Tim: Hello, everybody. I'm Tim Clark.

Robin: I am a pajama knitter for pygmy goats. I'm Rahma Dean. I breed anteaters for a local marshmallow farm.

Travis: And I'm Travis Burleson. I'm a disestablishmentarian electroencephalogram.

Tim: You're listening to the Writing Obsession Podcast.

Travis: The Writing Obsession, your sport touring motorbike fix. We're an ever-developing online venue for motorcycle enthusiasts who enjoy responsibly spirited riding along routes less traveled. Today, we'll be talking about the 2020 Suzuki V-Strom 1050 XT, safe, efficient tire bead braking, and vinyl wrap moto pants.

Robin: This episode of the Writing Obsession Podcast is brought to you by Twisted Road. Find your perfect motorcycle rental, book a bike, ride the world. Visit TwistedRoad.com forward slash R-E-F forward slash TheWritingObsession and get one day free of riding or 25% off. Also by DriveWeather. Be safe and check road weather conditions using the DriveWeather app. See wind and weather information at each point of your trip. Visit DriveWeatherApp.com to learn more. And lastly, by John DelVecchio's Cornering Confidence program, a self-paced interactive online course that brings more enjoyment and assurance to the twisties. Their website is CorneringConfidence.com. TheWritingObsession.com is gaining ground with sponsors for this podcast. Woohoo! But there are still spots left. Reach out via email if interested. The address is podcast at TheWritingObsession.com. I'm going to take this opportunity to promote our next group riding tour, which is scheduled for summer of this year. It's the Lake Michigan Circle Tour. Seven riders will rock the LMCT over five days beginning July 8th of 2020. It's a scenic sport touring getaway that's perfect for entry-level tourers and first timers. More information is available via TheWritingObsession.com. Visit the group tours link, which is anchored under events in our navigation menu. Travis, how was your month going?

Travis: It's been a doozy. So we canceled the last podcast recording because I wasn't feeling well. I had a pretty, pretty aggressive upper respiratory infection there for a couple of weeks. You know, did the online doctor visit and they're like, oh, you might have coronavirus, but you're young and you don't seem like you're too sick. So just stay home. And then and then a week later I did the same thing. And they're like, oh, you should probably actually go to a real doctor since you're still sick. And then by the time I got to real doctor, she was like, they're like, OK, well, your symptoms are, you know, indicative of coronavirus, but also that's the same symptoms of any upper respiratory infection. Let's do an x-ray. And then they did an x-ray and then she like came in like super worried. It was like, I really think you have coronavirus. You need to go to the hospital right now. So they sent me to the ER. They sent me to the ER. They gave me a CAT scan, like in the like the corona response area. Of the ER, they gave me a CAT scan and and they did like a test swab. But it'd be a couple of days for like the corona swab thing to come back. And then they were like, OK, well, you definitely have a bunch of crap in your lungs. We'll tell you what the other test is. And then in a couple couple of days, the covid test came back and was not detected.

Robin: Awesome.

Travis: And then they tested for every other viral infection that presents like that. And they were not detected. So it's probably a false negative of some sort.

Tim: Or you have come up with your own novel, Travis Furleson virus.

Travis: Yeah, you get the, you get the, the, the Burley virus.

Tim: You got the Burley.

Travis: The, yeah, so they're going to do, and I feel fine now. And the doctor's like, well, if you had it, you're, you're, you're past it and you're not contagious. So just follow regular pandemic protocols, wear a mask when you go outside and But they're going to do an antibody test here in a couple of weeks and see if I had it, they can tell me, you know, posthumously if I had it, which isn't super, but no one else in my house got sick. So that's, that's good. So the babies are good. My wife never got sick. Her parents never got sick. So that's good. I got a window put in, in the basement, which is nice. My workstation, except now the yard's all torn up. I had a guy, had a guy come look at that and it'll be like 700 bucks to have a landscaper come like regrade it and get the grass and stuff fixed. Boo. Just fill it with garbage bags. There's a, there is a window there now, which is very nice down here. My thing, still trying to sell my Kawasaki ER6N, my 2009 Kawasaki ER6N with 1400 miles on it, $3,500. Reach out via the Arrival Session if you're in the Southern Wisconsin area.

Robin: You know, tell me this, I got a counterproposal for you. If Laurel's ever interested in hopping on anything two wheels again, we're, I'm, I think we're trying to ditch the scooter and I'd be willing to negotiate a thing there where, uh, I'd love to take the damaged Cowie and put some clip-ons and turn it into a track machine.

Travis: Oh, maybe. I don't want your scooter though. Damn it. Somebody's going to want it. Um, dogs, sorry. Um, the, oh, so it's on, it's been listed on Facebook and Craigslist and stuff since the fall and now the weather's nice and everyone's getting their tax refunds and their stimulus checks. And so I've had a, I had a bunch of people reach out and they're mostly like young guys. I don't want to say kids, but kids. Um, and the, sometimes you just never hear back from them. And then there's this one kid at $3,500, which is a pretty good price. And I'm, I got some wiggle room there.

Robin: Yeah.

Travis: Uh, there was a, uh, local shop was selling basically the same bike for like 41 at like shop price, 4,100. So it's like 35. It's a good price. That's their meat on the bone. Yeah. Yeah. I get, I get this guy, this kid messaged me. How would you take $2,400? Will you take 30, will you take 35% off the asking price?

Tim: Wow. Yeah. So like Craigslist, I'm normally, you know, I'll price it about 10, 15% above what I really want to sell it for because I know people are going to come in at you. Yeah, that is ridiculous. No, 30% less. How many miles?

Travis: 1400 and change. How long have they been making that motor? Long time, a decade and a half, two decades.

Robin: So parts for the foreseeable future. And yeah, no, go away, kid.

Travis: Yeah.

Robin: Good try.

Travis: And four different models using that same platform. There's the, there's the, there's the Ninja 650. There's the ER6, just the Ninja without the fairing. There's the versus 650 and the Vulcan 650 are all the same platform or all the same motor, at least.

Robin: All right. So what else you got?

Travis: I'm trying to find, I got out a couple of times here to ride, which is nice. Just like a little 40 minute route. Not too far from my house. That's got some, got some good twisty bits down by like Lake Kaganza steak park and through some down by some apple orchards and around some farms and stuff. But then it started freaking snowing again this week in Wisconsin. So someone, someone posted on Facebook, what's this white stuff falling from the sky? And my answer was, Oh, that's the Rona raining down after the 5G mixes with the chemtrails. Um, but it was, it was, it was just snow turns out. But yeah, so I'm trying to get hard with the babies. You know, I got twin boys. If you haven't been listening to the podcast, I got twin infants. So.

Robin: Beautiful, beautiful children.

Travis: Finding the time is, uh, yeah, they look nothing like Robin Dean. They look like actual humans. Um, but so find some time here and there. So 12, I'll get out, get some more riding in and, uh, this summer and get my, get my chops back. Cause there's definitely getting out the last couple of weeks when I could, you know, just don't quite have my, uh, my feet under me for the bike, but it's good. It's good to get on. It's good to ride. Got some new gear over the winter. Got some drunken late night online jacket purchases. I guess I ordered this, uh, but I got like the Revit, there's a good deal on like the Revit one. It just looks like kind of like a denim button down, but it's got the, the sea soft, the Revit sea soft armor in it. That's super thin and super flexible. So it doesn't, it just looks like a jacket. It doesn't look like a motorcycle jacket at all. Um, and if it's really nice and it's really, it's really nice to ride. And, um, the only thing it didn't have was it didn't have it's collared like a, like a regular jacket and it didn't have snaps on the collar to hold.

Tim: Yeah.

Travis: Yeah. So I just, I just installed some snaps on it myself. I was going to say that shouldn't be too big of a deal. Um, yeah, that's been my deal.

Robin: Well, you got the weekdays off, so you got to let me know. Uh, I'm, I'm definitely available for riding on any given day. So long as I have a little bit of advanced notice, I can try to make something happen now that we are, yeah. But that's all, that's all to Tim. I'm sorry.

Travis: Um, yeah. Once you guys are out of travel quarantine, you know, maybe come down and maybe, uh, Maggie can spend some time with Laurel and the boys.

Robin: That'd be awesome. That would be, she's, she wants that.

Tim: Um, anyway, Tim, what are you been up to? Well, I've been packing and getting ready for the trip sevens tour with Robin. And, you know, I'm, it's always a challenge for me because I am a tech nerd and I like to pack basically like double the amount of tech of what my clothes are, like seriously, like the volume comparison, it's more than two to one tech versus clothing. So it gets a little out of hand. And so everything else is like super obsess over reduce, reduce.

Travis: Tim's underwear is made out of SD cards.

Tim: I was going to say, yeah. Like gorilla tape. Little chafing, but you know, I got a half terabyte below my waist. So it's all right. Is that how you get the ladies? That's right. You need to save. I've got the memory cards. I don't even know what that means. It doesn't mean anything. That's a nonsense. But, you know, so like just for giggles, I like posted up, I like sent you a link to my packing list where it tells you not only where it, what it is, what part of the luggage it's stowed on the bike. It's a little obsessive. Um, and then I will have Robin posted up pictures of my obsessive toolkit here. It's gotten smaller every year. Um, so yeah, the, basically I've got all the Torx bits for my bike, all the Allen bike kit, um, bits for my bike. A pretty good set of sockets in there. Um, screwdriver bits and a couple double size open end wrenches. So it'll be like 17 millimeter on one side, 13 on the other. So you end up having, you know, twice the wrench with half the wrench.

Robin: Yeah. Not the favorite leverage, but definitely, uh, compatible, you know?

Tim: Yeah. So I do have like one closed end, 13, 17 for my axles. Yeah. That's just a tiny bike with tiny axles. So, so yeah, so all of that, it's like the main toolkit wraps into six inches long, about four inches wide and maybe three inches deep. Is that a bead breaker? That is the Motion Pro Bead Pro tire lever bead breaker combination. Yeah. Yup. Yup. A little aluminum levers, uh, fantastic. Um, and then a little Leatherman signal to round it all out. And that all fits under the seat. Nice. Well, except for the tire levers, those are kind of stashed on the bag somewhere else. So yeah. Yup. So this is the whole thing, you know, I end up just crazy with the gadgets I've got. I'm going to be carrying a large, um, full frame mirrorless camera with a big ass 7,200 lens on it. And then I'm going to have my, my secondary camera, the RX 100 in the tank bag, um, spare batteries for both charges for both cables for both. Then I've got a GoPro, same thing, spare batteries, cables, chargers, remote. And, uh, decided like I tested out the gimbal and I lost the battery door and one of the batteries going down the road. So that's not coming. I don't really have room for it. Anyways.

Robin: I do love a gimbal though, but that's, you know, really good for the short ride and documenting us some stuff. That's like a product and all that, whatever.

Tim: Yeah. I mean, it would have been, you know, the whole idea is like, you know, we can get a little promotional video. We can, we can even like, you know, if we're riding with people who are inexperienced, we can follow them, chase them down and like point out things to them when they're, when they're done with stabilized video. Yeah.

Travis: Yes.

Tim: Yes. You know, super, super slick. It it's the way it's supposed to be. Yeah.

Robin: We'll just, we'll just duct tape it to the side of my arm motor.

Tim: Yeah.

Robin: Why are there four of that rider?

Tim: Instead we'll do the old primitive. I've got a little chin mount for the GoPro. Use my, my head as a gimbal.

Robin: So when you talk, the camera goes up and down. This is a high.

Tim: Yep. So that's been, you know, between everything else, it's getting the bike ready. I still need to do an old oil change before the trip. And that's pretty much it. We should be ready to go. Good noise. Um, how about you, Robert? Tell me what is going on with your week, your month or even your year. I don't want to know about that. I that's too much.

Robin: That's a lot of information. Okay. Uh, well, okay. So I've got my notes here rolling with the COVID-19 punches and trying to stay optimistic and also following the science, you know, Tim, you've been keeping really good documentation of it, which has helped a lot. I've been following you and Trav who are both following that. Uh, just the, everything that needs to be known. Um, the tours might take a hit, but for the trip subs, we certainly got lucky. Uh, or hopefully we are being smart enough about how we're doing it, that we'll stay lucky. MSF coaching work is completely non-existent. So I've just, uh, I've been mostly just writing promotional materials and stuff. That's it. I've updated all three of our devices for trip sevens. I've got two phones, plus a GPS unit to use the newest 2020 trip sevens maps, which now defaults to the advanced routes instead of the, uh, isn't this a nice tour? No, it's about, damn, this is a good tour. So that's all updated. Um, preparing our rig for the trip to Lone Rock, Wisconsin. That's done and done. We are in Lone Rock. As I say this, we got the coldest place with the warmest hearts. Yes. Yes. And so it says the sign, we've got a really good spot. Our, our bay window opens up into low trees with birds, fire pit garage. It's all, it's all set up. So, uh, we're very pleased with our location and, uh, everything's good. We're, we're basically just looking to get the ride on and, and hopefully have a decent summer despite the circumstances and keep everybody alive. You know? Um, so with that, I'm going to go ahead and phase over to our, uh, guest interview with field correspondent, Margaret Dean, AKA Magsta.

Travis: Our latest interview features John DelVecchio, a long time motorcycle instructor and author of Cornering Confidence. It's a great book aimed at helping you keep it rubber side down. Maggie Dean, take it away.

Maggie: Maggie Dean here with John DelVecchio. Did I say that correctly?

Jon: You did.

Maggie: I'm here with John DelVecchio, the author of Cornering Confidence, the formula for a hundred percent control and curves, and John, I have a copy of your book right in front of me. I have to admit, I am almost done with it. I am in the middle of chapter 11. I've highlighted a couple of things that I want to talk about. Lots of sections. This is your interview, but I do want to start with a comment. I have to admit, I had a little resistance on reading. I'm a reader, but when it comes to something like an activity, as in riding your motorcycle, I think I kind of thought that live in person courses or even coaching are more beneficial. And we have a few books, but yours is the first one I actually read. And I have to say, I really appreciate it. It's very digestible. The pictures are simple, but effective. And the way that you structured the chapters as you lead up to the real, what I would say, meat of what a person that picks up this book would be interested in, I think it was a nice natural progression. So I'm really enjoying the book. And a lot of concepts are things that Robin already does and has tried to sort of share with me. So I guess he sort of preloaded me with some of the content and reading it. I was sitting there sort of, as you would talk through some of the action, the take action steps. I actually was sitting there doing it, you know, like with the kiss the mirror technique, which I do, but I think I like your description better of kissing the mirror. So anyway, that's just my comments. I really appreciate the book and I'm looking forward to when I finish getting into the online course. But with that, please tell us about yourself.

Jon: Yeah. I, before I do get into a little bit about myself, I just want to say that hearing you bring that opening comment into the conversation right away is, is really hits right at the heart of what I was trying to do with this book. I, you know, when someone writes a book or they teach a course, you know, it's really not, I guess, beneficial to just repeat what someone else is doing. And when I kind of honed in on the cornering confidence curriculum, if you will, I wanted it to be sort of a new thing, a different thing brought into the, to the discussion, whereas, you know, the, the, the total controls, the sport writing techniques, these, these, what I call encyclopedic books. They're fantastic. But I didn't want to create a book that was going to be just parroting what those were, or to try to insert myself into the conversation as someone who knows the great details like these people who've dedicated their lives to it. And so when you say that you picked up the book and you read through it, even in spite of the fact that you were thinking maybe a book isn't, you know, the best way to learn a physical skill, like riding a motorcycle, it really does make me feel good because that was the goal that the book is, is like a how-to, a hands-on description of the actual lesson plans or skills that I would like to develop people through the beginning to the end. And it wasn't, it's not designed to be the type of book that is to, to per se build your knowledge base. I try to put some knowledge in there, some background information on why things might be relevant only to the point where it's effective. And so that makes me feel pretty happy. And it's also different in the fact that when, when I wrote the book, it was sort of like the how-to to bring you from point A to point B where a lot of times you'll read these encyclopedia skills books and they're just knowledge conveyance. Now, some of them like total control does give you exercises and they do, they are kind of hands-on books, but this was supposed to be a method of bringing someone from one point to another. Now, so, so that's the book. And then of course the book, the book came in between teaching coaching tours in track day courses and, and the online course. So the book is kind of smack dab in the middle of my writing school, which is called Street Skills. And I began in 2015, in 2016, I got my big break to teach coaching tours at the BMW MOA rally in Hamburg, New York. And I did the two after that as well. And I also did some track day courses annually for the first three years of my school, which is where many of the pictures come from. So then when I, when I decided to write the book, I decided to maybe back off a little bit on the coaching tours and the track days. Those are pretty expensive and for time. But the online course I really am happy about. And I basically took the same curriculum from the book, put it into the online course. Now you run into similar issues with an online course where people say, you know, I can't learn how to ride a motorcycle from the computer. Whereas the MSF basic writer course now has its first classroom session through a similar standalone online course. And I think this is just something that could be on the rise there. But to go back a little bit more, to just introduce who I am. My name is John DelVecchio. I live in Rochester, New York, and I was a MSF rider coach from roughly 2007 to 2017. And as you can see, I said I started my school in 2015 and so there was a little overlap there, but I decided to branch off on my own and to explore some of the finer, the finer points of cornering. And that kind of led me down the path to focusing on the Cornering Confidence Program. And I'm a licensed driving school in New York State, Street Skills. I also have a American Motorcyclists Association Promoter Charter and that's how I tend to get the sanctioning and insurance for the events that I do live. And so that just kind of gives you a little bit of background of, you know, my credentials, if you will, or where I come from. I am pretty happy to see while I'm really not a big name in, you know, motorcycle coaching, my book does show up with the, with the big boys. And that really makes me proud because they shaped, they shaped me as a rider and to be on the same pages as them and on Amazon is really, is really a thrill for me.

Maggie: So the big boys, are you referring to people like Lee Parks and who are some others?

Jon: Yeah. So, um, you basically, the basic books that, the basic books that sort of shaped me and the experts that, that I developed my skills through paying attention to over the time have to do with, so Total Control was big. That was probably one of the, Total Control was the first book I probably read after Proficient Motorcycling and in the basic traffic types of things. I also read Keith Code, Twist of the Wrist 2. Now that, that was also a big influence in my, I guess, method, if you will, Sport Riding Techniques by Nick Inotch. Fantastic. There's also Reg Pridmore's book, Smooth Riding. And I would say those four books and programs were, were some of the, I guess, most influential in my assembling the method that I'm teaching in the Cornering Confidence book. And what I would also like to point out is that the book is my personal preferences on certain techniques that I have learned from the different experts. So one thing I might've learned from Lee Park's book, one thing I might've learned from taking the Champs school with Nick Inotch and reading his book, you know, there are certain things that you may or may not like depending on your preference or how it feels for you. And so what I've tended, what I tended to do was think through the bits and pieces of what I've learned over the years, about 20 years worth of writing and assembled them into the method. And so that's sort of where the book comes from. It's, it's no one aha moment from, you know, from start to finish from one other expert to another. It's, it's bits and pieces sort of dragged in and assembled in different, in a different way, basically.

Maggie: Okay. So what I'm hearing is, and that was the impression I got as I was reading the book, you're not saying in the book that this is the way, the only way, the best way. It is a way and it works well, but you're not trying to say that is, it is the way.

Jon: That's exactly right. For example, I'll just give you one quick example of how that's, that's true. We, when I teach people to do the brake to throttle transitions, which people think of trail braking, but brake throttle transitions is going back and forth from each control, one to the other. Many people, myself included, prefer the first two fingers resting on the front brake lever. And then when you roll off the throttle onto the brake and off the brake and onto the throttle. Well, some people have said, well, I like to use the outside three fingers on my hand to go onto the brake lever. And I like to keep the index finger wrapped around the, the throttle grip. And I say, go, that's fine. If that's your preference, if you like that better, do that because it's the actual transitioning from the brake to the throttle. That's really the important part. And I, I try to be direct with people that does, you know, maybe you're going to use 99 or 90% of what I propose. Maybe you're already using some of it. Maybe you're not, maybe you just don't like it today. Maybe tomorrow you realize that this might be something you're interested in. And there are techniques that I have learned taking other people's courses that I just don't like. Now I have a friend who knows, knows all about what I teach. We were, we ride together, you know, we're sport tours and he, he prefers the method of keeping your revs high and your RPMs near peak horsepower and using very little brake. Now, sometimes he would trail brake as I would encourage the way I do it. And I use less engine braking. I use less peak horsepower numbers and running that higher, that higher RPM. And even though I've tried to sell him or not sell him on it, but he knows I'm a big proponent of the trail braking technique. He still prefers running the higher RPM in the twistiest sections. And it's not up to me to say, Hey, you know, friend, you really should be doing it the way I'm saying, because what works for someone works for them. And that is what they should be using because it's all about confidence. Now personally, because I wrote my method the way it is and I teach the method the way it is. I believe that when you're in the twisties, sport touring, sport riding that really nothing beats the trail braking technique using front brake, brake to throttle transitions. I personally believe that's the best way to, I guess, go through those types of riding environments, but I'm sure that for every one person that is agreeing with what I'm saying, there's another person that agrees. No, you don't use the brakes at all. We're going to use engine braking and it's a very valid technique because it will slow the motorcycle down. And we know we have to slow before we enter that turn. It's just at what point do we transfer from brake to throttle? And when, when do we start to increase our speed in a corner versus reduce the speed? At what point do we do that? And so, so that's, I guess my answer to that.

Maggie: So you do coaching tours. Tell me a little bit about that.

Jon: Yeah. So the coaching tours, when I began at my school, I knew I wanted to teach a curriculum that had to do with cornering, but here I was, I wasn't an MSF site. I wasn't doing any basic instruction or training. And so I didn't have a parking lot. I didn't have, you know, I did, I had a track to go to and I did go to the New York safety track in Oneonta, but those are very expensive events to put on. And so I said, well, the roads are free. And when we take people into twisty environments, they might be a little bit more, I guess, excited to take, you know, coaching tours or to take training, if you will. I don't really particularly like the word training, even though that's what people refer to it as. I just think it has a negative vibe to it. But so I said, I'm going to do these coaching tours because I can just get the sanctioning and insurance from the American Motorcyclists Association. I can meet these people and we'll go use those public roads. And however that using public roads brings with it a whole set of other problems. And, you know, you have to try to price the tour accordingly and marketing and get people involved. And so it's hard. It was hard initially for me to recruit people to take my coaching tours where I live in Western New York state near the Buffalo area. And what I found was if I partnered with organizations like the MOA, the BMW Motorcycle Owners of America, they could do the marketing and they did just that. So my first coaching tours that really took off were in 2016 at the Hamburg Rally. And I sold 24 seats, four people in six different classes. And I had 24 people on the waiting list. It was very successful. And then the next year I went to Utah, same thing, had a waiting list. And, you know, I realized that the leveraging the marketing of that organization was going to be better for me. Now I decided that it was difficult for me to follow the road show of the MOA because they go to very different places around the country. So my whole idea was to set up shop maybe in Roanoke, Virginia, base myself out of a BMW dealership down there. And so last year at this time I did run two courses. But it's, it's, it's a tricky thing to do. That's why you don't see a whole lot of coaching tours. I mean, I'm sure Robin and you, when you're doing these, these tours that you are bringing people like the 777 and the other one coming up in Michigan. It's quite challenging to lead rides, especially if people that you really aren't familiar with. And so in addition to having to give them a nice ride and to make sure that they enjoy themselves and safely, you know, when you're doing a coaching tour, you're trying to teach them something as well. And that can lead to issues because we're, what are people thinking about? Are they thinking about the road hazard or the technique you're trying to teach them? And it's a real challenge. And so part of part of what interested me in making the online course was that people can read the book along with the online course, learn the skills. So what, so what really has me excited about the online course is it solves a lot of problems for me. And it does, I guess, extend opportunities to the riding community even more because with, with the online course, people can learn the skills, pace themselves out. We can, we can talk, we can do zooms. We can, you know, even meet in person if people are close throughout the online course. And then at the end we can just get together and discuss the course skills informally and just, I guess, be riding buddies. You know, when, when I'm teaching the coaching tours, they're very, they're, they're structured events. I can't really let my hair down. Whereas if we, we take someone through the online course, now when I get to see people face to face, it can be more of a social learning event if you will. And to give people the thumbs up or thumbs down on the skills. One, how I could explain this a little bit better is the, the three rallies I did for the MLA. I mean, it was start to finish. I was just exhausting myself cause I was a one man show. So I would get there a day or two early, prep the class route. Then I would execute the classes and it would take me, you know, from when I got up at six in the morning till five or six o'clock at night. And I didn't get a chance to enjoy the rallies. I didn't get a chance to really get to know the people. And that, that's the, I guess the most important part for me. And so what's, what's nice about the new model is people can get the instruction upfront through me communicating with them in various ways. And then when I go to the rallies, we just hang out, we go for rides, there's no pressure. And I think that that's going to be more enjoyable for me than I guess carrying this burden of, of the coaching tours is a sole operator for, you know, three to five days at a time. And I think that's going to be more affordable for people. And it's been, it's been quite successful since August is when I published the online course. The book now has been out two years.

Maggie: Yeah. I saw that, that it came out in 2018. So it's pretty fresh and I liked the, uh, the little fact or fiction boxes, which, you know, those are kind of fun. A couple of times you address do cruisers require different breaking techniques. So, you know, this isn't, while the audience might be more sport touring, this can be for anybody. The techniques.

Jon: Yeah, exactly. Um, now one of the things I remember Lee Parks, you know, saying in his book and through his teachings and things is it, the motorcycle, basically any, any motorcycle could be ridden well in, in the same, with the same techniques. Yes, there's different weight biases from a cruiser to a sport bike and lower, um, you know, parts and things and ground clearance. But generally speaking, the techniques that are proper writing, and let's say even a proper writing for advanced, uh, riders, they're generally the same techniques. And if you look at the book on the cover, there's a, there's a gentleman on a, um, a Harley, and he was a great student and he was using the techniques, especially kiss the mirror. We want to keep the motorcycle more upright. And that's really important when you have a cruiser in parts that can drag. Uh, there's one person, I think it might even be that image. I'm looking at the, let's see what page it is now. There was one guy on a cruiser in the book and I'm not sure if he's on my website or in the book. I'd have to go back and check. There's just a lot of pages to look at, but he was at my New York safety track, uh, course. And about noon he said, look, I've had enough. I, I learned so much. Um, he was on this vintage, uh, Harley Davidson, uh, and he said just the kissing the mirror, just the technique of shifting my body inside the turn. He goes, I learned enough. It was worth it. I had a ball. Thanks for everything. And we didn't even get into the real good stuff yet. And this person was thrilled that they had attended the class and participated. And again, I was, that made me happy to see that, that the cruiser crowd right up through the sport touring crowd and everything in between could gain something from, from the book. So what it really boils down to is that cornering confidence is a way to control your speed and steering. If you can master the brake throttle transitions and get them timed properly, then you can turn a motorcycle very easily, regardless of how fast you're going, where you're riding it. And, um, I'm pretty proud of that fact.

Robin: Hey everybody. Robin Dean here. I asked Maggie to get me a 20 minute interview with the one and only John Delvecchio. I thought this is a big name. She got me an hour and 10 minutes of invaluable information. So we only had 20 minutes for this episode of the podcast. If you go to the episode page, however, the entirety of it is available there. What you've heard so far, that's just a taste. Trail braking, chin over wrist riding. It's all in there. In-depth bridging and connecting references to all kinds of technical details. Make sure you check it out. That's an hour and 10 minutes with John Delvecchio of Cornering Confidence. Have at it.

Tim: And that was our guest interview. You can find out more about John Delvecchio and his curriculum at streetskills.net.

Robin: Also, we'd love to hear your motorcycle story. If you'd be, if you'd like to be featured on this podcast, record your thoughts to an app like Auphonic for Android and iPhone. That's spelled A-U-P-H-O-N-I-C. Upload the resulting file to SoundCloud or something and email us the link. We'll polish things up before featuring your tale in your voice and words. And so now that brings us to this month in motorcycle history. May 26th, 1975, Evel Knievel crashes attempting to jump 13 London buses at Wembley Stadium. Quote, you are the last person people in the world who will ever see me jump unquote. He told the crowd because I will never ever jump again. I am through a crowd of nearly 60,000 at London's Wembley Stadium. Witness Evel Knievel reach a grim end to his career when he attempts to jump over 13 side-by-side London double-decker buses on his Harley Davidson XR 750.

Travis: Catching the last bus, Knievel somersaults just after landing and lays unconscious with his bike on top of them. Evel suffers a fractured pelvis, a crushed vertebra, broken right hand, and sustained a concussion. It was a painful ending to a Monday afternoon in which the audience happily watched other people in danger, including 71 year old Henry Lamothe who dived 40 feet into only 14 inches of water. Roy Franzen who dived 60 feet into a blazing pool after first setting himself on fire. And the Traber family who walked the high wire, blindfolded, then rode up on motorcycles, suspending a woman underneath.

Tim: That bit about never jumping again. Well, that lasted until October 15th, 1975. What is that? Six months? Yeah. When he cleared 14 Greyhound buses at Kings Mills, Ohio.

Travis: This is a giant hold my beer episode. Yeah. So you know what, man, just on a side note, Harley Davidson who's in needs to make a street XR 750, not the whatever garbage they put out that road rod thing, street rod, XR 750 like Evel Knievels. Just make it, sell it. Anyway, side note over.

Tim: Yeah. I remember seeing those on TV long after the fact, because clearly that was the year I was born. Why will the sports? Yeah.

Robin: All right. Let's get into this month's featured segments. The first one is a model focus, which is brought to you by the ugly apple cafe of Madison, Wisconsin, where they use local overstock produce to make a quick tasty breakfast. Find them by visiting ugly apple cafe.com order a selection delivered to your home during the COVID shelter order at Christine's kitchens.com that is hyphenated Christine's hyphen kitchens.com. Uh, yeah. Google that. So Travis, what are we talking about?

Travis: Uh, you know, I'd want to look at the new 2020 Suzuki Vstrom 1050 XT. So a couple of years ago, Suzuki redid the Vstrom 1000, the big Vstrom, um, you know, made it, got rid of the God awful bubble windshield that everyone hated. Uh, either I had that bike.

Tim: It really sucked.

Travis: Yeah. The styling, the styling was divisive and some people like this awesome did, but everyone hated the way the windshield actually functions.

Tim: Yep.

Travis: Um, so they went in with like a beaky, more adventure, modern adventure a couple of years ago and they've just done another refresh on it. And now they're calling it the 1050, even though the displacement has not changed. Um, cause it's always been 1036 I think, or 1038 CCs. Um, but now they're calling it the 1050. Uh, what they did do is rework the engine, keeping the displacement the same. So cams are different. They just kind of tweaked all the little tweaky things you do on a rework. It's now throttled by wire. They're including cruise control, trash control, rider mode. So there's different trash control modes you can set different engine power modes you can set. Um, you know, and cruise control are, are de facto tools in it. Um, I think you still get cruise control even on the base model. Um, if you get the adventure, obviously you get the hard bags and the factory, all that stuff. Um, and they've got some, uh, if you're back from the nineties, I believe the Dr. Big, that might've was that they ever saw that in the United States. Was that Europe only the DR big?

Tim: I think the DR big was only Europe. Um, yeah, I know it was developed as a Dakar racer if I remember correctly. Yeah. So it was in the age of the, like the big old XR 650 from Honda.

Travis: So they kind of have the styling and colors are kind of, uh, an homage to the DR big, um, including an all yellow, which I think looks great. Um, like it looks like a race bike. It looks like a bigger DR big. Uh, so I think it looks cool. Especially like the V-Strom has always kind of been more of a sport touring adventure bike.

Robin: Yeah. Adventure sport is one adventure sport.

Travis: Like it's, it's always been one of the more road oriented, softer adventure bikes.

Robin: I've never liked the V-Strom. I like this.

Travis: Yeah. I think it, I think it looks good. I think it's an improvement over the last update. Um, and uh, you know, there was what's at the Fort nine. He did a good review and that's been his bike for a while, but it's not the, oh, and this was the last one before this refresh, how it's, it's a really good bike. It's like not, it's, it's very Honda asking that. It's not great at anything, but man, it does it all really well. Um, like you can off-road it if you want. You might need to modify a little bit. You can sport to run it if you want. You can commute on it if you want. And it's just not, it's not really going to let you down. Um, and it's like got enough power. It's not like, Whoa, power, but it's like got plenty of power for a big bike for touring for two upriding. Um, the only thing that gets me about the new one though, is that $17,000 price tag. And that puts it up against like the beamers, like the, the 1200 GS is, um, that's in the range of the Honda Africa twin as well. Yeah.

Tim: And I think even the new KTM, uh, seven 90 adventures around that price tag, I think it's less for starting for starting price. Yeah.

Travis: Um, and so that's what I got one is like, if you want to, if you want to support, I mean, if you want the off roady stuff, you know, but if you want it for street use and you want to support tour, the tracer 900 GT with the bags and the GT trim is 13,000. Wow. And has that, that wicked, that wicked 900 CC triple as a wonderful bike.

Robin: And the name backing, I mean, Suzuki to me is sort of, it's not that they're a discount anything. They are a great brand, but usually when you buy Suzuki, something about is made of Swiss cheese that you're going to have to upgrade.

Tim: Yeah. They are the Kings of the parts bin builds where, you know, this they repurpose a part in every bike that they use, you know, so that it leads to lower overhead and they tend to be lower overhead or lower over for all prices. Um, which is, you know, and they build them and they run them forever. And so parts are everywhere. So like the DR six 50 is not changed since 97, you know, and that's another one of those rock solid bulletproof bike. You can tear apart in a gas station parking lot and get back on the road.

Travis: How would you know, Tim?

Robin: Well, with the tracer, you get that, like the Yamaha branding, which is totally galvanized to the point where they were able to experiment nonsensically with bizarre two strokes and such for a fraction of the cost. I mean, either way, I hope it does well. It's the, I've never been drawn to that bike and yet here it is. I'm like, well, that actually doesn't look bad at all.

Travis: I, I, I test rode a couple and I liked, I mean, I liked that, that big, that big V twin motor. Um, I think it, uh, and I mean, I would, if I had the money, I would really think about it, about buying a new one. Or even just like the last gen one, like the, when they first did the beaky, the beaky look, um, there was one last year. Again, I had the, the babies on the way, so it wasn't going to happen. Um, but there, they had like a couple. So the base, the base 10 50, just go back, starts at 14. The adventures is 17. So that's the, that's the price discrepancy there. But there, they had a last generation, like a year or two old brand new at the dealership adventure model with the bags, the skid plate, the hair, the whole, the whole trim. Um, and it was like 10 grand.

Robin: No, that's getting more. That's more like it.

Travis: And I was like, cause it was, you know, it was Mark, it was Mark to move. It was a couple of years old sitting on the floor. Um, but it was the, the, not the new 2020 revamp, but the last, the last gen from that. And it was like, I, Oh, it was, it was, I was like, Oh, I really thought about it, but, um, but yeah, cause I guess I've, I've test ridden them and it's like, they, they make good power. They're comfortable. They got the adventure bike riding stance.

Tim: And I had the, the gen one, um, 1000 and it was, you know, overall a very good bike. It was geared down. So it wanted to wheelie all the time, which was kind of fun. Um, but yeah, the, that gen one with the air management was just horrible. It would go from anywhere from mildly annoying to, I can't quite see cause my head is being shaken so badly.

Travis: Oh yeah.

Tim: And, uh, I tried everything. I, I put it on extensions. I put it on spacers. I changed the angle. I cut it down. It just like, the whole thing just, I didn't mesh with it.

Robin: And Tim, you haven't met Ringer yet, but you guys would get along perfectly cause you guys are both badasses in that realm. But Ringer just walked up one day, he had the, he had the first 1000 and he's rolled up to his windscreen and just ripped it off. No wrenches, just, just I'm done. And he's actually a mild mannered guy. It was like, fuck this, I'm out.

Travis: I remember riding cause to the way on the first gen, if you look at it, it was like built into the body work. So it kind of had this like U shaped scoop that became clear. And I remember riding with Ringer and he just, there was no windshield on it. And it, it's not like it, it doesn't look right without a windscreen. Like you can tell there's a chunk of plastic missing. There's supposed to be, it's not shaped in a way where, you know, the windshield can be removed and it still looks like it's supposed to be there.

Tim: An open wound. Yeah.

Travis: He was just riding with it. He's like, it's so much better. I was like, yeah, sure. So yeah, I have to say though, I think if I had the money to buy a brand new off the shelf bike, I'd probably still get the tracer. Yeah. Yeah. At this point. But you know, I just thought, I thought it looked good. The reviews seem like they're coming up pretty good and it's got the trash control and the cruise control and all the new motorbike stuff. So I thought it was pretty cool.

Tim: That's a lot of new tech.

Travis: Let's take a look at Tim's section here for new kit. What are we looking at for for gizmos and doodads there, Tim?

Tim: All right. We're going to go pretty low tech on this for the first one is the 3M Scotchgard clear paint protection film. This is the heavy duty stuff that car manufacturers will put on your hood to protect your car paint from, you know, rock chips and door dings and things like that. And for probably the last four or five bikes, I've been putting it on my gas tanks because I've been using the strap down tank bag. So what happens is it, you know, if you ride it off road or on even dirt, dirty gravel roads, like I tend to do, there'll be a little bit of dust and grime that'll build up underneath the tank bag and it'll rub into your paint finish. So I put these on the tank and you don't have it. And when you, you know, like me, if you're like me and decide you need a different bike every year, then, you know, protecting a little bit of the resale is a good idea. So I, instead of doing a strap down tank bag this year, I have the strap down Mosco Moto, um, reckless bag on the back of my Husky and it's gonna, so I just put this down on some of the contact points to keep that from rubbing in and damaging the plastics.

Travis: Yeah. Well too, the Husky's got a tank rack.

Robin: Yeah.

Travis: Which you've modified to make out of metal.

Robin: Yes. It looks bad-ass man. That little bike looks like it could fight the Hulk.

Travis: It is a Mad Max, it's a little Mad Max machine.

Tim: Yeah. It's, it's, it's a fun little bike. I really get a kick out of it. So, so that is the, the main modification kit. And it's kind of been a slow year for kit it seems like along with everything else.

Travis: I've put some of that 3M on parts of my bike too, like yeah, like where the tank bag or like right where like the zipper rub is, like, uh, like right in the crotchal region of the gas tank where like your pants like the rub on it. Um, just cause might as well. It's pretty easy to put it on and it protects it. And then, yeah, once it gets, if it gets janky looking, you just peel it off and stick some clean stuff on.

Tim: Yeah. So much better than repainting. So.

Travis: Yeah. Or if you use a magnetic tank bag, it's really helpful too. Cause right where the magnets grip, it'll start to eat through the paint.

Tim: Yep. Yep. Yeah. Same kind of thing. There's, there's always that little bit of dust and grime that will rip into the clear coat. All right. And then the next thing is, um, the Klim Marrakesh pants. I am taking a gamble on these. I haven't seen anyone actually riding in these, but I'm been looking for new warm weather pants that are not bright blue warm weather pants, which you know, it's there. They're just, they've been, I've had this same pair of like mesh pants from Klim. The old like first generation, uh, Mojave pants, they're a dual sport off-road pant. And I have had them for six or seven years now. And they're, I'm not wearing them out, you know, except for like one cut and then where my old knee guards cut, cut through the pants on a crash that, you know, broke my scapula. But the pants are fine.

Travis: Of course. Um. Should I have the pants on your scapula?

Tim: I know. I know. You know, it was one of those flukes where the front end washed out on me and a rock just found the gap between my shoulder pad and my back pad and clipped my scapula. So the Marrakesh pants, these are the newest generation of mesh supposed to be extremely high abrasion resistance. And it's not, it's mostly just like an open weave and it's supposed to flow a lot of air and they're not bright blue. So.

Travis: So they'll, they'll keep, they'll, they'll keep your four terabytes below the waist. Uh, nice and cool. Should be.

Tim: Should be. Yeah. So we'll, we'll find out if they actually get here in time for the trip. I'll have a good chance, you know, a good solid week to test them out and hopefully not crash test them or anything silly like that, but. Let's not. Yeah. So yeah, this is, uh, I'm always interested in like these mesh products that are getting stronger and stronger all the time with some new materials.

Robin: Well, once they discovered that they could make stuff out of the fire hose material, that was a big deal. If they weave it like that, it's like, that's that the near it bone will break before it will tear. So that's, uh, then that's a good thing, believe it or not. That's a really good thing.

Tim: The idea that like, you can have a four second slide on a mesh and not have it disintegrate because it's like most of the old school meshes, you know, they, they were just toast. As soon as you hit the ground, there were no better than wearing blue jeans. Yeah.

Robin: If you want to see an example of how this stuff works and without sealing the gore of a crash, just go to YouTube and look up a fire hose, like how they, uh, prime fire hoses for a fire. And they're all wrapped up and then they just fire all this water through them. And they just expand outward and bang on everything around them and just no damage to the hose at all. It's that's kind of the idea. Um, anyhow. Yep.

Tim: Yep. So that's the, that's the kit. Now it's, you know, it's been a slow year. There's been a lot of things that come out, but they've been just kind of evolution, not a whole lot of revolution from what I've seen.

Robin: Yeah.

Tim: So I'm going to go with the, uh, the straight up things I know and I've been using for years. So Robin, you're up. What article are we reading this episode? All right.

Robin: This, this one's a quickie or at least it can be. It's safe, efficient tire bead breaking the best, easiest, fastest, safest way to break a motorcycle tire bead. Uh, this article is read is brought to you by riding solutions, helping people become motorcyclists and motorcyclists ride better. Be safe while having a great time riding the open road. Visit them online at riding solutions.com. So this article is another one by Brian Ringer. I don't think we've ever written, read anything but Brian Ringer articles.

Travis: So they're the most entertaining.

Robin: They are the most entertaining, right?

Travis: Yeah.

Robin: So safe, efficient tire bead breaking. You can break any motorcycle tire bead quickly with three short tire irons with no damage to the tire or rim, no excessive force, no jumping, and no farting around with kickstands, giant levers, titanic forces or disaster. This works on any tire tubed or tubeless car or motorcycle. Let's break a tire bead.

Travis: Number one, deflate the tire completely if it hasn't already been handled for you by, um, external factors.

Tim: Number two, stick the small curved tip of one tire iron between the tire bead and the rim with the curve at the tip facing up, wiggle and weasel it in there until the tip is touching the rim or as close as you can get. Number three, about two inches away.

Travis: Do the same with tire iron number two. Number four, with one hand, push down on both irons.

Tim: Number five, take tire iron number three in your other hand, turn the tip so it's facing down. Then weasel it into the middle between the two, between the other two tire irons. Yes, this is a little awkward.

Robin: Six, work the tip of the third tire iron in as far as you can. That's what she said. The idea is to use the tip to dig into the rubber a bit to push the tire bead down by pulling up on this tire iron while pushing down on the other two.

Travis: After some pushing and wiggling, you'll get a little motion, which you normally won't completely break the bead on the first push.

Tim: Number eight, move a few inches to one side and repeat the procedure. And you'll get a little more motion.

Robin: Number nine, if the tire bead hasn't broken at that point, move a few inches to the other side of your original tire bead attack spot and try a third time.

Travis: And number 10 and this is the most important step. Enjoy all the astonished looks around your success.

Tim: Oh yes. Cause if you're riding with friends like mine, they're just gonna stand around and watch you work and sweat and go, that looks hard.

Robin: All right. It's in the details. Once you get a little experience with this trick, it's faster than just about anything else. It's also possible to damage the inside of the rim slightly. The first few run throughs by weaseling too enthusiastically. So take it easy and don't get in a hurry. Move a few inches and repeat.

Travis: Even the crustiest most stuck on tire bead will start moving.

Tim: The tire irons I prefer are sold under a few different names. The ones I have marketed, the ones I have are marketed by Rocky mountain ATV MC under the Tusk name and are extremely strong and slim. The tips are nice and smooth so they don't damage tire rims. So they don't damage rims or tires. You can change any tire with three of these.

Robin: The motion pro tool works on the exact same principle, but it costs more and is more bulky and heavy than three short tire irons.

Travis: Is that the motion pro tool that Tim has in his tool pack? That is indeed.

Tim: And I think I might disagree with Brian on the, the bulk and weight. I don't think they're all that bad. And I get by with a lot of times just those two and not using three.

Travis: Yeah, they are. They are longer than the other ones he's linking to. So I guess if that, if that is a concern in your packing, but what motorcycle tire change tricks do you employ?

Robin: There are a number of known techniques for changing a motorcycle tire. Which ones do you prefer? What do you like about each and why? Your input is invited. Post an article at the riding obsession dot cam.

Travis: What I like to do is like, wait for a semi to roll by. And then like when he's not looking, throw, throw the tire, but just right. So it's like clips just the rubber and then it'll pop the beat. No problem. Works every time.

Robin: No risk at all.

Travis: Don't do that at home. And that brings us to updated site features and development. We've partnered with twisted road.com to offer motorcycle rentals. Visit the site mouse over digi tools and click motorcycles for rent. There's also a pop-up that'll come up when you first log on to the riding obsession.com the search form lets you find rentals near you or wherever you're traveling to. And this new feature is already integrated into our group tours mentioning and linking to bikes. You can rent near any given tourist start point. Actually, that gives me an idea. I'll ask their API guy or if he can let him filter specific dates to match the tour schedule so that only bikes available on those dates are shown.

Robin: Once I'm not so lazy and then the code overhaul is going well enough. Our group motorcycle tour page has seen several updates, not just with an information rentals, but also the ability to share rooms during a tour, which lowers the price. This isn't a guaranteed option since we travel in odd numbers, but you get the point. Uh, a link to, oh, we have a link to our testimonials on the tours page. Read them. Uh, there's a skills meter on each tour, one to five stars. And I don't, I don't have it. Um, there's the skills meter, one to five stars for a balanced take on what kind of writing is involved for any given tour. Like our LMCT is only like two stars in difficulty because we modified it. Let's see for any tour that is sold out. We now offer wait list registration. Sometimes people cancel. It happens when it does. Others now profit. Trip sevens is one example. If you want to go get on a wait list or the, uh, Lake Michigan circle tour. Uh, lastly, the podcast pages are, are become, what did I write here? Last, lastly, the podcast pages are a lot more automated, which makes my life easier. All of the posts for mess all the motor are now listed using the Facebook API. Hooray API code party party. No, it doesn't work anymore. So I have to fix that crap. All right. So a lot of the podcast material is automatically generated. Yay. Easier content. Uh, you can now write for TRO from just about any page, have the bottom of the homepage category pages and articles sits a link that you can click to publish a sport touring motorcycle article on our server. Have at it. We need content. We would love to have yours. And that, uh, Oh yeah. Now we're looking at listener questions. Trav.

Travis: William O Yates writes in, I really like the single rail folding trailer from Northern tool. They no longer listed on their site. Searching the web, a thousand results pop up. I spent hours looking. Does anybody know where to find the same trailer?

Robin: No, no. I've already done this. So yeah, there's a, there's a Chinese knockoff version and now I know why they pulled it. It's because of some safety factors.

Travis: The suspension was crap and the Chinese version, I mean probably fine for like going across town and picking up a, picking up a bike from Craigslist, but I wouldn't haul your bike across the country with it. Right?

Robin: No. And in the Chinese version doesn't even have any suspension and is just a total piece of junk. So, um, they do. However, Northern tools next to the next one up, which I think is for two bikes is significantly better. It's designed for you to plank it with plywood. It has a spring coil suspend. It's good.

Travis: Oh, that's just, that's just the regular, it's not, is that just the eight foot four by eight foot folding aluminum utility?

Robin: Yeah.

Travis: So it's not designed for bikes necessarily, but you can, it is a trailer platform. It's like 550 bucks.

Robin: Yeah. And by itself, it's three times better.

Travis: Yeah. So you can put some thick, you know, one inch ply down on it, bolt some wheel chocks to it and go with that. Or there's like, if you look up, if you just Google like single rail motorcycle trailer, like the Kendon one, which is kind of expensive, it's like three grand, but those are really good. USA trailer has a similar one for like 19 to two grand. And those have like the diamond plate like platforms. They aren't just the little rail. I mean, you get, you kind of get what you pay for. Um, they're going to be a little better. I've there was that, um, motorcycle.com with, uh, Aerie and Zach before they went over to Motor Trend and maybe RevZilla now, I don't know what they're working for, where they got like the really cheap Harbor Freight folding ones and, and rigged them up for motorcycles, put dirt bikes on them, then haul the dirt bikes with like a Goldwing and a Vulcan. Um, so they like hauled lightweight dirt bikes on these Harbor Freight trailers behind big, heavy, like cross-country tours. And it seemed to work. So, um, but again, those were like the folding, the blank canvas folding trailers and they had to put plywood down and secure everything and put wheel chocks and trap points for a motorcycle on them. Um, but yeah, those like little single rail guys. Yeah. They're hard to find. They're not, they're also just not great. Especially if you're doing any distance around town, like I said, it's fine, but I've also dealt with them and they're just hard to use because there's nowhere for you to stand while you're loading a bike, especially if you're loading a heavy bike, like a street bike. Like if it's a dirt bike, that's 250 pounds, you know, whatever. But if you're trying to put like a Goldwing on one or something or, you know, 500 pounds sport touring bike, you're going to have, you're going to have problems. So I would say look on Craigslist and see if you can find something that's a little more heavy duty, uh, you know, that you can afford or pony up the cash or something that's a little more heavy duty. Just cause you know, if you, if you want to fight, if you really want to trust your $10,000 motorcycle to a $500 trailer, you know, that's, that's up to you, I guess. But I just wouldn't recommend it. There's also U-Haul does rent a motorcycle specific hauling trailer that has like the rail and lockdown points. And it's not that much. So with how much you're going to use, I mean, unless you're really hauling a bike like every week or something somewhere, just rent the U-Haul for 50 bucks.

Tim: Yeah. I did have the cheapo Harbor freight folding trailer at one time. And it's primarily strength was from the decking you bolt onto it. So I used like three quarter ply and it was still not quite enough. But the problem is you go with that thicker decking, it gets harder to fold. So like I've had friends who have bought them and like, instead of just bolting the trailer together, they've actually welded the joints together and gotten more rigidity that way.

Travis: So you might be better off too. If you do get one of those folding trailers, like maybe try and get your hands on some like aluminum diamond plate or something like that.

Robin: Yeah. I like it. Okay. So are you ready for the next one? Okay. So Rolando asks two questions. The first question, I tried centering my sprockets on the chain. Some teeth ended up to the left when looking underneath. Is this normal? My answer is underneath the sprocket, the chain becomes loose. So the extra slack will have this effect. It's nothing to worry about so long as the chain is properly adjusted. See your manual.

Travis: Yeah. There's also, you can go to cycle gear. I mean, there's a motion pro like chain alignment tool. And if you go to cycle gear, there's whatever they call their house brand. I forget now, um, same thing. No, it's their house tool brand. Um, I forget what they call it, but it's like, it's just like a little tiny, like micro C clamp with a steel rod on it.

Robin: Okay.

Travis: And the clamp, the clamp clamps to your sprocket. And then the rod goes in and gives you a straight line. And then you just look down the rod and you look down your chain and you make sure the rod and the chain are going in a straight line with each other and you're good to go. It's like a 10, $15 tool. And that it just makes, it just makes life easier. Like you, there are tricks to like lining it up and you spin the tire and make sure that's the one I apply.

Robin: That's I just basically spin it. If the teeth line up, I'm good.

Travis: I just, I, I just use the tool because it saves me 10 minutes of digging with it. Every time you change the tire, you know? So yeah, I just recommend, I recommend go to cycle gear or go on Amazon or, you know, get the motion pro one if you want or get the off brand one. Um, it's just that little clamp with a steel rod. They're pretty cheap.

Robin: And I recommend that you don't do that and that you do it by sight using spinning the rear wheel, which Travis does not. Tim, what about you?

Tim: So I'm going to go at it from a little different angle where I am not like, I understand what he's trying to do. He's trying to minimize his wear on his chain and on his sprockets. I'm not that worried about that. Um, you're mostly going to worry about, you need to align your wheel with the frame. So I have used the, the little tool on the sprocket. That's pretty good. You can also go super low tech, just grab a string, you know, lay it along the sprocket, drag it along to the front of the bike and make sure it's aligned with the front sprocket because the chain is going to have a lot of, um, you know, in each link, there's that tiny little bit of play. It's going to add up that that chain can wander left to right quite a bit. And even in motion, it's going to give you a little, this, uh, a little bit of an illusion and it's not going to be super accurate.

Robin: So in summary, I think my idea is right. And that Tim and Travis's are horrible. Travis thinks his idea is right. And then me and Tim's ideas are horrible. Tim thinks his idea is right. And that me and Travis's are horrible.

Travis: So Rolando, Rolando asks, what kind of oil should I use?

Tim: I'm also the kind of guy that doesn't mind replacing a chain every other year.

Travis: Chains are cheap. Well, depending on the bike, I guess. Unless you're in the middle of Nebraska. Well, let's get to his next, his next question. And I have some input on here. It's related. Okay.

Robin: So his next question, are your sprocket teeth all centered from the point it makes contact with the chain? Crazy thing. I got most teeth centered while spinning the wheel, but the swing arm markings were almost two inches off or two notches, two notches. Thank you.

Travis: Yes.

Robin: My answer to this one. They are for the most part, there's some minor deviation, but not much. Basically make sure your chain is clean and in usable condition first. Is it dirty? Damaged? Are there any kinks? What about the sprocket? Is it marred in any way? Shark toothed? Once I confirm that the chain and sprocket are in proper working order, then and only then do I assume my adjustments will be technically correct. If the post adjustment setting seems odd afterward, it might be worth pulling an engine cover off to look at the front sprocket and be sure it's not shark toothed. Travis, what do you think?

Travis: So here's where it's tricky. What, what bike does he have? Right? And I don't have that information here. So like, I'm really confused. Air quotes, hair quotes, cheaper bikes. Um, so like my NC 700 X has like the super basic square tube swing arm with like the chintzy like adjuster chain tensioner things on it that are just so sloppy. Like the notches mean nothing.

Robin: They're not right. Yeah.

Travis: Really? The notches don't really mean anything. Um, and especially when you're tightening that axle, um, you know, one side turns, it's turning one way. The other side is turning the other way. So that the tension on the axle while you tighten it pulls the axle in different directions on the swing arm, right? It wants to, it wants to walk in opposite directions, which is why it kinks your wheel to one direction or the other. When you're trying to align your chain, once you tighten the axle down. Um, and it's always, I find it's always a pain then to adjust those chain tensioner stops because the one side is always kind of going the wrong way. Like it's not, you need, you actually need the chain tensioner to push and not pull. And you can't do that with the cheap basic setup on like a cheap Honda or an older bike. Um, as opposed to something that uses a, um, like an eccentric style, uh, axle adjuster or something where the actual axle adjuster is anchored into the swing arm and you're turning that screw. And it's very specifically moving the axle points.

Robin: Travis is basically saying be eccentric and get screwed.

Travis: Tim, what about you? Sort of. So yeah, if it's, if it's the more basic style swing armor adjuster, I mean just don't even, I don't even use them. I just use a ruler.

Tim: Nice. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'd definitely say like, don't rely on the count on the adjuster, you know, like it's three marks on one side, five on the other. No big deal. If you've taken your time and you've gotten it aligned properly, um, you'll make note of it. Um, one of the things that I like to do is I will actually use some, uh, paint marker and I will mark a couple of the, uh, like, I'll mark some horizontal stripes on both the flats of the screw head and along the screw. And I'll do like red on one side, blue on the other. So that when I am doing a future adjustment, you know, you count how many flats you're turning it because you shouldn't have to, you know, rotate those screws very much. But once you know that like I've got this aligned, then from there you can, you know, make a controlled adjustment to both sides and you don't have to look at even, you know, think about that anymore. You just say I've moved it three flats on the left and move it three flats on the right. We're good.

Travis: I'd say there's also like the string alignment method, which you can Google, um, which is kind of a pain in the butt, but it gives you it makes sure that your wheels are both perfectly aligned and that they're aligned with the frame.

Robin: I think if you combine all three answers, then, so I'm saying, make sure everything's cleaned up and tuned. And then Travis saying make sure that you consider what is happening with the operation of each wrench as you adjust. And we're all saying, ignore those notches. And Tim saying, if you, if you maintain some record of the data, once everything's finite, you'll have a lot more, you know, it'll be ease of use in the future. So very cool.

Tim: Yeah. So I've had to very many times, you know, adjust out in the field.

Robin: Yeah.

Tim: Um, my big 8,000 mile trip, I had a chain that was dying on me and I was adjusting the chain twice a day. Oh yeah. And I was like, I was turning that screw almost a full turn every day. It's turning into a bow and arrow. It was dying fast. Yeah.

Travis: Yeah. Well, once they start, once they start to go, they, they go, right. Cause yep.

Robin: And with that, we're going to, we're going to slowly make our way out of this by going into, uh, we're gonna, everybody's going to pick one, right? We're going to all pick one thing from T7 Poip and it's time for mess Alamodo. Onto this week's mess Alamodo brought to you by the super slick, ultra bad-ass motorcycle mega posse of incredible power, power, power, power, power. The super slick, ultra bad-ass motorcycle mega posse of incredible power, super slick, ultra bad-ass and incredibly powerful as a sidebar. I'm going to pick, uh, let's see here. Oh yeah, man. A frigging dude from a much bigger operation than us. Uh, Shaytree surgeon car goes rolling by while he's in the middle of doing a thing. That was crazy.

Travis: Yeah. They were just, uh, they were just stopped at like an intersection and there's like a backup from like construction or something. And then a guy tried to like swerve out and caught another guy in his like Kia Forte just started rolling down. Like he just caught it just right. Just make the car start rolling and rolled, uh, you know, side over side right by the motorcycles. It's, it's, it's a crazy catch. It's insane. Look it up.

Robin: Yeah. Uh, who's next? Take your pick.

Travis: Oh, I'm going to look at it. I, so I posted this video. Uh, it's a great one to watch. Uh, she's actually like a revs, uh, revs, uh, a Revit brand. Um, she's sponsored by Revit, uh, itchy boots on. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, so it's just a Dutch, uh, Dutch woman. And she did her first season solo travel on Rellen field, uh, Himalaya all over India and Southeastern Asia. And then, uh, she was just starting a solo trip through the Americas where she was going from, um, Tierra del Fuego up to Alaska.

Robin: This is the video diary, right?

Travis: Well, this is, yeah. So she was stuck in this little tiny village in Peru when the, uh, Corona virus, like lockdown started happening. And like, she was like a foreigner in this little village and they're like hunting her down. And like the, the, the mayor has to like make announcements that like, no, the foreigner in the village is not spreading the virus. Um, and she had to like, and like all the flights are like the, she had to get in touch with the Dutch embassy and like get on a special flight to get out of there. But then she needed to like, get her motorcycle ship back because like, she doesn't actually have like a home or anything. She just lives on her motorcycle. It's crazy. So check out, check out itchy boots on, uh, on YouTube. It's, it's, it's pretty amazing. Solo female motorcycle world traveler.

Robin: It's frigging awesome.

Tim: Tim, what's your fave? I like the, uh, the guy who's him and his buddy is set up this, uh, big motocross jump. He's jumping. Looks like he's jumping into a pond and they set it up. So he catches fire as he leaves the ramp and he goes in way too hot and he misses the pond entirely. He jumps over the pod. Yeah. And this is like, he hits this thing going, I don't know, 60, maybe better.

Robin: Yeah.

Tim: And he's, he, he covers a good 200 feet or better.

Travis: Oh yeah. On fire. And then crashes into the sand. Yeah.

Tim: On the, on the opposing bank. Yeah. Nice. Yeah. That was a bad choice.

Travis: Yeah. Over overcooked it. Very cool.

Robin: All right. And then it's time for our closing sponsorship. This episode of the writing obsession podcast is brought to you by twisted road. Find your perfect motorcycle rental, book a bike, ride the world, visit twisted road.com forward slash R E F forward slash the writing obsession and get one day free of writing or 25% off. Also by drive weather, be safe and check road weather conditions using the drive weather app. See wind and weather information at each point of your trip. Visit driveweatherapp.com to learn more. And lastly by John Del Vecchio's cornering confidence program, a self-paced interactive online course that brings more enjoyment and assurance to the twisties. Their website is corneringconfidence.com. The writing obsession is gaining ground with sponsors for this podcast, but there are still spots left. Uh, reach out via email. If interested, that email address is podcast at the writing obsession.com. I'll take this opportunity to promote our next group riding tour, which is scheduled for summer of this year. It's the Lake Michigan circle tour seven riders will rock the LMCT over five days, beginning July 8th of 2020. It's a scenic sport touring getaway. That's perfect for the entry level tours and first timers. More information is available via the writing obsession.com. Visit the group tours link, which is anchored under events in our navigation menu.

Travis: And that's our episode for this round. Tune in next time for more discussion on all things for sport touring or motorcycling as a whole for the writing obsession.com I'm Travis Burleson. I'm Tim Clark and I'm Robin Dean. Safe travels, everyone.