[lucky6man]

that brings up a saying, what do you tell a girl with two black eyes?

nothing, who'v already told her twice!

[soccersteve]

"perhaps it should be the rule of wrist"

quote rightfully stollen from "the boondock saints"

[tzortn]

After going to the Cycle World Motorcycle show this weekend my gf asked her if I would teach her how to ride. I immediately told her no, I would be happy to sign us up and take the MSF class with her. That is a great low risk way for someone to learn the basics.

[The CyberPoet]

(A) Get a scratcher. Think an used 250 to 500 cc smaller bike (Ninja 250's and Ninja 500's, Bandit 400, Katana 250, Katana 400, etc) that costs under a grand. If she totals it, no big deal financially.

(B) Put her on the bike, on the centerstand. Get her to learn the controls by memory, so she can select them without having to think about it. Repeat again with the engine on (still on the centerstand). Teach her to learn to start the back tire by releasing the clutch very slowly without using the throttle at all. Teach her how to find neutral on her bike.

(C) Sign her up for the MSF course. While your waiting for the course date, take her out to a dead end street with no buildings or a big parking lot and teach her to learn to start moving (in 1st) by releasing the clutch very slowly without using the throttle at all. This will teach her the most difficult task most new riders have, and that is fine clutch control. She'll stall it out -- be encouraging and tell her to keep at it. She'll get it. From there, teach her how to do a first-second shift and clutch-in stop. Repeat many times. Then go first-second-first-stop. The clutch control is something to be mastered early.

(D) Send her to the MSF course. Don't attend yourself unless you've never taken it -- she'll do better without fear of make a fool of herself in front of you.

(E) When she gets back from the MSF course, take her out and let her practice the same stuff as the course over and over. After a couple weekends of practicing, sit her down and start explaining the other hazards of the real road (visibility of herself, water, potholes, braking lightly just to activate the rear brake light earlier, etc). Take small trips, a few miles at a time, letting her lead with you behind her on your bike. Give her 30 to 40 feet and be ready to stop and act as a barrier for traffic if she should drop it at a stop sign or turn. Your position in back is for her safety and to keep you from pushing her to travel faster than she's comfortable with. Consider investing in a communications system so you can talk with her as she rides -- but keep the talk to a minimum for the first couple months so as not to distract her or get her into conversations that might distract her from the road/surroundings.

(F) Keep increasing the distances and let her pick places that she'll want to ride (places she'd want to go, such as possibly shopping or the movies, etc), so that she learns to affiliate the riding with fun activities in her mind -- positive reinforcement.

(G) Plan a road trip somewhere, and break it into very managable segments -- an hour's ride, take a break for a meal, another hour's ride, visit a site, another hour's travel and it's done for the night. Remember that her endurance isn't yours and on a smaller bike she is probably fighting the wind and fatigue far more than you are on the Kat.

Cheers
=-= The CyberPoet
(whose GF rode to Fontana and back on her own bike -- but kissed the ground up there by the dragon when she hit gravel unexpectedly in a turn)

[soccersteve]

cyber, excellent advice as always. i think that is probably the route that i will take. thanks.

[Meikol2]

Well Cyber...very well put.

[JesterGfx]

Cyber pretty much summed it up. I taught my wife to ride this past year on my 600 in an effort to get her to feel more comfortable on it. I pretty much took her through the process that I learned in the MSF course. We practiced a lot (but only at her requests in an effort not to pressure her) in empty parking lots and now she's doing pretty well. We're taking the MSF course this year together so she'll be official.