Two weekends ago I took a motorcycle safety class. For curious minds, I don’t own a motorcycle nor do I plan to purchase one any time soon. It was just something new and interesting to do. And in Illinois it’s free (after they refund the $20 down payment that holds your spot in the class). So why not?
The class was one weekend long: Friday 6-10 PM, Saturday and Sunday 8-5. Friday night was just class time. They have a book they go through, some videos you have to watch that are quite as bad as the 50 year old driver’s education videos I watched 12 years ago, and study questions you go over as a class. I learned all kinds of things about parts of a motorcycle (it has a clutch!) and how to operate it safely. Good things to know since I didn’t know the first thing about motorcycles. I knew my dad and my cousin both had one and I’d ridden on a few and that was about it. Now I know that the clutch is the left hand lever, there’s a foot and a hand brake on the right side, and all that kind of important stuff.
I also learned something about the class. It’s not just to teach you how to ride and ride safely. It’s actually a licensing class. On Sunday they actually give you the driving and written test! That threw me for a loop. I didn’t actually care to get my license right now. I just wanted to learn to ride. Having a test at the end puts all kinds of pressure on me that I don’t need. I stress myself out about tests. I hate failing. Ugh. More on that later.
Saturday we spent the first 5 hours of class learning how to ride. It was fun! A few times across the parking lot and I had the clutch mostly figured out. We worked on curves and turns and emergency stops and other important maneuvering skills to keep us safe. Then we went back into the classroom for a few hours and went over the book more.
When I left class that night, a few things were clear to me. I wasn’t very comfortable on a motorcycle. Don’t get me wrong, it was fun to learn to ride, but the thought of being unleashed onto the streets and highways alone after just one more half day of riding around a parking lot didn’t seem appealing to me at all. I could think of two reasons I felt that way. First off, I don’t have very good balance. Things that require balance (rollerskating, water skiing, standing on one foot) were not things I was even remotely good at. Being on two little wheels did not seem all that stable. And it’s not the same as a bicycle. My bike doesn’t go 55 mph, or even 35 mph for that matter. Okay, it did once during RAGBRAI but it was a huge downhill and though it was kind of fun in a oh-crap-my-bike-is-going-to-shake-apart-isn’t-this-exhilarating kind of way I wouldn’t want to go that fast very often. The second reason is that I’m afraid of getting hurt. I’m not that great of a driver anyway, I get easily distracted, and I’ve seen how scary motorcycle accidents are. I don’t want to be a statistic.
Basically Saturday night found me not feeling all that confident that I even wanted a motorcycle license and not even the slightest bit confident that I’d actually pass the driving test. But I got up on Sunday and went to the class anyway. The riding in the morning was still fun but I was really frustrated for the first 20 minutes because I basically had to relearn the use of the clutch. Turns out it’s not quite second nature on your second day doing it. Weird.
When it was time to take the test, I still wasn't quite confident. Especially about the figure eights that you had to do in a little box (i.e. tight turns). Though I never got the figure eights down in practice, I still could have passed the test. Going outside the lines of the box was only 3 points off the test and you could lose 20 points before you failed. So I got in line to do my figure eights because it was the first part of the test and one of the instructors came up to me and said "I really think you can nail this. You just have to lean more to make the turn." So when it was my turn, I leaned more than I had been before (and was really comfortable with) and... I fell over. Yeah, that's right. Two days and no one in the class and gone down with a bike and I did it in the driving test. Awesome. Turns out crashing is an automatic failure on the driving test (as I would assume is true for cars as well) so my test ended there. It was embarrassing and frustrating at the time. In all honesty though, for all the reasons I stated before, I'm really okay with not getting my motorcycle license and I'm not sure I'll try again. Plus, I really don't need any more expensive hobbies!
I love that you tried this! Even though it's hard to learn something that detailed so quickly. Probably most of the people in the class had ridden & learned to ride from friends or family. It was your first shot! So give yourself a break. I am proud that you even tried the turns! I think it would have taken me a lot longer to get up the courage to try those figure 8 turns. Woo Steph! :)
ReplyDelete-Carrie