With a little over 4 weeks until kick-off, I found myself in the car at 5 AM, heading off to the Honda Adventure Center in the heart of the Exmoor National Park.
Some context here: I have not ridden a motorbike for about 25 years. My road experience consists a few Japanese sports bikes including a GPZ550 - my university commuter - and an imported RVF400 which eventually got nicked from an event at Donington Park. I also did a few thousand miles to the French Alps and back on a Honda Pan European with Naomi on the back. I am rusty on road, and I've never ridden off road.
The 'Africa Twin' or CRF1100 is the bike of choice for Honda adventurers and is a style of bike I've never ridden. Tall, quite heavy, V-twin engine, 50/50 on-road/off-road tyres. The Africa Twin is a legend in the Dakar rally world in its original configuration, but this new bike is miles away from that.
I won't give you a blow by blow of the 2 days, but a quick summary would be:
I was extremely comfortable on the bike. My usual ailments (weak back, dodgy knees, tight neck) were all a long way from memory. I'm not sure if it was because I was so focused on the job in hand, but in any event all seemed well. I found standing on the pegs - an essential skill - came naturally. So far so good.
The course was very gentle to start. Lots of time spent doing slow first gear skills like tight turning, figures of eight and some gentle off road wide tracks to ease us in.
More testing conditions quickly came - a lot of recent rain has washed out a lot of finer gravel on the hills making most trails either mud or lose and larger gravel. The instructors admitted it was hard to find places for us to ride as many of their usual trails were impassable. Or, impassable for beginners. So we did do a lot of repeats but actually I was fine with that.
We did some green lanes, and few more private woodland trails and progressed the skills along the way - steeper descents and ascents - nudging the confidence along bit by bit.
We got plenty of practice picking bikes up. All low speed spills. Not me - yet.
All in all I was pleased. I was sore after 4-5 hours in the saddle on day one, but nothing unexpected. I shared my Tunisia plan with a few guys in the pub during the evening and the universal feedback was to simply get time in the saddle. Anywhere, anyhow, build the hours.
i confess i was not a huge Africa Twin fan. The bikes' ability to tackle the mud and ruts was quite staggering. It was comfy off-road, fitted me well, and was also pretty nimble on the 20 minute road blast to the lunch time pub. But I just could not get the throttle and gears sorted. First gear, although tall, was very snatchy for me, particularly standing up where I couldn't find a smooth speed. It was on, and pulling too hard, or off, and I'm bracing. Second gear was much better, but needed a certain minimum speed, which was not always appropriate to the conditions. I think the rider is probably more at fault - perhaps just more hours required, but I'm hoping my own bike (or the BMW's next week) display a slightly less aggressive throttle pattern. We'll see.
The other staggering attribute of a modern bike was the ABS. We did a braking exercise with ABS on and off and it is simply unbelievable how quickly (and how controlled) a big bike will stop on gravel with full force put through both brakes. We tried it again with ABS off and the difference was staggering. I don't think I got the instructions quite right on this one. I went a little quicker than planned and chose back brake only which resulted in a very long skid with a bit of sideways action. It put a smile on my face.
So I managed to get to about noon on day two before I took the inevitable tumble. 7-10 miles an hour, second gear, the front washed out on a mud section. Bike went right, I went left. Bike got the mud, I got the rock and gravel. Bit of a none event really. The clothing and protection did their job. I realised quickly I'd landed on my knee, elbow and hip in quick succession, but all were protected and all survived. Yes, I was sore later and the next day, but if anything it gave me more confidence that low speed tumbles - and most are low speed - whilst not desirable or fun, are not too big of a deal. I even managed to pick the bike up myself, dust us both off, and get going again within a minute or two.
Now, to caveat that, there was one injury on the trip. There were 18 of us in total and unfortunately there was one broken leg from a low speed fall. Rock, leg, bike is not a good combo. Tim, if you're reading this, I wish you a speedy recovery, and hope you find the confidence to get bank in the saddle soon. It was a reality check for me. Safety kit is essential, so are our own skills, but never get complacent.
So a 3 hour drive, 2 days of riding and a 3 hour drive home equals knackered, but it was invaluable to get it out of the way. Yes, I need to get fitter - knew that already - but it is doable and that is the main take away. It was also bloody good fun, which is also an important tick in a box.
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