Brian: In this episode, we're waving adios to friends turned enemies, we're pondering spec sheets and internet arguments, and we're picking out gear by remote control and probably even more. But Robin, what you got? What's happening in your life? You look giddy.

Robin: I'm pretty happy, yeah. So I actually flooded our opening banter section with all kinds of stuff to the point where I was like, this is not giving Brian the helm. I subtracted all of it, put it in my sandbox for next week's episode. So my banter is this. The Triumph is sold. Excellent. Not only is it sold, it's sold to the right buyer who knows exactly what the problem is. I'm not saying they know how to fix it, but they really bought it at a price that totally compensates for the time and effort it'll take to replace the components they need to.

Brian: Beautiful.

Robin: And they have a rideable bike. Great buyer. It's sold for a price that we're accepting and now we have money. We're throwing down cash on new old stock. We got a 2024 SV650 in mind that we've managed to locate for a really good out the door price.

Brian: Sweet. Yeah. God, that'll be so nice. I look forward to riding with Maggie without that anxiety.

Robin: Yeah, I'm excited. It does mean that she will officially, if we get the bike, once we get the bike, it does mean that she will officially be riding Sweep on the upcoming Truth or Consequences group motorcycle tour.

Brian: Oh, cool. I didn't know she wanted to do that or would rather just stay home with the dog. You know, I don't know.

Robin: There's a chance she'll actually be in Korea at the time, so I'm not sure if it's actually going to happen. We'll find out. Oh, sweet. Everything's flying around. Everything's starting to get momentum. Join the club.

Brian: And yeah, I think that the percentages are inching upwards for pretty darn sure I'm going to be in New Mexico. Love it. For the Truth or Consequences tour. I don't know. I'd put it about 89, 91% around in there. No decimal point? 91.2 maybe. Your spot is waiting for you. It's held. Excellent. It's all warmed up. That's good. You're doing some interesting things with this, like your gas and meals are included, which I thought was interesting.

Robin: Yeah. I mean, I'm not talking about like, hey, I'm at the airport. Look, I'm going to need you to cop my breakfast. That kind of thing. I'm talking about like from the time you put your bags at the lodging. I've never tried this before either. I don't know how it's going to go. We'll get good at it over the course, but nice. We go to a gas station. I will probably park my bike, walk to everybody's lined up at a single thing, throw in the card, fill a tank, you go, fill a tank, you go, fill a tank, you go, repeat, repeat, repeat. And then we take our break. So I think it'll be fairly efficient.

Brian: Interesting way to handle it. Yeah. Bikes want premium these days, so. That's fine. Yeah. It'll be all right.

Robin: Don't worry, man. I'm completely overcharging everyone to compensate for this.

Brian: Please do. Please do. Yeah. Well, you might make a dollar an hour this time around instead of like 50 cents an hour. Maybe. It's possible.

Robin: I also don't like all of us speaking to wait staff and saying like, here are 17 credit cards. Go divide that evenly, except he had the caviar. So make sure you, you know, like, just eat what you want and know that it's in the bill.

Brian: For the record, this isn't going to be 17 riders. What is it? Five, six? Five customers with a lead and sweep. So seven total.

Robin: That's my max. Personal max.

Brian: Can you imagine doing this with 17? No. Yeah. I need a house that can sleep 17. We're going to stack them like cordwood. Yeah. That'd be great. Yeah. In actual motorcycle related news, like I had to coach this guy through the whole process of selling things online. We finally got through it. It's on the way. It's a UPS has it. But I'm getting a really nice cogent shock for my KLR and cogent is kind of one of those. They're kind of the best known company for KLR suspension. Yeah. I'm fully aware that I'm putting high dollar suspension on a bike. That's essentially welded together by children in Thailand out of water pipe. I understand this. Go on. No, I fully understand this. Don't tell me I'm stupid, but it really does improve the experience from what I, from what I understand. And I'm can't wait to try that out. Hopefully it gets above freezing here and sometime this weekend.

Robin: So that's cogent dynamics, Inc. motorcycle suspension technology, moto cd.com.

Brian: And they're kind of, yeah, they're kind of known as the, uh, the kind of the premier KLR dual sport shock people, uh, in certain circles, they do all kinds of suspension.

Robin: We talking fully adjustable, rebuildable, uh, it's rebuildable and everything.

Brian: Uh, this one is, you can get them fully adjustable preload and all that stuff. This one's, uh, this one's not the highest end models. So it's, it's fixed valving, uh, very low miles on it. Uh, the guy sold his bike or something.

Robin: Nice.

Brian: And, um, I don't really need adjustability cause I, you know, I never take a passenger.

Robin: Okay.

Brian: My KLR doesn't even have its passenger pegs anymore. They, they got bent and I just took them off.

Robin: Sidebar tip. You can tell your insurance company that, and they might give you a lower rate.

Brian: It's, it's like costing me a ridiculously small amount of money each year. I, yeah, got it. And really, yeah. Carrying passengers on a KLR is just not, yeah, it might get you out of the woods, you know, like in an emergency, if you're a good friend.

Robin: Well, you know, today's Harley Davidson, the Pan America that's been lowered. Yeah. Your KLR may as well be ST according to them, according to Harley's new updated street profiled Pan America. The KLR is as good as a sport touring machine. Uh, I'll get into that next episode with a lot of angst. Oh, I'm upset. We'll talk about that another time.

Brian: That is on the list of bikes. I would love to ride around. I'm trying to, trying to find a, uh, a demo day for Pan America. I just want to see what they're like. The local triumph dealer, Indianapolis triumph or triumph of Indianapolis or something like that, whatever they're called. It's a, it's a really great dealer, very well respected, and they do a lot of stuff for the local community. They have vintage days every month. Uh, when it's warm to, they had, um, a new model introduction downtown last week, we went to, it was really fun. Yeah. Somehow I got, somehow I got on their mailing list. So they, they send me an email and I go down there and I get a little bit of free food if there's any left by the time I get there. And, uh, the venue was really interesting as a place with, uh, it's basically a place where you can keep your Lamborghini safe. So it's indoors, it's locked up. It's got security and all that stuff. And there's like Lamborghinis, Rolls Royces, Bentley's. It's not like one guy's collection. It's like people who own these cars, keep them there. Yeah. And then if you want to have like a really cool gear head type event, uh, you can actually rent the place. And so you can wander around with your beer and your, uh, hors d'oeuvres. How cool is that? Yeah. With the lamb, there's a Lamborghini Diablo. There's all, you know, there's all kinds of really exotic Ferraris all over the place. You can cool some dudes, Miata, you know, whatever, you know, there's not much to report about the new triumph models for the year. You know, you can look on their website, something about a scrambler with a different artwork on the tank, you know, it's just incremental stuff.

Robin: And, uh, I imagine an immobilizer.

Brian: Yeah. They probably have an immobilizer set to fail in about five years, six years. I don't know if they're still doing that or if they're any better, but you're, you're a little bitter about the brand. I, I hear.

Robin: I'm not looking back now. I'm looking at what I know and what I can manage and maintain. And it's just, everything's forward thinking as simple as possible. I want simplicity. Excellent. Well, for my wife's bike, I want simplicity. I want her to have a nice, simple, happy experience. That's quick and crazy as she likes. And I think the SV, is it lighter than, than her street triple was, or? I'm going to say yes. I'm going to say yes. Or at least it's got a lower center of gravity because it's got, I think it will. Yeah. Is it the Westrom engine? I don't know. See, I'm not super same engine. So it's the Westrom. And so that, I think that front cylinder, that's just banging forward 45 degrees. That has to drop the center of gravity significantly. Uh, the inseam is going to be easier on her too. I think it's a 30 or a 31 depending, and we'll probably shave the seat down anyhow. And then the Triumph is like a 30, 31.2, 30.

Brian: Yeah.

Robin: Somewhere in there. Yeah.

Brian: Similar, but yeah. There's just so many of those things too. Like I'm sure you can go to see concepts and get a lower seat foam and you know, yeah, you can get everything you need for it. I think it'll be, I think it'll be great bike. We're going to mod it, have some fun with it. What color is it? That's important.

Robin: We haven't bought yet. We've narrowed it down to three bikes, two of which are used. One of which is new. The first priority purchase is the new bike. They gave us a hell of a price, a really good price. And we did shop around. We did argue case and point and explain things about like shipping and location and all this stuff. But we isolated a unit that is priced well within, wow, really polite of them. It's a 24 of course, but it's just been sitting. That's going to be the black sparkle, whatever the paint is called. It's a gloss black with a light sparkle finish.

Brian: Nice.

Robin: Uh, option two, which is also, uh, the option two is a 23. I think that's got the gunmetal gray with red rims. That might be, I mean, it's used with 3000 miles on it.

Brian: She has a history of liking that color too, I think.

Robin: Yes. The gunmetal gray is her thing, but she, she, she chose man. It's all her. I'm not. Okay. I did my hustle just shopping around. That one is used in heavily modified. I think the suspension's been tuned. It's got some race action going on and the exhaust is downright pissed. You think my exhaust is loud. The Hawk GT, I had that thing just excruciatingly rude on purpose because I wanted a bike that did that. Just one. Yeah. This bike will do the same. I guarantee it. That exhaust is just a honking chunk of angst.

Brian: Is that what, uh, is that what Maggie wants?

Robin: It's her second favorite of the bunch. And she's like, I want to hear that. The third is my favorite, but that's because I mean, it's a standard classic blue used with 7,000. They're asking too much. So I'm talking them down to like 6,400 and we'll see. Long answer.

Brian: Suzuki's blue is really, really nice. I like blue bikes. Yeah. It's going to be more reliable and so forth, but yeah, it's a great platform that L twin really sounds really sounds great when you wind it up too. So let's do questions from the wild. Uh, if you have a question, if you'd like us to field your questions, email podcast at TRO dot bike, we can guarantee that if we choose your question and answer, we'll be heard whether it's the answer and answer the right answer. I don't know. It'll be some sort of answer. So I thought this was an interesting general question. This is one I see a lot. And so let's talk about it just a little bit. I think there's a lot we could say too. Should I quit writing because blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Something happens. Somebody's mad, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, et cetera. And so on. So they're like, should, should I quit writing because of something I haven't answered it surprises people a lot of times. It's like, yeah, go ahead.

Robin: No, you don't have to, you don't have to, but go ahead. Maybe question. Yes. No, the question. Isn't for anybody to answer, but the person who asked it, you know?

Brian: Yeah. And the way I put it to people is I tell them, first off I've had, I've broken my left leg three times on my right wrist, two times riding motorcycles. Well, in the vicinity of motorcycles, I wish I was still writing. Technically I wasn't writing at the time. Anyway, the point is I still ride motorcycles. And so I tell people it is a commitment to something. Um, it's a commitment to a certain amount of risks that you can minimize. You can get training, you can blah, blah, blah. But no matter at the end of the day, there's a lot you have to accept and take on board. And if you don't immediately know, the answer is hell yeah. I'm crawling back on this bike. As soon as I'm done with this Walker, then maybe not. I don't want to talk anybody into riding motorcycles who doesn't want to. Yeah. If you have a passion for it, then you will know the answer. If you don't really know the answer, then yeah. Maybe you experiment.

Robin: My response to this saying that we shouldn't be the ones to answer that question. It stands tall, but at the same time, if you aren't telling yourself, man, I really, really want to go for a ride. Then why would you, if you, if you're not feeling it, or if you're concerned about it, is there pleasure in doing so in there anywhere until you arrive at the anticipation that, oh man, I get to go on a ride now. Yeah. You're not in need of one. So why risk it?

Brian: If you're not incredibly depressed when it's cold outside. Um, yeah, I don't want it to feel like gatekeeping or anything like that. Like, you know, you can only ride a motorcycle if you're the true blah, blah, blah. But yeah, you know, there's a trade-off and it has, the juice has to be worth the squeeze.

Robin: Yeah. Pattern speaking is what I'm referring to. The pattern says probably if you're thinking that way, maybe you don't need to ride right now. And if you don't feel that way in the future, probably you don't need to at all, but we can't necessarily tell you what to do.

Brian: Yeah. Nobody can answer that for you, you know, or change the kind of writing you do, you know, manage risks, things like that. Make some changes. See if that helps, you know, the, when you put it up for sale on Craigslist and no time to ride, come on. Yeah. Maybe, maybe get a convertible or something of if that's a, you know, and sometimes people sell a bike or whatever, get out of it for awhile and then really get the itch to come back. And that's, you know, lives change, people change. Don't let peer pressure influence you too much. But yeah, you see that question a lot. Should I stop writing because of blah? I don't know.

Robin: If you're asking yourself that, keep asking until you want to write again, or just slowly fade away from the question until you're sitting on a park lounger doing whatever you want to do, but be happy with whatever decision you make. Don't be sad.

Brian: Don't be sad. Be happy. Okay. Let's take a quick one. Ever hit a bird and how do you not hit birds? Yes. Yeah. I've hit like a bird hit my bike once, a bird hit me twice. You know, one time one of them hit my chest and, and like whatever squeezed out of the bird kind of seeped through. It was pretty gross. One of them, one of them hit my knee and like a, you know, the people behind me were just hysterically laughing because there's just suddenly a big pile of big puff of feathers erupted from my knee. It was awesome. Like I had feathers stuck in my wheel. I don't even know what the hell kind of bird it was, but and I've also had some near misses, like, uh, one of the only avoidable bird strikes. I was going around the corner and there was like a dead thing in the road, a dead possum or something. And there was a buzzard, a vulture, a Turkey vulture.

Robin: I was going to get into scale of bird. Yeah.

Brian: Yeah. Turkey vulture was like yanking away on this, uh, possum, you know, had some really tasty gristle or something. Yeah. I definitely changed my path of travel quite drastically because you know, that's a big bird for one. You do not want it. It's a big stinky bird. You don't want it anywhere near you. And a lot of times, uh, when a vulture or a buzzard is startled, they'll dump the contents of their stomach back onto full fury for a flight. Yeah. You don't want to be anywhere near that. So, but as far as actually avoiding birds, it's really tough because they're really hard to see. Don't dive into a flock of, no, just don't run through road kills is one of the big deals.

Robin: A shout out to Mr. Don beer in front of mine, Don beer and long time buddy. He used to say, you know, if you can consume it in a single sitting comfortably, don't even bother looking at it. If it gets bigger than that, maybe consider the break or swerve decision as we call it. Am I slowing or am I swerving? So yeah, the scale of the bird comes in. So have I hit a bird? Yes. Quite a few birds, not on purpose, just going about my paces. And then here comes the small songbird or the pigeon or the whatever. It's the big birds that are on the ground that I'm mostly worried about. The turkeys, wild turkeys.

Brian: Yes. Oh God. So many close calls.

Robin: It's like a hit and a half deflated basketball. Not that I would know. I've actually never hit one, but I imagine the thunk of that is just like, well, I guess we're eating tonight. The question is whether or not you're eating the bird or, you know, the remnants of it.

Brian: A little exhausted. Yeah. I think when you're leading a ride, you do run more of a risk of striking birds or other animals because, you know, when you're leading and you go through, they're like, oh, it's quiet. What a lovely path in the woods to eat my dinner. And then you come, you can, you show up the first bike and, and then you clear them out for the rest of the guys. So the rest of the riders. So yeah, it's kind of a, it is a thing. Yeah.

Robin: How to not hit birds. Well, however, makes the most sense in a given reaction, timely response moment. Yeah. Yeah.

Brian: And let someone else hit the birds first, I guess, or scare them off.

Robin: Yeah.

Brian: If it fits in a skillet, kill it, is a good rule to live by.

Robin: Oh, I like that. If it fits in a skillet, kill it. Ooh, that's a keeper. This is no longer radio TRO. It's now, if it fits in a skillet, kill it.

Brian: No, we're going to try a new segment. I'm going to call paper riders. All right. The thesis here, it's internet Caesar right now. Uh, you know, uh, a lot of us in, in, in Northern parts of the country can't really ride much. So, uh, it's prime time to argue about motorcycles on the internet. No, it's not. No, it's not. No. All you need to do is put your house on wheels and head South unless you, and even if you do, even unless you live in some, like some place where like there's motorcycles everywhere, like maybe Southern California or other countries, things like that. Like you can't even go look at a lot of the bikes that you might be interested in. Like they just aren't there or the dealer that the next dealer that has one is 300 miles away, things like that. And the same goes for helmets, gloves, gear, stuff like that. It's just not on the shelf anywhere nearby for at least in the U S most of the writing world, not in stock. Yeah. Or put down a deposit and we'll see if we can get one, you know, that kind of thing. And even if you do find a bike that you're interested in, um, and you can go see it. Usually, I mean, test rides are pretty much non-existent in the U S like the manufacturer might put on a demo day at some dealerships. You're not even allowed to put your, your nasty buns on the bike. Like they don't want to use it. They don't want people even sitting on the bikes or you have to go through approval or something like that. And so, and the same goes for like, if you're buying jackets, helmets, gloves, you, you just have to use the internet and figure something out and order it and hope it works out. How do you do a good job of figuring out what kind of bike might work for you or what kind of gear might work for you given the resources you have before you even you've even seen it. And I've done this successfully. I bought, yeah, I bought my last three or four bikes without ever seeing them first. Uh, like my, uh, Yamaha, I had seen one in a dealership, but I'd never like even sat on one before I went to the guy's house in Missouri and bought it, you know, so it's like a six hour drive to pick this thing up. But I had a really good idea that it would work really well for me. So I knew, you know, I knew a lot about it and went and got it. And as it turns out, it was fine. Great bike. I like it. Yeah. Keeping it for a long time. Same goes for helmet stuff. And so like, have you, have your Maggie ever written like a late model S S V six 50? Have you sat on one? Have you written one?

Robin: I have. So during the Suzuki demo rides, which I led at the moto America races at road America this past year, wrote every single bike, including the Busa. It was almost like that scene in fight club where Tyler Durden just starts to flash in the beginning. You don't know what you just saw, but there's a flash of this person. I could see a flash of Maggie and I knew, I know her inseam. I know how she's going to fit on that machine. She's going to fit that bike really well. So I took it out for a couple of spans and I love the turning radius, the field, the handling takes a little bit more higher rev to get the clutch to work smoothly. Cause it's a twin. It's a 45 degree twin. Yes. So the answer is yes. I have written a new model SV and I knew right out the gates that this is a great bike, simple, accessible.

Brian: So yeah, like I bought my Yamaha without ever even sitting on one before like my, when I had a V-Strom 1000, I had, I had ridden one briefly once like three years before then decided to, you know, I wanted to buy one. So I, you know, I had a good idea of what I was in for there.

Robin: Well, I did that with the R 1200 RS. Now I did sit on it, but our good friend, Neil, who's been on a podcast before he, he said, Hey man, you need to check this bike out. And I rolled down to this dealership. I didn't get to turn it on. I didn't get to hear it run. I didn't get to ride it at all, but I did throw a leg over and sat on it and it was like, okay, okay. I bought it. And now it's still out there with 116,000 miles on it at this point. Yeah. It does work out. If you're read and you're studied and you're spec friendly and you get a feel for what's happening with it and you read the, what the forum posters say about it.

Brian: Yeah.

Robin: It's a completely doable thing.

Brian: Yeah. And again, you know, like, and it's with anything else for, and you've said this many times for any given motorcycle, there's a forum out there where people are arguing and discussing about these bikes a lot. Yeah. You know, whatever one you're thinking about, join it, you know, see what the wisdom is and just be aware that you have to throw out about 40 to 50%, maybe more of what people say, because it's the internet, you know, come on.

Robin: Don't use that front brake. That's dangerous.

Brian: That'll put you right down. I'll throw you right over the bars. And again, one of our sponsor for this segment at TRO.Bike is a Twisted Road Motorcycle Rental and a great way to get to know bikes that are the bike you're thinking about or close enough to it, or you can kind of extrapolate a little bit like, okay, this is similar power, or this is the earlier model, the same bike or whatever, that kind of thing. But yeah, Twisted Road. And if you go to Twisted.TRO.Bike, we'll hook you up with a nice discount on your first rental.

Robin: And you'll make us look good to our sponsor. So have at it.

Brian: Rent lots of bikes, but yeah, rent it's really like, look around and see what's around you. There's like, there's a crap ton of bikes around Indianapolis. Like I could go, I could go rent, you know, 20 different bikes and, and just see what they're like, um, you know, live with it for a day or two. That's a great way to figure out kind of what works for you. What features you like, what features you don't. Cause if you're doing a quick test ride around the block, it's very, very tough to get useful information from a really short test ride. It can be done. Like if you have a lot of experience with different bikes and you're really go in focused, you can, you can extract a lot of information, but you really have to live with something for a while. So it stops feeling weird after a day or two. And totally. If you go to TRO.Bike and you look for the word ergonomics. Oh yeah. Yeah. You're going to find a great article. Did you write this? That's Kelly Howard. That's Kelly. It's a really good article. It talks about touring ergonomics. Mostly it kind of delves into motorcycle ergonomics and that's kind of the biggest factor and whether a bike's going to work for you. Like Robin's a pretty average human male in every way. Yeah. Like you are 50th percentile height, weight, everything on the gray scale. I'm dead center. I'm at the right end of it. You know, I'm six one to 40, blah, blah, blah. So yeah, you can, and you can, it kind of goes over ways to, to figure those things out. There's a website called Cycle Ergo I've used, and I actually use this to preview an FJ09 because they've got the, so basically CycleErgo.com, cycle-ergo.com. They've got a database of a crap ton of motorcycles. You can look for your motorcycle and then you can punch in your height and your inseam, and you'll see this little goofy stick figure on that bike. Yeah. And it kind of shows you your body position.

Robin: And don't lie. We've all gone to this website and created an eight foot four human being who's riding a Honda Monkey. Oh, hell yeah. And they have alligator arms, but they have a 75 inch inseam. You can do that too. So if you just want to see something weird, go get weird with it and have fun. We actually use that in an article where we start to calm people down about the concept of motorcycle type, which is weird being a sport touring website. You know, I'm always about sports. What is sport touring? Sport bikes, luggage, sport touring. No, it's not. The argument goes on. It's what it is. To be niche or not, the truth is when it comes to motorcycle type, ergos speak a lot. Yeah. It really is all about horseback riding. If you're in a normal walk, you're on a cruiser. And by the time you reach full gallop, you're on a race replica. But one thing that did not change between those two positions, all the way from a chopper to a full on race replica MotoGP bike, the triangle very often doesn't change. It's just your position and gravity and the way you're absorbing impact and things like that. So Cycle Ergo can help you kind of eyeball some of the things like that, which is a lot of fun.

Brian: Yeah, it's a good start. And again, if they don't have the bike that you're thinking about, you can find something close and get there. And you can kind of derive some of that from the forum and so forth. Like if I'm five foot two and if I'm five foot two trying to ride a Yamaha FJ09, I'm going to have a bad time. Our Africa twin. Yeah. It's saddling an elk. You want to be somewhere above the 50th percentile on those. So that's a tool that can help. There's another ergonomics, it's called Motonomics.com. It's a British based site. So sometimes you have to do some interpretation.

Robin: And the electrics are bad. I'm such a dick. So nice.

Brian: Like my inseam is 32 inches. It's pretty, pretty standard and so forth. But I've had so much damage to my knees that I have to consider, like for me, the knee angle can be a particular issue. So that's one of the reasons the FJ09 works so well for me, because it's got an enormous distance between the pegs and the seat. Nice. So you're very comfortable. I'm extremely comfortable on that bike. It's got more room than the KLR does even. And most people don't really realize that. But it is, you know, tall rounder, as you call it. I actually didn't coin that, but I'll accept it. You popularized it. And another thing you have to think about, too, is whether as what can be adjusted or changed on the bike. Like on the FJ09, you can actually, there's risers that come off the top triple tree, and you can actually flip them around to move the handlebar a little more forward or a little back. Oh, nice. That's actually legally something you can do in the manual. Wow. And you can also, there are two different seat positions. I think, does your BMW have that seat positions? No. Like you can put the seat in different levels? Okay.

Robin: Nah, I mean, you can buy the tall seat or the shorts.

Brian: Yeah.

Robin: And there's a couple in between, but yeah.

Brian: Like there are different seats you can buy. Sometimes they're from the factory, or you may have to go to seat concepts. And seat concepts usually will make, they'll make like a low seat, a tall seat, comfort seat. You know, they'll make different versions, especially if it's a reasonably popular bike.

Robin: I think we all know somebody who does seat work as well. And it's not the most expensive thing to get somebody to modify a seat. Yeah. You know, if it's heavily modified, maybe in the hundred dollar price range or something like that. But there are a lot of people that really know what they're doing. I know Joanne has a friend that does it.

Brian: I need to find a guy and I need to find somebody in Indianapolis that does seats.

Robin: You're better off going to Bed Bath & Beyond and getting yourself a nice toilet seat cover or a floor mat for a bathroom.

Brian: That's right. Nice fuzzy bath mat. Yeah, that worked for me. But no, I honestly, like I, like my GS 850 vintage Suzuki, it's, you know, 42 years old now. Good Lord. Oh yeah. I've had this bike a very long time and ridden a hundred and God knows how many miles on it because the odometer pooped out. But anyway, I've been passed by that bike several times. The problem is my accumulated skeletal damage has, is such that it's very difficult to, it's very difficult to ride it for very long because of my, the, on most, on the earlier model 850s, the seat was kind of straight across and on the 8283 models, it was scooped out a little bit in the front. So that lowers me a little bit. And my knee is, gets pretty uncomfortable after 150 miles or so. You need a seat guy. So I need a seat guy to, to build up the front of the seat and into something I can sit on, move me up a little bit. Like I've got this, I've got this Amazon butt pad. I bought, you know, I saw the link on tiaro.bike and Robin made, you know, you got like two cents out of the sale. I'm sure. I'm rich. But yeah, I put like this, this strap on butt pad. That sounds terrible. But anyway, I put the strap on butt pad on the bike and it helps quite a bit.

Robin: It's got the whoopie blaster removed is what it is. It's a whoopie cushion that they just, you know, defunct.

Brian: Like it helps, but it's a separate piece. You know, like an SV650 is probably going to have a lot of seat options. I'm sure Sargent makes something. I'm sure Seat Concepts makes something. That's kind of the cool part about a bike. There's a lot of them around, so you can, you can modify them. The other thing is tubular handlebars. I think the SV has what they call normal or tubular handlebars and not clip on.

Robin: Yes. Well, okay. So the SV650S, which by the way comes fared. I don't know if S is for sport. Who cares? Point is though, that they also do one that has a full fairing. The belly fairing is a completely separate component. My goodness. That's a good looking bike. We actually found one on Facebook marketplace that we thought about because we would have no debt. We could buy that bike and we would, it was a second gen. So it's a gen two SV650S with the full body fairing. Gorgeous machine. So it's got clip ons. Whereas the normal SV650, yeah, it's got tubular handlebars, which I don't know if they're seven eighths at the grip and an inch at the connection, but I'm hoping that they're seven eighths all the way through and through because that's easy to, you can get anything you want. Superbike bars, man.

Brian: Yeah, I think they are. I mean, and the bar that's on it is pretty reasonable, so it may, yeah, may work as is. Yeah. And like the FGO9's got this weird, it's got an aluminum handlebar that's like fat in the middle and then skinny at the ends and kind of like inch to seven eighths. There's, yeah, it's bizarre. It's a weird, it's a weird thing, but fortunately I don't think it's in the stock position. You know, you can flip it around, but anyway, it works fine. I'm fine with it and I haven't bothered to, to change it around, you know, like on the KLR and on my GS850. Yeah, I've had to change the handlebars out to make it work for me. Uh, but yeah, I need to find a guy. I need to find a source.

Robin: Um, well, we do have an article for John Ravilla. Now he's an interesting and cantankerous person, but he's an amazing seat guy and he is John the seat guy. So if you go to TROTABike and look up the seat guy, John, or if you just look up the seat guy, John in Google, John the seat guy, John the seat guy, John Ravilla, J-O-N, not J-O-H-N, just J-O-N Ravilla. He is, uh, greatly skilled.

Brian: He leads you to buttock happiness.

Robin: Yes, yes. If you describe your situation, he will accommodate.

Brian: I need to raise myself in the air. There's a nice article on TROTABike. I wrote the etiquette and the art of, uh, riding a borrowed bike. So go to TROTABike, search for borrowed. You'll find that it kind of gives you a little overview there. The other thing to maybe look at is, you know, there are millions of online reviews, but there are like a few YouTubers who ride a lot of bikes and have a presence and have some, uh, trustability. What do you call it? I don't know. Some, some sort of credibility. Cred. Yeah. They got a little cred, you know, like, uh, like Zach Kortz and Ari Henning and so forth. And they, and usually when someone reviews motorcycles, they will tell you, here's my height. You know, they'll tell you their height and weight so you can decide, oh, okay. This guy is, is folded up like a, like a cricket on this thing. And it's not going to work for me, or you can talk to somebody else. And there are different, you know, like, uh, Carolyn, I don't know her last name, but Carolyn, the doodle on a motorcycle. She rides a lot of bikes. You can see her riding her Triumph or whatever, and she's 5'3", 5'4", and decide what to do there. Hi, Joanne. Next segment is the armory brought to you by gearcheck.com. And we're putting you on the spot, Joanne, but I think. Yes, please. We're talking about the topic of, you know, how do you figure out whether a bike's going to work for you, uh, by just using internet resources? You know, when you, it's so hard to get your hands on anything, how do we apply that to gear as well?

Joanne: Well, it's a really broad topic. So I tried to narrow this down a little bit to gloves. However, um, what I'm going to, the advice I'm going to give it, you can, you can apply that to, I already know what might fit you. You can apply that to clothing as well, but, um, I don't want to rattle on too much. So the first thing, um, I want to say with gloves, which I think are the next to helmets, the second most difficult thing to fit is to know whether or not you need a wider hand, shorter finger. And what I really refer to as an American fit hand or a narrower hand, longer finger, European fit glove. You know, I also want to preface this by saying, it doesn't mean that you have to buy an American glove or you have to buy a European brand glove. It's just identifying the issues you have, you may have with fitting your hand and just really looking at your hands and going, wow, I really do have a wide palm or wow, I have a narrow palm and my fingers are really long. You want to know these things about your hands. So then you can go and filter out the brands that will not work for you. Case in point, if you do need a wider palm and a little bit shorter finger, you know, generally speaking, then you generally want to look at American brands because that's really the average fit. I mean, it really speaks to clothing and height. The average American man and woman are under 5'5". If you Google that, that's kind of the general trend is the average height of an American man and an American woman under 5'5", but also hands, there just tends to be a trend with if you buy an American brand glove, say a Cortec or a Tourmaster, you will always have more room in the hand and a shorter finger compared to its European branded counterparts. So that's the first thing to identify is really look at your hand.

Brian: What are some of those American brands you mentioned a couple?

Joanne: Yep. Just your typical, I would say, you know, very popular performance-based brands, Cortec, Tourmaster, I think Olympia is still making gloves, Klim, very popular. Those are kind of the top, Scorpion. Those are some really popular. And we're talking about street and adventure products right now and race. So this, the, some of these discussions, some of these suggestions, they really don't apply to off-road and MX. That's a whole different type of fit.

Robin: I'll throw the Alpine Star and SP8s in there too. That's what I wear.

Joanne: So that's an example of a glove that is very neutral. It is for a European branded glove. It is actually a very relaxed fit. However, it is still not going to be as relaxed as say a Klim or a Cortec. Generally speaking, there tends, you're still going to find the most forgiving fit in a glove toward American brands for the most part. There are some small exceptions, but that's kind of the general thing you're going to want to do. So you just Google the brands and find out where they're based. You know, Klim's based in Idaho, Cortec is California, Tourmaster's California, Scorpion, then you know you're in the right place. Okay. Also as a, we're still in the wide hand, short finger, also with a wide hand, short fingers, avoid track and race gloves because they tend to be millimeters longer. And I'm talking millimeters, not like an inch longer, but because race and track, full race and track gloves have a really heavy pre-curve, meaning they're cut more aggressively to squeeze your hand grips than say a Touring or Harley style glove. If you're trying to get every millimeter or centimeter of length out of the glove, avoid aggressive race style gloves because they do have just a slightly longer cut than a street glove. Also, you want to avoid a lot of adventure styles because adventure styles also tend to be a little bit longer for the standing because the assumption is they need room for pockets.

Robin: They have to put all the pockets on the gloves to match the pants.

Joanne: That is not true, everybody. Disregard. You're going to, so again, with adventure gloves, the thought process is you're standing sometimes because you're riding off road. So a lot of adventure gloves tend to be slightly longer so that when you're standing on the foot pegs, you can still operate your brake and clutch and have the length needed for that. And by the way, the same glows for your jackets and pants. If you find yourself sizing up to fit a brand, say you're like, ah, this medium, every medium is too tight. I have to go to large. You're likely shopping for brands that are too Euro fit. So make sure you're really looking at those American fits, American brands. And if you're still having trouble, you might be trying too aggressive and too sporty cuts because the more sporty, right? Like I said about track and race style gloves, the sportier they are, the snugger they will be. So a medium style and say an SP8 Alpinestars that Robin wears will still be tighter than say a medium in one of Alpinestars cruiser style gloves.

Robin: Yeah. Other gauntlets.

Joanne: Within the brand, the fits are slightly different for the rider type. So you also want to match your style, your lifestyle to the glove. If you ride a sporty bike, check the sporty gloves. If you ride an adventure bike, you want to really look at some of the adventure gloves, but I know there's exceptions to that based on fit issues, but these are again, very broad generalizations.

Robin: And if you're a proctologist, nitrile.

Joanne: Again, that is not true. Okay. Nitrile is what you use when you are desperate to stay warm because you only brought summer gloves on your winter glove trip.

Robin: Okay. They do work for that, right? Like a windbreaker.

Joanne: I had to do that once riding home from Laguna Seca from MotoGP. Yeah. It was nighttime and we were riding up the freeway and it was very cold and I was not prepared for that. Anyways. So switching to those of you who have narrow hands and longer fingers or more Euro minded hands, where your hand fit is, you're not necessarily the widest palm. You're not necessarily the narrowest. You might be neutral or very narrow where you tend to find gloves are too bunchy or too wide in the palms. You're probably looking at American brands. And honestly, you're probably looking at a lot of budget brands. So the more you shop away from a higher quality premium brand, but also away from American fit brands, you will get better fits around your hand, especially a little narrow or more fitted and that slightly longer finger. You also, as a longer fingered person and longer hand person, you want to look for stretch points at your finger knuckles. The more, the better. Because again, that's how you get more length. Because if you think about it, say you curve your finger, you know, you curve your finger into a little hook. If you measure your finger from point to point, the end of your fingernail to the first knuckle, then to the second knuckle, and then to the third knuckle, that distance is ever slightly longer than a straight line from the tip of your finger to the knuckle. If you extend your finger out, if that makes sense. So point to point, you're getting just a little bit more, smidge more length, and then add a stretch point on that knuckle. And now you have even more room to flex your finger without necessarily needing more length. Sometimes you're just looking for like a millimeter of just a little more space. So when you flex your fingers, you're not getting resistance and push back from the seams. So look for those stretch points. Avoid any glove that has a flat finger and zero stretch points because you're just going to be fighting that seam. And let's say you ride an R7 or a Daytona or something like an aggressive sport bike, imagine wearing shorter fingered, you know, say cruising or casual gloves, you're having to make that glove conform to your aggressive hand grip. And that's tiring. Your hands are probably getting tired. Your hands might be getting numb after a while because you're squeezing so hard and you're trying to force that glove to hold the position for you. So for your longer fingered hands, you really want to move toward the sportier and race styles because those have the most pre-curve. If you try on a track glove, the minute you put it on, it's like somebody's forcing your hand into like a jello mold of a curved hand. You know, it like makes you curve your fingers without even trying. And you're just going to gain more length that way.

Brian: Nice.

Joanne: Really some nice things you can look for, whether you're a short finger or longer finger.

Robin: Mind blown. That's some hilariously good information because I've got my SP8s, which I love, but then I've got these River Road Taos gloves. So you know the SP8s. Now look at this.

Joanne: Oh my God. I can't believe you.

Robin: These are my winter gloves, right? Do they fit? Yeah, they work. I mean, they do the thing, but look at that. That's not my hand. That is not my hand.

Joanne: No, the fingers are way too short. Now you basically need the winter version of your SP8. If you go on Alpinestars' website, they have waterproof thermal sport gloves, and you'll find probably a tremendous difference in comfort and fit.

Robin: I have an interesting sidebar. Let's not run with it too far, but a sidebar question that I ran into with these gloves in specific, nevermind the fact that the fingers are too small.

Joanne: Too small for me.

Robin: They're comfortable enough, but I have found that the liner inside, you're riding, your hands sweat, it gets into the liner. If you take these gloves off, there is a chance in a deep downpour that you can't get them back on because the liner becomes a wall. Your finger can't re-enter the glove.

Joanne: So you're asking me for a solution to that?

Robin: Yes, I am. Hold on. Part of the question comes from shopping for such a thing where you read the reviews. Oh, they're nice and warm, and they're comfortable, and you buy them, but then that happens. Now you're stuck because you've got to use a knife to dig out the... What's your solution? I'd love it.

Joanne: Two things is stop wearing those gloves. Second is seriously, you need a glove that's more tuned to your riding style. I forgot what bike you're riding.

Robin: R1200RS.

Joanne: I mean, the R1200RS isn't sure a race bike, but it still has a riding position where you need some pre-curve, right? You need like 50% of the S1000RR version of that bike, right?

Robin: I will defend that I have control ridden on that bike at track days, which is really depressing to whoever I have to catch up to and then have a chat with.

Joanne: So we want to get you some more pre-curved, sport-oriented gloves.

Robin: I love those SB8s. I love them.

Joanne: The two... Well, then you'll probably love, honestly, the waterproof warm version of them because they have so many. So the two words to look for in the descriptions of gloves when you're shopping besides waterproof and insulation is lamination, and then if you can afford it, Gore-Tex. So I'm going to say or. Actually, I want to say and. So here's the thing. Lamination is the priority. You want to make sure that any glove like this you find has a laminated waterproof membrane. So that's how you minimize and avoid this issue of breathability, but also the lining, you know, separating inside and then sticking because with lamination, basically you take the waterproof membrane and the insulated part and kind of iron them together. So they become one.

Robin: Okay.

Joanne: Okay. And some brands, the really higher quality, really expensive Gore-Tex products, they're going to laminate all of it. So the Gore-Tex membrane with the textile fabric, with the lining will all be kind of pancaked together. Think of like a, you know, a panini machine where everything just gets smooshed together. And then the lining can't do that because it's laminated. But that's going to cost you at a minimum $150, $175.

Robin: I was going to say, here it comes, here it comes. This is where she's like, I want you to look at a jacket for me. It's $1,300.

Joanne: Okay. You're taking that a little far, but $150, $175 for a really good winter glove is good. Because remember, we're talking about performance. So you cannot expect performance at $50. It's just like any other thing, tools. You can't expect a Harper Freight wrench to perform like, you know, a Sonic or a Snap-on, right?

Robin: Is that the memory foam Ikea bed?

Joanne: Exactly. Right?

Robin: Yeah.

Joanne: Yeah. It's the same thing. So if you really need that performance and you ride in the rain a lot, or you really, you need more breathability. So part of why your lining is sticking to you is because it's using... It's coming from me. Right? It's coming from you, but also the membrane in that River Road glove, it's a basic, it's something very simple to get the job done, but it's not something that's been designed or engineered or created or technically designed to perform better and breathe better so it doesn't stick to you. But the word lamination is key. Avoid anything that isn't laminated. And that's how you really reduce how that works or the consequences or the risk of that, of what you're experiencing. And I'm going to find you a glove while we're doing this. I'm going to find you.

Brian: Yeah. All right. One of the things I've noticed, one of the things I've noticed too is that, and I think we mentioned this earlier, is that the better brands are a lot more consistent. Like if you order a pair, then you can order the next pair.

Joanne: Absolutely. That's why you spend more money.

Brian: Yeah. You can get something to cover your paws that are for much lower prices, but you go back to buy another pair or you buy something else. It's all over the place or you're left and right or different. Yeah. Similar banter at higher revs can be heard via the Gear Chick podcast. Visit gearchick.com and dig in. Segment three, moments in motorcycle history with Jordan Liebman.

Robin: So for our listeners, you may as well know that Jordan's segment, we record in sometimes small portions, sometimes in bulk portions, but I'm always seated with him and sort of playing guardrail to the conversation to keep things on track and have a good time. Well, this time around, in our effort to just discuss what he called the Devonian period of motorcycling, which I thought was fantastic, we took a look at George Wyman. All right. And so we're going to sit down with a little bit more organization and Jordan's going to get deep into the George Wyman story and the first motorized crossing of the Sierra and the U.S..

Jordan: The George Wyman story is a rabbit hole that I went down, you know, typically at my age, I'm 55, and I've learned that when I come to a rabbit hole, you walk around it, you look at it, you point at it, say, that's a rabbit hole. I'm not going in there. And you walk away because you're not getting that time back and you know, you can't commit to it. But anyways, so this guy Robin shows up and he says, Hey, let's talk. And so let's talk about George Wyman. So this guy was born in 1877, George Adam Wyman, and he was born in Oakland, California and started racing around 1890 at age 13 on bicycles. It's a big deal because bicycles were really popular. And by the age 20, he's so good at the racing and the circuits in San Francisco and Oakland and that whole area there that he decides he wants to go to Australia. And he becomes the first American to circumnavigate Australia on a bicycle, engine free on a bicycle. He's the fourth person to do it, but the first person who wasn't Australian, right? And Australia is not a small country. In fact, I think it's just about its own continent. And so we get an idea of what kind of person he is. He's not a wimp. To me, he's like one of those gladiators. You know, you see on TV, he, he is tough, but he's also really humble. And he's a gentleman because I guess there was a different mentality back then among people that were trying to impress each other. He doesn't smoke. He doesn't drink, doesn't swear, clean cut guy. So he does the Australia thing. And by 1902, he's done living in Australia and wants to come back to America. He comes back to America and he goes back to living around San Francisco and he's, uh, 26 years old now. And there are motorcycle companies popping up now. So there's one called the California Motorcycle Company or CMC. And, uh, they know about this guy cause he's already made a name for himself. He rode around Australia. That's the big deal that makes the news. And they say, Hey, look, you know, we have a motorcycle, take a look at it and see what you think. He gets into riding motorcycles. And so he's the first person, uh, after still in 1902, he rides across the Sierra Nevadas from San Francisco to Reno and back, which is a big deal because we don't even have roads outside of the towns had roads. They could be what they call Nick Adam, which is crushed rocks. It's a layer of crushed rocks, about three inches across and a bunch of smaller rocks on top of that. And then Dustin, it gets packed in and they call that a road. And then they could also have cobblestone and they can have brick and they can have wooden blocks like parquet almost at the bottom of the BMW dealership in Chicago on the South side and their basement where they keep their storage. The whole floor of that basement is that type of floor. It is blocks of four by four or six by six wood stacked vertically all over the place. It is the old street from that part of the city. They were still getting the idea about what was a road. So in a proper good size town, you will have streets. You will have something that's packed that you can ride, drive, walk, and keep your feet relatively clean and not, you know, lose your feelings because it's the street. It is the town and they're proud of it. And you get out into the boonies a little bit out of town. Maybe you're going to go a block. Maybe you're going to five miles out of town in a really big town and that shit ends. Okay. They do have concrete. They had Portland cement, which was invented in the 1800s. It's a place or a rock or something like that. And they just named it that. In some places they do have roads that are concrete. Okay. Portland cement. And they called those sidewalk highways. So really, if you drive down interstate and you look at the frontage road that runs along it, and you see that it is white concrete and it's being taken over by weeds and mud and dirt and things that are just trying to reclaim it, there's a good chance that that road is a hundred some years old and it was the highway and they ran a new highway right next to it. And they're using it as a frontage road. They're using it as an access. Back in the, this is 122 years ago. Here we are talking in 2025. This is in 1903. So really there wasn't much road. You're in town. You can ride to your old friend's house or ride to the pub or whatever. But outside of town is no man's land. This guy, he's the first guy he rides from San Francisco to Reno, Nevada and back. And that puts another feather in his cap. And so this company, CMC, the California Motorcycle Company, they're competing against 200 other companies in America that are trying to make a name for themselves. Two of which are Indian and Harley Davidson. By 1903, they were both in existence and they're not unknown. And so he accepts the offer because he made it to Reno and back. How bad could it be? It could be pretty bad. It can get pretty bad. And there's a lot more after Reno. He made that trip. And you know, this guy is tough as nails, but the motorcycle itself, the bicycle, motorcycle, whatever, it's a developing life form at this point. And I already talked about the Devonian period. We've, the Devonian period, there's a great dying after that. And all these things that came up, tried to get a latch on life are dying up and a few things are going to survive. And now we have fishes or fish or whatever you want to say. We're getting into the area where the new life form is going to take hold and it's going to one that's going to carry us to the next stage. He takes us, this California, it's called the California. So May 16th, 1903, he takes off to ride from San Francisco to New York, coast to coast. Day one, Saturday, May 16th, 1903, he leaves from San Francisco at Kearney and Market Street, which I looked up and I are in San Francisco. And they're still there and heads to the Golden Gate, but it's not a bridge because there is no bridge. The bridge doesn't exist for another 30 years. Back in 1903, the Golden Gate was a ferry and that was called the Golden Gate Straits. So he goes there and he's got to go there because there's no, I looking at the map, I'm like, why doesn't this go straight across to Oakland? Well, there's no IATA yet there either. He cannot cross to Oakland. He's got to go up and around. So he gets, he puts the bike on a ferry and he gets to the other side and he gets to Vallejo. And really the first day was a lot of pomp and circumstance. It was the motorcycle manufacturer and the other sponsors. So he got sponsors. This is not money out of pocket. The manufacturer, the California Motorcycle Company and a magazine called the Motorcycle Magazine. I know, very creative. They're sponsoring him and they're going to cover his room and board and his food and his repairs and whatever else he needs. I mean, they're selling thousands and thousands of magazines, thousands and thousands of bikes. So they're going to cover this guy and he's going to make this trip. So the first ride is three miles to Vallejo. It's really just publicity. They take pictures, they have a crowd to see him off. And as far as soon as he's out of sight, people probably go back to the pub and talk about it. There's no big deal there. They're speculating whether he's going to make it or not. It's not a foregone conclusion that he's going to make it. And if he doesn't make it, how does that make the motorcycle manufacturer look? Two days after he leaves, the very first cross-country car trip starts from San Francisco going to the same place. That's a whole other story. So this is almost like one of those movies from the 70s where they're all trying to run to a certain place at the same time and it's some kind of a comedy. And it is tragically comic, but they're not on the same schedule. They're just really close. And I don't know how much of that is a coincidence, but we see by the end who is the winner. And by no small margin, it is George Wyman, because there are a few people that could put up with what this guy's about to put up with and make it all the way. This is a trick bike. There is some suspension and I'm going to put that in quotation marks because it's not telescopic suspension. It is barely a trailing link suspension in front, almost like a girder fork. But I mean, we're talking about like maybe two inches of suspension at most. And it's not for roads. I mean, this is, this is a bicycle and the rear has no suspension, but it does have a sprung seat, right? So he's got a seat made by X manufacturer and it has some give. It's not like a seat with four inches of padded foam of different densities and some vinyl on top. It is a bicycle seat. They made the human beings tougher back there. I don't know anybody personally that would be up to this task in 2025 or even in the last 55 years. CMC and the Motorcycle Magazine have secretly made a deal with him that he's going to get $500 if he makes a trip in less than 40 days. So this is across America. It says 3,800 miles on a bicycle with a, with a motor on it and engine on it. This is not publicized that he's going to get 500 bucks. And in today's money, that's about $17,000. We'll see what it is next week. But anyways, that's what the money was, right? So this is kind of his impetus. Plus he gets to put the third feather in his cap. The first guy to cross the United States, you've already done Australia. He's already done San Francisco to Reno and back. Once you get out of San Francisco, past Vallejo, there's no roads. He's riding up and down hills with rocks and, and maybe a sheep pasture or something like that to get to Vallejo. There's, there's nothing. It's like the sound of music racing. He's running around in the back, backwards from nowhere.

Robin: Now it's time to wind everything down, decrescendo, round it out and figure out what are we doing next week? I can tell you right now that based on Joanne's discussion of always spend up on the better, now it's time to put the hurt on. Not everybody can do that. And you can't just say, well, but, but, but, but, but they still should. Because a lot of people do that. They know that the next spend there's, there's inspiration in making a bigger purchase that in some people's lives will suddenly cause things to happen that allow success and more, more progress because they went for it. Right. But there are people out there. They shouldn't not get to ride a motorcycle who just can't, they just can't. So as much as you might want to talk about, well, I still love that. I won't bring it up again, but the $1,300 jacket joke is the one that will reign supreme for the past three episodes. It's concluded. It's behind us. Yeah, it's gone now. So I'm going to say that what empathetic purchases of reasonable caliber in terms of head to toe, helmet to boot, what direction can you tell the worthy rider who just isn't where everyone else might be at? What can they get that will protect them, be comfortable, look good, all the stuff, and still stay in that budget territory?

Joanne: Are we talking about a head to toe solution? Like you're just talking about everything, like someone who needs to buy everything.

Robin: Yeah. There are people out there that they're going to, you know, they could buy some bad kit that scratches them up and hurts, but that's their budget. Couldn't they do better on the same budget?

Joanne: First and foremost, you cannot go into motorcycling without budgeting something. So this really only applies if, say you can only budget $800 or $900. Now that sounds like a lot, but we're talking about head to toe protection.

Robin: I can say right now that's not a lot.

Joanne: Right. With motorcycling, there is no $50 solution. There just isn't. If you actually want to wear something to really protect you, that's where your expectations have to be met. I'm not going to give you any solutions to spend hardly anything. It doesn't exist in our world.

Robin: You still got framework. There are boundaries you can't go past that you don't want to put the hurt on somebody and just tell them, no, you can't because then they're not.

Joanne: No, but there's some level of expectation people have to start with. Your foundation has to be going into motorcycling. I could get hurt. I could die. I could be seriously injured.

Robin: How do you help them frame their expectations in ways that are realistic for their life versus what we might want them to be able to do?

Joanne: There is definitely a range where you can do that, but it's not going to happen with anybody whose expectation is zero on gear and $30,000 on motorcycle.

Robin: DOT approved flip-flops?

Joanne: Yeah. There's a huge range in that question. There isn't a definitive line there because, right, depending on the person's background or who they are or where they come from, yeah, that number can be low, but we can also find many used affordable solutions, many, many where you can find really great product from people who just don't want it anymore.

Robin: We live in that day and age. In the opening of next week's episode, there's going to be a rant. Harley Davidson's done it again with a lack of research into known norms outside of their demographic and staking claim to the ST concept with something that just isn't, and I'm going to go off on it, but I'll keep it short-lived on the intro and just know your audience, know the demographic a little bit better before you label something something at eight, which then is going to need a palate cleanser. What would you guys like for me to talk about in my segment, segment one, next episode? Give me a topic, any topic, I'll figure it out.

Joanne: How about getting back into motorcycling when you're old?

Robin: Ooh, okay.

Joanne: Like you were riding in your 20s and now you're going to go, because that's the highest risk group. If you were younger and you bought a bike 40 years ago and now you want to ride again, and you're like in your 60s and 70s, that's the other risk group where you spend thousands of dollars on insurance because they know you're going to crash your bike and possibly kill yourself.

Brian: The rubby question, the re-entry biker. Yeah. Yeah. And that's a little different because you know, and you're good friends with a lot of old guys who've ridden all their lives, like Kelly. And so that's a little different. This is more like, I want to get back into it, my kids are out of the house and I promised I would wait. So that's an interesting thing to think about.

Robin: Well, the very first word that comes to mind, and I will get into it when the time comes, is venue. Brian, are you ready to get out of here? I'm ready to get out of here. Let's get out of here. Joanne, thank you. You're welcome. I will say this, you're only telling me all this stuff because everybody out there, Joanne's going to be pre-recording for next week because she's got bigger, more important things to do than hang out with the likes of us. Yeah. I got to find a job is what. You are a rock star. Joanne needs a job. Let's everybody help Joanne. Are you grateful to Joanne? Get that woman working.

Joanne: Find me on LinkedIn.

Robin: Brian, get us out of here.