babyhog wrote on 06/15/10 at 08:13:49:


Baby,

Don't forget to give your drive belt a once over after every significant foray onto gravel.

The gripping the tank tip is definitely a good one when your in the twistys really connecting you to your machine but riding on gravel I've always taken the route of letting the bike do what it going to do anyways,  the key is you can't fight it  stay slow and loose and use your eyes at all times.  

When I was 17 I got my first bike a Suzuki GSX-R 750 absolutely crazy I know and to make things worse I grew up in Muskoka, Ontario tons of snow and buckets of sand and salt for months into the riding season and I lived in the boonies on an unpaved road, I rode that piece of road everyday actually put 30,000 Km's on the bike my first season but I still haven't ever been down (knock on wood) I'm 29 now but I have to say that my first 3 years of riding that ridiculous, amazing, exhilarating machine was the best training I could have ever had.   The only thing that will make you comfortable with anything you could encounter is by having already done it.  Just my 2 cents.

And the last thing yes always wear your protection and I mean jacket and chaps if you got em too ... Road rash is sometimes much worse than the impact of a slow wipe out on rough terrain.   Protect your largest organ.

Our driveway is gravel & has washes across it, lumps of gravle, generally, not a safe ride & its pretty seriously sloped up to the road. Stay loose on the handlebars, feet on pegs. Trust me, if the rear shifts right, youll shove your rear end over to keep it upright. As long as you arent being a goon( turning too hard) or hitting thre front brake the front will track along.

Now, Sand,,theres a fun subject. I had a kawa 750 I took out into the dirt roads of west texas. Ive been stuck, with cows in the road. If you think they ignore a car horn, just try to make them move with a bike horn. Anyway, if you come to a long patch of sand, slow down before you get to it & lean back & gently dial on the beans. Itll hold the front tire out of it a bit & make it a lot easier to handle. I came out of 1 patch of sand running near 70, but it was tracking okay. When the front tire settles into it, its no longer stable. The Savage has a better h4ead angle tho & is more likely to track straight, I think.