A question for ex-motorbikers...

[raleighnut]

Petrol went over £1 a gallon.
Cycled ever since.

 

[Gravity Aided]

Done with that. I found out I was done with motorcycles when my then fiance told me I was. I wasn't enjoying motorcycling that much by that time, anyway, so I made an issue of it and made it look like a sacrifice. Selling the motorbike helped pay for my expenses of the wedding, and a good nestegg for the honeymoon as well. I don't miss it at all. Love bicycles, though. True Freedom.

 

[TissoT]

[QUOTE 3125911, member: 76"]If you don't want it anymore, I'll have it!

I used to ride as my only form of transport, then I got a car and still used the bike loads. I had an RF900 for a three years, and put 36000 miles on it, including a highlight of a three week tour taking in the German, Austrian and Dutch rounds of WSB. Then we had a baby, in the next year I added about 40 miles to the total, and some of that was riding to get the MOT and a new tyre

Ultimately, like lots of you, it became an expensive thing in the garage that needed, servicing, MOTing, and general upkeep with no benefit, so it went I would have another bike tomorrow. Or even this afternoon if @tissot says yes [/QUOTE]
Sorry ..Not for sale due to it being my first bike
keep you in mind thought if I do change it.....

 

[MarkF]

Reading the expense posts makes your realise what daft fashion game m/cycling has become, it wasn't the reason I bought a Vespa but £3 bar levers, 20 exhausts & 100mpg+ were a revelation to me.

 

[Spinney]

OP, vulnerability is surely not a reason to give up, it didn't stop you starting?

But our attitudes to risk do not remain static. What seemed an acceptable risk when young, and when motorcycling was a new skill/new fun activity may no longer seem acceptable when older.

 

[4F]

I was finding that I was pushing the speed and riding like a dick and thought something had to change before I killed myself.

 

[GrumpyGregry]

My RGS Jota tried to kill me at high speed on a bendy rural A road in Wales. No idea what went wrong. No idea how I recovered it.
I was having to get up earlier and earlier on a Sunday morning to ride empty roads.
Then b-i-l, motorcycle paramedic, got wiped out by a nobber driver and it was touch and go if he would ever walk again.
Whereafter wife and children would cling to my leg as I headed to the door with my crash helmet in hand wailing "Nooooooo........!"

Haven't owned a bike now in five years. Haven't ridden anything above 250cc in two.

Still in lust with a Morini 3 1/2 Sport mind.

 

[User269]

I got fed up with the bike leaking oil, and often breaking down. So I gave up, and bought my first half decent guitar instead of a newer bike. That was in 1972.

It's a close run thing as to whether biking was more dangerous than the threats I used to get when playing my guitar in public....................

 

[pplpilot]

I got fed up with the bike leaking oil, and often breaking down.

British or Italian....?

 

[Vapin' Joe]

I bought my current GPZ500 two years ago after a break of six years. I've been riding for 40 years and even earned my living on one for a while. The GPZ is now on ebay as I wasn't using it much and the hassle of maintaining, taxing and insuring it isn't worth it. I wouldn't knock motorcycling as I got a lot of enjoyment from it but I've reached the age where bones don't heal very quickly and I no longer find it relaxing to ride, unlike cycling where you can just pootle along the lanes in your own little world.

 

[winjim]

My late father gave up motorcycling after a collision with a car. Left my mother widowed at the age of 30 after one year of marriage, with a baby who grew up never knowing his dad.

Please be careful out there.

 

[numbnuts]

I went though a hedge

 

[Archie_tect]

34 years ago HGV wrote off my motorbike and luckily I didn't fall that way too, so survived with a hare-line fracture to my shin [didn't know until having X rays months later] and cuts. Took a year to sort out the insurance even though 2 policemen were my main witnesses in the car behind me... couldn't afford to replace it and had to go up to Dundee anyway so never got round to buying another... got my '10 speed' Dawes Lightning instead and it's still as good as ever.

 

[yello]

But our attitudes to risk do not remain static. What seemed an acceptable risk when young, and when motorcycling was a new skill/new fun activity may no longer seem acceptable when older.

That's very true. I'm not entirely sure why I've become more aware of it... well, I've always been aware of it obviously, but it's only in the last year that it's taken on the significance that it has. Perhaps it's age, I don't know. All I know is that my awareness of it is perhaps now putting my safety at risk. That is, I'm TOO aware of it.

But there's a balance thing that others have referred to. Motorcycling stopped being fun as such many years ago and it became merely a mode of transport. That wasn't in itself a problem, I adapted to that, but over time I found myself riding less and less. To the point now where I just don't think it's worth the risk, my desire to ride is outweighed by the perceived dangers.

I wouldn't knock motorcycling as I got a lot of enjoyment from it but I've reached the age where bones don't heal very quickly and I no longer find it relaxing to ride, unlike cycling where you can just pootle along the lanes in your own little world.

Ditto. The 40km I did on fixed at 6am this morning was all I needed to put my world in order.

 

[Salad Dodger]

First time around, as a youth, I gave up on bikes and bought a car when I was courting the lady who became Mrs Salad. She wouldn't have anything at all to do with bikes - she hated them although not due to any previous accident etc.

Second time around, after we had married and had our daughter, I was using a bike to commute to work for a while. A combination of a long spell of bad weather, a fall on a diesel spill and the increasing unreliability of the bike as it got old meant that I chose to sell it and commute by public transport.

I have thought from time to time that it would be nice to get an old bike and restore it into a runner, just for "Sunday Rides", but I can't justify the cost right now......