10 Things You MUST DO in your FIRST YEAR of Motorcycling!

it's official the riding season is here days are nice and long and the weather is nice and warm unless you live in austin texas like i do and in that case it's been some sort of secret monsoon season either way if you've decided to take the plunge into everyone's favorite sports lifestyle slash drug addiction with your very first motorcycle you're probably wondering what to do next you've got your bike you've got your gear and you're looking to get out and experience the world on two wheels to be honest i'm a little bit jealous every time someone dms me and says me they're getting their bike for the first time because pretty much every time is a new experience however if you're looking for some things to do on your motorcycle to either improve your skills or just get out and enjoy the experience of riding a motorcycle then i've collected a list of 10 things you should do in your first year of writing nothing on this list is gonna cost you a bunch of money and everything is gonna help you get started with all that life on two wheels has to offer before we take a look at all that though one thing you're probably already doing is overpaying for your motorcycle insurance insurance is one of those things that everyone has to have but you don't have to deal with bottom dollar dude in a trailer saying yeah bro if you crash just give me a call and i'll fix you up kind of policies with progressive you can get coverage starting as low as 79 bucks a year which is literally nothing if you're a gamer that's the price of one video game and a headset to listen to some 10 year old scream into your ear about he's so much better than you instead of being made fun of by children you can get out riding your bike knowing that you're covered in case of an accident you can even get gear and accessories coverage for your mods and protective equipment so you don't have to worry about paying to replace that all by yourself we've had all the shop bikes at hq covered by progressive since before we started even giving them away and both spite and i use progressive for our personal vehicles click the link down below and get yourself a free quote and see how much you can save thanks again to progressive for sponsoring today's video now let's find out the 10 things you should do in your first year of riding the first thing you need to do in your first year of riding a motorcycle is modify your bike everyone does it and in this case it's perfectly acceptable to succumb to peer pressure i promise we're not gonna make you jump off a bridge don't worry modding your bike is the simplest way to make your bike feel unique and special and get yourself some wrenching time on your ride sure you might be starting off on the same r3 as everyone else maybe you've decided to change the levers on the bike or get a new seat or a new windscreen or a new exhaust and suddenly your r3 stands out in line of all the other beginner bikes out there it's also a nice way to get your feet wet wrenching on your motorcycle but we'll talk about that in a minute some quick do's and don'ts for your first foray into modding a motorcycle first start small you don't want to dive in with some crazy top end cam adjustment or something like that if you don't have experience wrenching on a motorcycle second don't spend a ton of money modifying your first bike i see a lot of beginner riders saying they're going to make some ninja 400 into a hot rod bike with the full system exhaust and the top end kit in a fancy air box mod suddenly it's going to keep up with all the 600s that's not going to happen at that point just get a new bike bikes are not like cars you can't just modify them to make them faster it's just easier to get another bike finally keep your stock parts if you're riding around on a brand new beginner bike whatever mods you do are going to lower the value so keeping your stock parts on hand can help you make a little extra money when you inevitably upgrade number two find some friends to ride with or at least some other motorcyclists to hang out with let me drop this little pearl of wisdom on you squids free of charge no one and i mean no one gives one sweet flying fudgesicle that you ride a motorcycle yep you can talk to your friends who don't ride they'll just give you the cool story bro look and change the subject or hit you with a damn that's crazy you're going to want to talk to someone about your bike the rides you've gone on get some advice for mods or maintenance and all that jazz so you got to find a group of riders to hang out with it doesn't necessarily have to be people you ride with because you know that myself personally i'm not a huge fan of group riding but hanging out and talking about bikes with a group of people can open you up to new opportunities maybe they just know some cool roads or maybe they can show you a trick or two or get you into a discipline in writing you may have not considered otherwise if you feel it's social but you don't want to go outside you can check out our discord server by clicking the links down below and joining our community for the best motorcyclists on the internet we've got boomers on harley small bike fetish just on 300s and everything else in between we've also got a meetup feature if you want to meet someone irl number three learn to do the basic maintenance on your bike motorcycles are not like cars where you've often better served by just taking to the dealer and having every single little thing fixed i can't think of a single person aside from maybe a bmw dad who would take a motorcycle into a shop and have the chain cleaned instead you need to learn how to just do that stuff there's a whole bunch of resources online for fixing your bike up on your own but if you're looking for some great videos on how to do basically anything on your bike arie hunting over on revzilla has a whole series called a shop manual dedicated to how to work on your motorcycle things like cleaning and adjusting your chain changing your oil and filter bleeding your brake lines or even replacing worn components like sprockets and brake pads are all things that you should learn how to do if you've never turned a wrench before and you're a little bit nervous about breaking something then hopefully you did thing number two and made some friends that can come help you out most of the time riders are more than willing to help each other out not to toot my own horn again but we literally have an entire channel on the discord server dedicated to fixing things up on motorcycles motorcycle maintenance is a lifelong skill that you'll need to pick up sooner rather than later so you might as well just dive right in and learn it in your first year number four take a trip on your motorcycle one of the best things you can do in your first year riding is to get out and take a longer trip and see something cool from your saddle now i'm not talking long way around here but i'm also not saying that you should just go to the next town over you should find some destination near your area where you can spend a night and basically make a road trip out of it if you're in the u.s looking for some cool places check out what spite made a video on the top 10 motorcycle destinations that go around all the country now i know you're thinking to yourself yeah you only have a 300 cc it's not capable of doing big highway miles i don't have the money to upgrade to a touring bike this is a huge misconception you don't actually need a special bike to do anything i mean look at the abuse we put our gixxer 250 through where there's a will there's a way and there's nothing like a road trip on two wheels it is so different than going out there in a car again you don't need to go across the country to see something cool from the saddle of your bike but trust me on this one you're not going to want to miss going on a trip on your bike the next few things are all going to help your skills as a writer and going to start off with number five take some sort of advanced skills course sometimes these are called bike bonding classes but basically it's like the next level msf course where instead of being on some random rebel 250 from 30 years ago you're riding your own motorcycle now i'm not a huge proponent of the parking lot warrior stuff sorry dan dan the fireman love you dude i don't think that being able to perfectly execute a u-turn within two parking spaces while not putting your foot down makes you a good rider and doesn't make you a bad rider either but that being said they're valuable skills to know how to do it's also important to learn some emergency braking skills and advanced handling stuff on your own motorcycle so you can use it for the street also motorcycling is a craft it's a skill you're going to be working on and improving for the rest of your riding career and there's lots of different disciplines and things you can do with motorcycles so you should at least get started and try to learn a little bit more in your first year as your brain is soaking up all that sweet sweet knowledge number six do your first track day ah yes the very first track day it is my moment to shine time to simp publicly for riding a motorcycle around a racetrack it's an experience that will stick with you for a long long time you get to experience what riding without a speed limit is like how much farther your bike can lean over there's no cops there's no stop signs there's no traffic it is absolutely wonderful and if you're a quick learner you might be able to get your knee down on that very first day and post a picture of your scraped knee puck on instagram if you ride a motorcycle you need to do a track day at some point and the sooner the better you'll be able to ride fast in a safe and controlled environment most the time for your first track day you're riding with instructors who can help you show the ropes if you're worried about price like getting a suit boots gloves a track motorcycle because you don't want to wreck your personal bike don't be lots of organizations will rent you a suit for the first time and you're not going to drop your bike riding around the track for the first time it's pretty rare chances are on your first time you're not going to be anywhere close to the limit of traction so just go out on your bike have fun and soak up the knowledge seriously go to attractive number seven keeping with the theme advancing your skills and broadening your horizons ride as many different types of bikes as you can if you've just gotten your first motorcycle chances are you just got something that looked cool or something that you think you'd like to do and that's fine it's why i started an r3 it was a sweet looking sport bike and i wanted to be a fast boy but here's the thing you don't know anything about what kind of riding you like to do and that's okay no one does when they start out for the longest time i thought the dirt bikes were dumb and ugly and all look the same but that's because i was a small brained boy i went out and tried off-road riding and i became the galaxy brain yam who speaketh to you now there are so many disciplines of motorcycling from road racing to trail riding to flat track racing to long distance touring to motocross to trials riding and all kinds of stuff each one has their own challenges and techniques that you'll learn and understand and only after riding a bunch of different kinds of motorcycle you start to understand and appreciate all the different disciplines don't write off a discipline until you've tried riding it unless it's taking 560 pound bmws off-road that's just dumb number eight pay off your motorcycle now i'm not gonna sit here and tell you how i have an economics degree and how you shouldn't finance your toys and stocks and all that but i do think that if you're financing your first motorcycle you should aim to have it paid off in a year i know that can be a little tough if you're a college kid working at your local sub shop but you should at least look to have as much paid off in one year as humanly possible why because you're probably not going to keep that first bike for much more than a year unless you want to turn it into a track bike or just keep it in the stable with an alternate bike you'll eventually want to upgrade and if you're upside down on a loan you're not going to be able to sell your bike yourself or trade it into a dealership for money down an upgrade if your monthly payment is around 150 you should really try to pay 300 down if you can swing it that way in your first year you inevitably do want to upgrade you can flip your bike the right way number nine upgrade your gear you've probably started out by watching one of our beginner gear list or maybe one from fort nine but your beginner gear probably isn't the best one out there not that you need to be rolling around in an agv carbon pista gp in an airbag jacket but if you started off with the 200 helmet maybe you should look into ones a little bit nicer later down the road or adding a pin lock or a cardo maybe you got a cheap jacket you want something that's a little bit more breathable or waterproof or your gloves aren't holding up all that well you should plan to upgrade slowly your gear throughout your first year riding or to get some nicer stuff don't go too crazy but it's okay to spend a little bit more on upgraded gear number 10 start thinking about your next motorcycle if you've done everything on this list and you're getting to the end of that first year of riding then it might be time to start thinking about what your next motorcycle is going to be maybe you want something with a little more power maybe you want something that's more comfortable throughout the office or you just want a second bike to do hood rat stuff with your friends on whatever it is you should be thinking about what that next bike might be that's why i said go try track riding go try a bunch of different bikes make friends with other riders so you can better understand what you want out of motorcycling don't dive right into that upgrade either take some time and marinade on it though don't forget that you're going to own a bunch of different bikes in your life so not every single one of them is going to be your favorite sometimes you just need to buy the bike fact a contronym is a word that's its own opposite for example if you seed the law and you add seeds but if you seed a tomato you remove them goodbye hey there partner you done made it to the end of this here yama new video but i tell you what there's another yam new video right over here waiting for you now i know i'm real gracious like that and i just do nice things for you so why don't you take a look at this video and you let me know what you think

Channel: Yammie Noob

Views: 167,351

Rating: 4.930491 out of 5

Keywords: beginner motorcycle, beginner, yammie noob, beginner rider, motorcycle accessories, beginner accessories, yammie noob list, beginner rider gear, beginner gear, motorcycle gear, best gear, motorcycles, newbie, motorcycles for beginners, yammie noob beginner bikes, yammie noob beginner, motorcycle safety, motorcycle tool kit, pinlock visor, best motorcycle lock, motorcycle gloves, motorcycle insurance, second motorcycle, finance motorcycle, first time on track motorcycle

Id: 0TLtrnaleCo

Length: 11min 11sec (671 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 06 2021