Riding Means Different Things to Different People

Most riders I talk to will tell me that they like to ride a lot, and they often complain about others not wanting to ride more often.

But it's often just a difference of opinion on what "riding a lot" means to you.

On our riding club forum, we had this guy from another club introduce himself and offer an invitation to ride with them on an upcoming ride. They wanted to ride to The Hideout, and then to the Oasis, a couple of biker bars in north San Diego County. This ride looked to be about 80 miles round trip.

This guy talked about how he was so frustrated that so many people don't ride their bikes that often, and how he just loves to ride "a lot". Then he went on to describe some of the riding that he and his club guys do.

Since I've never ridden with them, I can't really know for sure how often they ride, or how far they ride, or if they do more freeways than twisties.

But the sense I got was that they love to ride to destinations, as opposed to riding for the sake of riding. The examples they gave were either riding to specific bars, or travelling to specific rallies. For all I know, they took the freeways there, and for all I know, they only ride 100 miles each time.

I met another guy awhile back, who hooked with me through my Meetup group. I had planned a ride along Big Pines Hwy, and then over to Boquet Canyon Rd, and then to Little Tujunga Canyon Rd. These are three very scenic, and very twisty roads, with a total mileage of about 300 miles. It also included a stop for lunch at the Rock Inn, a popular biker hangout.

Anyways, he showed up on his Big Dog factory custom, with this ridiculously long rake, and ridiculously fat rear tire. I knew for sure he wasn't going to handle the twisties. I reminded him there was going to be a ton of tight twisties on this road, but he said it was no problem because he rides the twisties all the time.

So off we went, and as soon as we hit the twisties, he kept drifting further behind. I slowed it down, but he was still drifting back.

After that ride, he hasn't returned to ride with me.

I thought that he would be riding with me some more, because he kept boasting about how he rides his Big Dog so much, and that he can't seem to find anyone who wants to ride often as he does. And since he said he rides the twisties "all the time", I figured we'd be riding together again.

Obviously, his idea of riding is way different than mine. I think his idea of twisties are roads where you can still ride 50mph and not drag your pegs, and I think his idea of riding is more like 100 miles round trip, with a few stops in between.

Differnt strokes for different folks.

So when I hear someone talking about how they love to ride a lot, I take it with a grain of salt, and wait to see exactly what they're talking about. There's riding just for the love of riding, and then there's riding for the destination.

Maybe it would be more correct for someone to say, "I love riding to the bar a lot".