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All week long I was looking forward to taking the dirt bike out for another spin. I made plans to meet up with a guy named Raj from South Bay Riders. We went to Metcalf Motorcycle Park at 9am in order for him to show me around a bit and because we are both starting out and would be at similar skill levels in the dirt. This worked out great and we had a really good time. We each took some spills, including one in which I totally locked up the back tire in the pebbles, slid all the way up to the top of 8′ berm, flopped off the bike and slid on my back all the way down the berm like an overturned turtle for at least 20′!

I really need to work on my touch with the back brake. I think I took more dirt samples than Raj did, but nothing serious. We both struggled to make it up a particular hill that we tried three separate times. I finally made it up on my third time around, but not without stopping part way up because I lost traction and momentum. Seems to me like a good measuring stick to use and see if I improve on future attempts. It was a lot of fun but it sure did take a lot of energy out of us wrestling the bikes.

Raj had to take off at 1:30 but I decided to hang around and get some more loops in. A nice guy named Brian was parked a couple of spots down from me and came over to say hi. We chatted for a bit and then he offered to take me for a spin and maybe show me a couple of trails I hadn’t done yet. We started off on trail 1, but he turned off into the GP track, which I hadn’t gone around before. It’s a really neat little track with some nice banked turns, but still more of an off road feel than a motocross track. Then we took off on down to some more trails. When we got to one particular junction, he pointed at a trail with a sign next to it with a black diamond on it. “Ignore that sign” he said, “it’s really not that hard. Just stay on the throttle, feather the clutch all the way up it, and let the bike follow the rut.” Sure. No problem. Well, I got about half way up it, finally got too squirrely and ended up stalling the bike. This was late in the day and with much of my energy sapped, it took me a few minutes to get out of the way, and get the bike kick started again. In the mean time, Brian had looped back around and come up alongside where I was on an adjacent trail. From there he offered some more coaching. When I complained that the back tire kept spinning he said “Go ahead and let the back tire spin, just put both feet down and let it spin, feather the clutch and you’ve got to give it more gas.” So I followed that advice to the best of my ability (clutch hand cramping and weakening as I went). I finally got up the climb and after some more rutted and tight single track we completed the loop. It really was a lot of fun and very challenging, for me at least. I’m glad he came by and offered to show me around. It was a great chance to see how an experienced rider does things

The majority of the trails were very hard-packed and dry, but it ranged from the equivalent of dusty concrete to jagged rocks to loose pebbly stuff. My rear tire is pretty much toast (it was when I bought the bike) so I’ll be replacing it soon, but I’m not sure a new tire would have made much difference in traction in those conditions. Dirt bike tires definitely appear to be less expensive than street tires, but maybe its because they probably don’t last as long? I should be able to pick up a new one on sale from Cycle Gear for less than $80.