Total Motorcycle Community Forums

Hi all-

I don't have a bike yet, but I'm planning on it here in the near future. I found this site and hope to learn a lot about riding from it. It seems to have lots of good info. I've already started looking around various sites and have gotten a heads up on some things. I keep seeing posts about what bike to start with and I see a pretty wide range of opinions. What I'll probably end up going for is a used Honda Shadow VLX 600. I've seen posts about some recommendations for 250's and such so I haven't set any kind of decisions. I just plan on going with what's comfortable to me. I've heard a lot of recommendations on the Shadow for a beginner bike and I'm hoping that's true. I'm about 5'7" 180lbs and it's supposed to have a low seat height so I'll just go sit on a few and see what feels right. Anyways, hope to hear from a few of you over time. If anybody has any pointers other than some of the obvious, feel free to shoot them at me.

Tim

the shadow is an excellent beginner bike

Thanks for the welcome! I'm really enjoying this site. Seems to be a never ending list of stuff to look at, I don't know where to begin

Welcome!

hello,
Honda makes a good bike. I started out on a Yamaha 650 V-Star.
I wanted to get a 250 at first, but my husband said no because I would be wanting a bigger bike in a month. He was right. I started out on my 650. Now I ride a 1500 Vulcan Classic..... not bad for a chick. Riding is a lot of fun you will love it, but don't ever get too cocky. I recommend taking the motorcycle safety course, especially if you have never ridden before. [/b]

Thanks for the responses. I plan on looking into the safety course in my area. I hear they can be backlogged for a period of time so I might have to wait. I even downloaded a DPS riders manual to look through. I originally thought about a 250 but I started leaning toward a 600ish range knowing that I'd most likely want to go up shortly afterwards anyways. Most likely will get the loud pipes too. Doesn't hurt to be heard

Cheers

Welcome to the site...

Some of the courses have no shows, sign up on a stand by list and you may get in quicker...

Hi. I'm a newby here too. Kudos to the tough biker chick who started out on a 650 but here in my world (which I believe is much more typical,) I started out on a 400. Sad to say but I wrecked it two days after I got it. (I don't think it was too much bike for me. I wrecked it because I fixated on my rear view mirror at the car behind me instead of the curve before me I shouldn't have even been on the road yet. ) As far as managing the 400 though, I was learning on it just fine----until the wreck.
I have a 250 now that was a lot less expensive and I wish I had started out with it for that reason. I've read a lot of other people's posts on these sites who say you should start out on something smaller and less expensive to learn on. You can always re-sell it and get a bigger bike later unless you wreck it and ruin it. If you do, you will be glad that you weren't on the more expensive bike when you wrecked. If you don't, you'll probably be more ready for the bigger bike.
So, in hindsite, I do wish I had started out on the 250. The lady above is now on a 1500 so she went bigger anyway, right?
I learned my lesson the hard way and I am scheduled for the MSF test training soon.

Regina