.
I was thinking what good fatherly lessons I could teach him when we sat down to eat about riding. I was thinking about telling him to look through the turns and never look into the ditch because that's where you'll wind up. Problem is I already went through all those things with him.
Then as luck would have it I had the perfect lesson to teach him and I got to teach him by example. We came around one turn and at the corner of my eye I saw a DWD (Death Wish Dog). I did what I was suppose to do and that was nothing. I didn't freak out and try and avoid it and I held my line. If I would have seen him coming I would have slowed down and steered right toward him and hit the throttle. That way I become the aggressor and the alpha dog.
As we pulled in to Newport there were a bunch of bikes going the other way. They all gave us the thumbs up and it was pretty cool to look in my mirror and see my son giving the nod to all the bikers. He thought that was pretty cool and got to experiance first hand what the brotherhood of those who ride in the wind is all about.
When we got to the A&W Alex told me how he saw the dog running fullout down hill toward me and how he hit the brakes and skidded across the road on all fours toward me. He said I missed him by about a foot. I knew it was pretty close. That lead into some more good stories I could share with my son about riding and some of the road hazards you may run into.
As we were drinking our rootbeer floats we watched all the peeps checking out our rides. One guy asked if it was okay to take a good look at them and then he came back in to tell us how cool our rides were. We already knew that.
From there we headed back home and the ride back was even more enjoyable for me. I knew Alex was going to be just fine and I had a chance to reflect on what a cool ride we just had. I had him wait at the bottom of the driveway so I could get a video of him pulling in. When I got to the top his mom was standing there waiting for him with much joy to see he made it back safe. I guess that's just a mom thing.
Any way I thought I would share this with my buds on the board.
[nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ayp2AJTheuM"]YouTube- Broadcast Yourself.[/nomedia]
hyea:
