Motorcycling Is A System

If you want to ride a motorcycle often it’s always part of a system. Simply owning a motorcycle is great, but by itself that bike isn’t quite enough if you wish to ride a lot. Just like most individual recreational activities, riding (and racing) require a support system of parts, tools and equipment. And the more frequently and longer you want to be riding, the more extensive a support system you’ll need.

If you’re mostly a fair-weather and/or occasional rider, you may only need a place to hang a riding jacket and possibly a shelf for a pair of gloves, or gloves + a helmet. But if you want to ride nearly every day in all kinds of weather, and occasionally travel long distances by motorcycle, you’ll need more. Much more. Long-time high-mile riders usually have a closet full of old gear and a garage full of parts, tools, lubricants and assorted bike-related junk/crap/stuff. Maybe even an extra (or alternate) motorcycle or two. One for daily riding around town, and another for traveling. Or one for when the other one is broken and/or awaiting service, or perhaps another one as a “project bike”. It can be quite a commitment to ride a lot, year after year.

For a few riders all of this extra stuff is worth it simply because it means they get to ride all the time. And this is important: every time they ride -- rain or shine, day or night, long or short, hot or cold -- it’s always fun. No matter what. Riding provides one with a nice subtle (but measurable) dose of neural and physical medicine. You feel a little better after riding somewhere, even if it’s just going to the grocery store or wherever you may work. Bonus: If you choose to ride this much, you are also doing the planet and everyone sharing the roads a little favor, too. One Less Car and all that. Road-builders, carmakers and oil companies won’t appreciate that, but they’ll probably manage to get along ok without quite as much of your business. 

Side note: I’m fortunate to live in a single-family home, with a non-riding but extremely riding-understanding wife. Our house isn’t unusually large (+-1800 sq ft) but being in this circumstance makes having a system a bit easier. In an apartment or condo there’s a similar system, but it is necessarily a bit smaller since most apartments and condos are smaller. In these places your riding gear usually goes into the entry closet and your helmet and gloves go on the shelf just above. Having a system does not require living in a freestanding home. There’s this, too.

I’ve lived in two residences over the past fifty years and my system hasn’t changed much. It involves a garage large enough for a single car, a smallish adjacent space for a few shelves and a clothes-hanging bar positioned high enough so even a one-piece coverall riding suit can hang without touching the floor. In some ways this personal bat-cave setup is as important as the motorcycle itself, just because it makes near-daily riding so much easier and quicker: Get up, out of bed, brush teeth, get dressed, make some tea, read email and/or watch some news while drinking that tea…and it’s time to go.  

For me this means walking down a flight of stairs into a basement containing a furnace, water heater, laundry sink, a washer and dryer, too many boxes of stored items, and most importantly, a garage space with an electric door. (Side note: For many years this garage door was not electric. I’d open it, roll the bike out, put the bike back on its side-stand, then go close the garage door. Now that’s all done with a button dangling from a mini carabiner clipped to the shoulder strap of my small backpack.)

Mr. Subjective's suit hanging set up: Previous house -- current house.

On go the boots, then the riding suit, then the helmet, then the gloves and then (finally…) “I’m outta here!” Off and riding! Best part of any day, rain or shine. The clothes-hanging bar where my jackets, pants and riding suits hung at my first home was a water pipe which ran along the ceiling at a spot near the furnace, but still far enough away so there was no danger. Where I live now, I had to make a hanging bar with supplies from the local home/hardware store, but the job was simple. It’s a piece of wood screwed to one of the floor joists above, supporting one end of a closet hanger rod. The other end is held by a hanging-rod-saddle screwed to the adjacent wall. This whole thing took less than an hour to make and is only two feet long, but there is plenty of room for my gear. And it makes all the difference in how easy it is to go riding.

The other bat-cave installation is a narrow set of freestanding shelves reserved for riding gloves, a couple of helmets and assorted small items like ear plugs, bike keys, face shield cleaner and other incidentals. At my first home this stuff was located in a corner of the garage right next to the bike. Where I now live it’s located about three feet from the clothing hanger setup with the riding gear. Both worked just as well. (The little shelving thing was fully assembled and came from an unpainted furniture store and cost less than $100.)

That’s all there is to it. Same idea as Batman had for his bat cave, except my system doesn’t involve fighting evildoers. It’s simply about getting around on two wheels more often and easily. Nothin’ fancy.  Motorcycling is a system. What's yours?