I guess I have been lucky to spend most of my motor-cycling life in Southern California, where what we are pleased to call "winter" is simply a time when you can comfortably wear all your protective apparel. I have met a couple of locals who say they put their bikes away during the "cold months," but most people just laugh at them.
However, I did go to college in Wisconsin, so I have just enough experience with frigid weather to appreciate how good I have it-and what I'm missing. It is nice to rarely have a day when riding doesn't seem thoroughly appealing, and we certainly have no excuse for letting our riding skills go stale. But when I saw "October" on this issue, I waxed a bit nostalgic for some of what you miss when there is no temperature-induced motorcycling downtime.
For example, as the weather closed in during one of those Wisconsin autumns, I took my Honda apart in the garage and carried the components down to the basement for some attention. That winter I learned how to spoke and true wheels, time cams and weld. When the bike emerged the following spring, it had an extensively modified and refinished frame, reconfigured suspension, new wheels, modified brakes, repositioned footpegs and controls, a more powerful engine and completely new bodywork-fenders, seat and tank. Most people thought the final product was actually a different motorcycle, since little besides the engine could be identified as original. I repeated the process on a slightly less intense level a year later with a Kawasaki H-1. Since moving to California, I have never had a streetbike out of service that long, and have never spent that much time on a project, in part because riding almost always wins when there is a choice between riding or wrenching.
The agony of my last winter of motorcycling hibernation was cut short when I loaded my three bikes into my van and headed for Southern California, the motorcycling epicenter of the universe. Great roads and great weather make it so. It was the last time I'd thrill to breaking a winter motorcycling fast by gorging on that first real ride of spring, enjoying that rush of the new riding season with a freshly tweaked bike and new riding exercises. These days those new motorcycling experiences are spread out more evenly for me, and while there are no longer any long dark days of motorcycle deprivation, neither are there spring rides of rediscovery.
Riders who don't live in the Sun Belt may envy those of us who do, but it might be that those of us for whom motorcycling weather is as routine as sunrise are missing out on something too. I sometimes think riders from colder climes actually enjoy motorcycling more than those of us without inclement weather. We never get to fully appreciate what we have when we ride because we don't lose it. Those of you who are contemplating storing your bikes for winter can mourn the months of missed miles, but you might also welcome the opportunity to rejuvenate motorcycle and motorcyclist-and the joy of a new motorcycling season.
My last winter of motorcycling discontent left me more than ready for the endless riding weather of Southern California. My carefully massaged motorcycle quickly began winning roadraces, and the reading, motorcycling contemplation and yearning also unknowingly readied me for a job interview at Cycle News West a few weeks after I arrived. The idea that I might get a job that allowed me to make motorcycling part of my life not only 12 months a year but also seven days a week seemed almost unimaginably exciting.
Thirty winters after I got it, I still feel the same way -Art Friedman
E-mail Friedman at art.friedman@primedia.com or ArtoftheMotorcycle@hotmail.com.