Knowing & Treating Motocross Bike Well

Video Transcript

"The important thing to remember when riding a motorcycle and thinking about safety is just to always know your bike, know what you're doing before you get on it. It's not a good idea just to get on and just try and make mistakes. Trial and error works in a lot of things but, trial and error in motorcycle racing can be pretty painful. So, what we're going to do here is just basically get on the bike and take off. Probably the most important thing with riding a motorcycle is your throttle control, having a good grasp on your controls, your clutch, your throttle, and your brakes, and knowing how to shift, and use all of these things in conjunction. Although it's a lot to take in at once for somebody that's just beginning, getting the fundamentals down will really enable you to kind of push the envelope, and really explore how far you can go on a motorcycle. Using your controls in conjunction as you click the bike down into first gear, letting the clutch out slowly, and giving it throttle as you kind of take off. This is just an easy technique, and for people that are just beginning, just getting this down, to really learn how to use the throttle and the clutch in conjunction, so you don't have any issues where you know, you're looping out and landing flat on your back. But, motorcycles are really powerful machines that can spit you off of them in a hurry, so it's a good idea just to take it slow, find a nice, flat field, you know, without trees like this to run into or cars and go out, and just learn how to do the basics, learn the fundamentals and from there, then you can take it to all new heights. When you first get to the track, make sure that you always turn your fuel petcock to on. There's nothing worse than getting half way into your first practice session and your bike dying, you definitely don't want it to die on the face of a jump. So, always double check before you go out on the track that your gas petcock is turned on. Always check your tire pressure before you hit the track, make sure you're not running low or high, it'll make your bike feel a lot better underneath you, it'll trek better, and you'll avoid flats, and costly repairs. It's a good idea every time before you ride to just go over the bike and check all of the nuts and bolts, to make sure that you're not getting anything loosening up on you. Not only do you not want to lose bolts when you're on the track for the hassle of having to go down to the dealership and get new ones, but just as far as a safety thing and keeping your machine working properly and running well for you and giving it longevity. It's a good thing just to go over, check all of your spokes every time, check all of the fluids, you know, replace your oil regularly, lubricate your chain properly, and your bike, you'll get a lot of use out of it, you'll have a lot of fun, and you won't be pushing it back to the truck nearly as often. Checking and maintaining a clean air filter is crucial for the longevity of your motorcycle. You always want to clean or replace your air filter basically every time you ride. You can get a visual just by taking the seat off and looking at it, if it looks you know, pretty dirty then you're definitely going to want to either replace it with a new one or wash it. The hardest thing on the motor, on these motorcycles is sucking dirt in you know, through the carburetor and into the engine, it'll wear the parts so much more quickly and can definitely cause seizures and all sorts of other things that are very, very costly and just not a lot of fun. So, properly maintain your motorcycle, it's going to give you, you know a lot better performance, a lot more safety and a whole lot more fun. Another element crucial to rider safety and comfort is making sure that your controls are in a good spot for you. Everybody's different, a lot of people like their levers up high, a lot of people like them straight, I kind of like them in a neutral position. But, just setting them up to where you feel comfortable and you have you know, a good handle on what's going on, ensuring the tightness, and also somethings like the ASV lever, you know in the event of a crash, it'll actually move and it'll stop some costly repairs down the road. But, just in general making sure the control system of your bike is right for you. Straight handlebars, you know, a good bend that gives you a good grip on the bike, and a lot of leverage to make the bike do what you want to do."