Ive been on bikes my whole life. I grew up riding dirt bikes and enduros. I had trail 50s as a kid and 2 stroke moto 125s and 250s as a teen, then got into old school 80s era heavy Honda thumpers when I was a young man. For street bikes Ive had everything from crotch rockets to Harley’s up until we had my second son, who is now turning 8. This is in fact the first time in my life I have not owned a motorcycle. I sold my last Harley so we could move into our new house 7 years ago. That bike was 2 years old and had 45,000 miles on it when I sold it, I commuted daily, rain or shine, to LA. I sold it, partly because I got tired of the battle with LA drivers and relished that comfortable commute in a car with a cup of coffee not freezing my ass off in the winter rainy months.
Now I am retired and while I am working again I drive a short distance to work. The trucks going under the knife soon for a SAS and I don’t want to keep building up massive miles on my favorite toy so I got me a bike mostly for commuting. Honestly, I have no desire to ride it in the dirt, I have my truck for that. So the search began.
I sat on everything, keeping an open mind. I wanted to be able to comfortably flat foot or near flat foot it. In all the bikes I’ve ever owned my Harley’s were the most agile, believe it or not. I could drag floorboards around turns throwing sparks the whole way. I could do slow full lock turns with ease. I enjoyed the upright seated position. So I looked at cruisers. Nope, hated them all and a new Harley wasn’t in my budget. I had a 12-14k budget. I shifted gears to adventure bikes simply because of the riding position. I was apprehensive of the taller stance and how they would handle. Most of the Japanese dealers laughed when I asked for a test ride. BMW said we’ve got them all to test ride, take them out for a half hour and play.
Of the bikes I sat on, I was only comfortable on a few, I was surprised how tall so many of the bikes were, even the standard naked bikes seemed tall. Price wise the BMWs were the best bang for their buck, they were a bit more than the Japanese bikes actual price (price in the dealer over what the inter webs machine said) but absolutely packed with options and accessories.
I bought the BMW F750GS with Premium package. I found a corporate event bike which means they used it for one event and then sold as new with a deep discount because it had a whopping 140 miles on it. Perfect!
Now I am retired and while I am working again I drive a short distance to work. The trucks going under the knife soon for a SAS and I don’t want to keep building up massive miles on my favorite toy so I got me a bike mostly for commuting. Honestly, I have no desire to ride it in the dirt, I have my truck for that. So the search began.
I sat on everything, keeping an open mind. I wanted to be able to comfortably flat foot or near flat foot it. In all the bikes I’ve ever owned my Harley’s were the most agile, believe it or not. I could drag floorboards around turns throwing sparks the whole way. I could do slow full lock turns with ease. I enjoyed the upright seated position. So I looked at cruisers. Nope, hated them all and a new Harley wasn’t in my budget. I had a 12-14k budget. I shifted gears to adventure bikes simply because of the riding position. I was apprehensive of the taller stance and how they would handle. Most of the Japanese dealers laughed when I asked for a test ride. BMW said we’ve got them all to test ride, take them out for a half hour and play.
Of the bikes I sat on, I was only comfortable on a few, I was surprised how tall so many of the bikes were, even the standard naked bikes seemed tall. Price wise the BMWs were the best bang for their buck, they were a bit more than the Japanese bikes actual price (price in the dealer over what the inter webs machine said) but absolutely packed with options and accessories.
I bought the BMW F750GS with Premium package. I found a corporate event bike which means they used it for one event and then sold as new with a deep discount because it had a whopping 140 miles on it. Perfect!
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