What do you do when...

[CrashBomb]

...A squid who's been riding for six months and five thousand miles tries to advise someone who wants to buy a decent "starter bike?"

Do you ignore the entire debate, or do what you can to educate the future rider and ignore squidly no matter how loud he is?

Squidder also regularly stomps 'busas and 14s with his "sprocket and slip on" 954.:suspect:




I've had the "I want a bike, what should I buy" debate so many times I should be getting a paycheck for it. I always try to educate the would be rider about a few things, and then recommend an old 250 twin or SV 650. But there's always a 17 year old with a litre bike who thinks he knows what he's talking about because he's been riding for a week and hasn't crashed yet.

 

[teamorion22]

thats funny. honestly, unless I know the new rider or i am asked my opinion i just ignore the debate. I will listen though, until i reach the point that I feel I am becoming dumber for listening then I will walk away

 

[pbghost]

if the prospective new biker is sincere in getting into riding, by all means give better advice than the squid...it might save his life!

 

[TruWrecks]

I usually hang around long enough to talk to the prospective buyer after the squid is done mentally puking, if I have time. Then I tell them to ignore said squid. I like to find out more about the prospective buyer and then suggest a few different styles of very forgiving bikes to start on. Dual sport bikes would be the perfect starter bikes if they sat a bit lower stock. They are tough, pretty easy to take care of and get great mileage. They take very little damage when they get dropped. I decent set of tires and they can rail the corners pretty well.

 

[Mr Brown]

I usually hang around long enough to talk to the prospective buyer after the squid is done mentally puking, if I have time. Then I tell them to ignore said squid. I like to find out more about the prospective buyer and then suggest a few different styles of very forgiving bikes to start on. Dual sport bikes would be the perfect starter bikes if they sat a bit lower stock. They are tough, pretty easy to take care of and get great mileage. They take very little damage when they get dropped. I decent set of tires and they can rail the corners pretty well.

Excellent advice.
Only thing different with me is that I would speak up in front of said squid. You may be saving somebody from injury or worse by letting them know the real deal.

 

[CrashBomb]

if the prospective new biker is sincere in getting into riding, by all means give better advice than the squid...it might save his life!

I agree.

But a glaring problem remains.

I've seen it time and time again.

The burgeoning motorcyclist almost always has eyes bigger than his abilities; he has an appetite for a big bike.

Knowledgeable people have told him:
Buy small
Get an old 250
Buy a cheap twin
Get an SV and learn how to ride the piss out of it
The bigger bikes will come later

But the squids who have been riding for less than twelve minutes show up with their comments of: "OMG LAWL j00 won't crash, eye didn't and eye had mah bike since yesterday."

Gradually, these voices begin to outweigh the sensible ones, and the people who know what they're talking about give up and go do something else, having tired of the debate that they can never win. The conversation always deteriorates into a "mah bike is fasta den yor bike" slugfest between teenagers and the new rider doesn't know who to believe.

A lot of "first bike" posts I've seen on various bike forums over the years seem to be more about seeking validation from the masses than searching for reasonable advice. The newbie is going to buy what he wants, regardless of what the voices of experience tell him. Most of the time he seems to have already made up his mind and only wants people to tell him he's making the right decision.

At this point, the only thing you can do is try to educate him about gear and hope your advice isn't lost in the cacophany of "eye pwn teh busaz wif mah segwayyyyyy," testosterone induced arguing.

 

[The Big Red One]

...A squid who's been riding for six months and five thousand miles tries to advise someone who wants to buy a decent "starter bike?"

Do you ignore the entire debate, or do what you can to educate the future rider and ignore squidly no matter how loud he is?

Squidder also regularly stomps 'busas and 14s with his "sprocket and slip on" 954.:suspect:




I've had the "I want a bike, what should I buy" debate so many times I should be getting a paycheck for it. I always try to educate the would be rider about a few things, and then recommend an old 250 twin or SV 650. But there's always a 17 year old with a litre bike who thinks he knows what he's talking about because he's been riding for a week and hasn't crashed yet.

There's always going to be kids/squids like that.....if you spend you're time worrying about them, thats valuable time you should be enjoying. Life isn't forever...and neither are squid-kids Unless they're talking directly to you I'd ignore them and go on about your business of enjoying life

 

[CrashBomb]

It's not the squid kids that my concern lies with. The sooner they grow up or remove themselves from the gene pool the better.

It's the advice they seem hell bent on giving to inexperienced riders that makes me worry.

Picture this:
You've never been on a bike before. You decide you're going to learn to ride. There are approximately 974,437,588 different motorcycles in the world and you don't know ANYTHING about ANY of them. You don't know that there are squids and experienced riders. To you, a motorcyclist is a motorcyclist is a motorcyclist. You've got a hankering for that shiny new rocket bike that all the magazines are saying is the fastest thing in the universe. A few people have said, "too much bike...start small." But a bunch of other people have told you they started on ultra fast bikes and they're still alive.

Now imagine that you're 17 and the conversation has progressed to the point where people are calling each other out on having the fastest bike around.

Whose advice are you going to take?

How do they know who to listen to; someone older and wiser? Of course not, teenagers aren't exactly world famous for that particular trait. They're going to listen to the 19 year old whose been riding his super sport race bike for a month and considers himself a better than average rider because he's got a few hundred miles under his belt and is now learning to yank the front wheel off the ground every chance he gets.

How do you make your voice heard above the din? Maybe it's a sign that I'm getting older, but I'm tiring of arguing with people who have already made up their minds to be stupid.



Share your stories of people you've turned on to (or off of) motorcycling.

 

[MPH 200]

Ask him when the last time he was at the track honing his craft. If he says never just start laughing real loud & ask the new guy why he would even talk to him...

 

[Fastfrog007]

thats funny. honestly, unless I know the new rider or i am asked my opinion i just ignore the debate. I will listen though, until i reach the point that I feel I am becoming dumber for listening then I will walk away

couldnt have said it better

 

[proud dad]

This dates back a couple years.A 23 year old is arguing with a 30 something about this.Except it's the younger telling the older not to start on a 1000,say's it's too much machine for a beginner.The older gent tells him he's young and stupid,don't know what he's talking about,this went on for a week or so.Early last year the older gent bought a left over R1.Road it once then put cams,exhaust and pc on it.12 o'clocked it 100 feet out of his driveway on the test ride. I'm bad.

The youngen been riden since he was 5.Small sportbike at 16 and worked his way up to a 1000.

The older knuckle head rode a dirtbike when he was 12.So he thought that made him an expert.He works for the same company I do now,but across town.Everyone there warned him,he said he would proove them wrong. He prooved something

 

[The Big Red One]

It's not the squid kids that my concern lies with. The sooner they grow up or remove themselves from the gene pool the better.

It's the advice they seem hell bent on giving to inexperienced riders that makes me worry.

Picture this:
You've never been on a bike before. You decide you're going to learn to ride. There are approximately 974,437,588 different motorcycles in the world and you don't know ANYTHING about ANY of them. You don't know that there are squids and experienced riders. To you, a motorcyclist is a motorcyclist is a motorcyclist. You've got a hankering for that shiny new rocket bike that all the magazines are saying is the fastest thing in the universe. A few people have said, "too much bike...start small." But a bunch of other people have told you they started on ultra fast bikes and they're still alive.

Now imagine that you're 17 and the conversation has progressed to the point where people are calling each other out on having the fastest bike around.

Whose advice are you going to take?

How do they know who to listen to; someone older and wiser? Of course not, teenagers aren't exactly world famous for that particular trait. They're going to listen to the 19 year old whose been riding his super sport race bike for a month and considers himself a better than average rider because he's got a few hundred miles under his belt and is now learning to yank the front wheel off the ground every chance he gets.

How do you make your voice heard above the din? Maybe it's a sign that I'm getting older, but I'm tiring of arguing with people who have already made up their minds to be stupid.



Share your stories of people you've turned on to (or off of) motorcycling.

Crash I applaud you....you're a better man than me You still actually care enough to try to protect and educate every new rider you come across.......in fact I think you might care a bit too much I realized a long time ago that the kids are always coming, and I can't educate them all, too many, they can be too stubborn, and I'm getting too old. Now I just try and help the ones I'm personally involved with, and let the rest depend on folks close to them for help....hopefully