Buying Your First Motorbike

Speed, an open road, the wind blowing through your helmet, that is your desired vision when you first thought of ditching your 4 wheel enclosed box and exchanging it for an exciting two wheeler. But if you have no motorbike experience whatsoever where do you start?

Bike Types

There are a vast number of different bike types you can choose from to fit your needs and style. I first started with a scooter, which is probably where you want to start if you are an absolute novice, they are low powered, and very easy to drive, they can be driven around with a moped license, depending on the country. Scooters are suitable for city environments; they enable you to move quickly through the traffic of busy streets and roads. Fuel consumption is low, and a decent scooter can usually be bought for sub 2000 USD. Bear in mind though that they are often involved in accidents, primarily young drivers, and due to this the insurance rates can be quite high, as high or higher as you would pay for your car. If you are looking for speed and excitement, a scooter is not the right choice for you. Say you are on a tight budget but still want something slightly more challenging than a scooter you should take a look at supermoto or racing bikes, you don’t need to start off with a high powered one, you can get one with a 125cc engine, this is only slightly more than double of what you would get from a 50cc scooter. They look like the big bikes but are essentially very similar to scooters from a technical standpoint. 125cc and below motorbikes are typically two stroke engines with one cylinder, which can make them more aggressive to ride than say a 4 stroke bike.  2 stroke bikes are available up to 250cc’s. The 125cc racing bikes and supermotos offer you a more exciting driving experience but are still not suitable for the motorway or so called freeway, depending on your location, for this they are slightly too slow. Speed wise many will crack 100MPH but it’s asking a lot from such a small engine. 2 stroke engines are also not as reliable as 4 stroke engines. If you are into rough terrain you might want to consider buying a motocross bike or an enduro bike which is more of a multiple purpose bike, which can handle rough grounds and still be suitable for normal paved roads.

To sum up; a 125cc and below bike is a good way to start and getting experience, once you get started you will get hooked, for most it’s a passion formed during childhood and develops further, you will always be wanting to upgrade, chasing the next thrill.

Riding basics

Scooters don’t require any special driving skills. They come with an automatic transmission in most cases, you can hardly go wrong. You will have no problems balancing, like you don’t with a normal bicycle. Be advised though that you are still in a different and somewhat more unstable situation while driving than if you were driving a car. Logically you have less ground contact and are sitting on a slim machine rather than a wide vehicle. Be careful when applying the breaks, especially in wet driving conditions. When using the rear break you can easily lock up and causing a skid, in this case, let go of the break to regain control. If you gently apply the breaks it doesn’t matter which one you use, rear or front, start slowing down using the front break and then apply the rear one. The rear break is located at your right foot, on supermotos, racing bikes and cross bikes, as well as enduros. The front break is located on the right side of the handlebar, on the left side of the handle is the clutch and with the left foot you control the gearbox, push down for gear down, place foot under the gear bar and pull up to shift up a gear. This will be explained to you at the dealer anyway if you don’t already know it.

Once you have gained experience you might want to get something really sporty in the 1000cc range, like a Suzuki GSX-R 1000 or a Yamaha R1.