Who got you started

[PurpleRose]

Soon after my divorce I saw a guy on a goldwing, pulling a pop-up tent with a dog sitting on the tent..........i thought how cool is that. I was traveling and thinking about what I was going to do with my new found freedom. How wonderful it would be to ride like that and leave all your worries behind......an escape from everyday hustle and bustle and just feel the freedom.

That dream occurred to me 6 years ago and I never forgot it. I met a friend that has a bike. He gave me a ride a few months back and it rekindled the feeling I had. Then he sold his bike. When he bought a new one, I asked for a ride and he said no.....he wasn't giving rides on this one. That's when I asked him to teach me to shift on a dirt bike. Never happened. One day he tells me that there is a school that teaches you to ride. I immediately got online to find it.......I will be going to school on the 22nd of april. I am very excited. Now what seemed like a dream really is coming true. Touring interest me for when my son flies the coupe.

[barmy_carmy]

Good on you Purplerose, go for it gal! good luck on the 22nd! You will never look back

[LoriAnn]

I would have to say my Dad did. He took me for rides in the summer and I fell in Love with the ride. Right now, my husband and gas prices.

[Sarek]

My boyfriend taught me to ride when I was 16. We rode on a street bike in a field. He gave me a brief lecture on what to do and not do then said go for it. I popped the clutch and did a wheelie for about 20 feet. I didn't panick and I stopped like I had done it a million times but I was ready to quit. If he hadn't talked me into it, I wouldn't have ridden again. I will always be gratefull that he didn't let me quit.

[Digginit]

When I was 10 my dad bought me a ('72??) Yamaha Enduro 100. I rode that bike for YEARS!!! He encouraged me to ride even after his best friend was killed riding alongside my dad--someone crossed the centerline and hit his friend head on. That my dad got me started is something that I'm very thankful for. I don't know if I would have started riding as an adult if I hadn't had years on bikes as a kid.

linz

[Brooke]

I have to credit the guy who played Bronson in the television show Then Came Bronson with really getting me turned on to mortorcycles. I'm dating myself here, but I think that show was popular around 1969-70? I was an impressionable tom-boy who wanted to join the circus, be an artist in Paris and/or travel the world doing anonymous good deeds like Bronson on his kick-"O Ring" bike.
I think he was riding a Triumph.
Then it just seemed like all the significant men in my life were bike riders, 4 of them BMW men (....wonder what that means?)
About 5 years ago, I started to dream about teaching myself how to ride. In each dream, over a period of a few years, I got better and better at handling the motorcycle in the dream, until one night I was riding it all alone and doing just fine!
I figured if I could teach myself how to ride a motorcycle in my dreams, I could definitly do it in my waking life--turned 50, took my motorcycle class, and that was all she wrote.
yeeeha!

[jmillheiser]

I have toyed with the idea for a few years. But only recently finally decided to go through with it and learn to ride.

It was my wife's cousin (who happens to be a woman) who finally got me to make up my mind. Now to just get enrolled in the MSF course.

My wife and I have decided to do this together and she will also be taking the MSF course with me (hope we can both get into the same session).

Will just have to buy 2 bikes instead of one;)

My wife's cousin is unique among bikers I have met. She rides a Harley Road King and is one of the few harley riders I have seen in this area that wears a full face helmet and full gear.

My wife just needs to decide what style of bike suits her fancy, she is on the short side which would cause many to steer her towards a cruiser, I also know she really likes Ducatis.

[Wizzard]

Bronson rode a sportster from the AMF era .
Kind regards, Wizzard

[sapaul]

If anybody it has to be Steve McQueen,I came out of "On Any Sunday" at our local movies and was hooked. Everbody around me was horrified cuase I was only about 12. First bike I rode was a 50cc Puch with pedals. Some of you guys ask "what about this 1200 or that 1300 for a first bike" took me 30 years to get up to my K1200S. Sammy Miller was a big influence though.

[Kaige]

I tend to hang with a lot of guys. They all happen to have bikes and while I wanted to ride with them, I wasn't comfortable giving someone control over my life by riding on the back. Maybe I'm just a control freak

So my only alternative was to get my own license and my own bike. Now they all want to ride my bike. I don't fricken think so!