Something like 3-6, anyway

I’m not really counting, that’s for sure. Usually I’m too busy trying to remember which gear I’m in, so when I stop the Patrol I can get it down to first and then into neutral smoothly.

Moments of firsts

The past few days have been a mix of riding and non-riding days, but there have been some interesting moments of note — most of them moments of “firsts”:

• First night-time ride. One evening I threw on my fleece and leather jacket, and hit the road. Got the feel of riding with my headlight, and gauging distances in the dark — including distances between the tub and curb. Not too different than in daylight, but a little bit. Or, to put it another way, that nighttime ride is the only time where I’ve rolled the sidecar wheel over a curb. So far.
• First real roads. On, let’s see, Thursday or Friday, I felt confident enough to get a real road. One with, like, other cars. And stoplights. And cyclists. Real-world stuff, man. The street is called Maxwell, and it’s a feeder street connecting two main roads and a lot of neighborhoods. I was riding during rush hour, and while Maxwell isn’t terribly busy, it has a good share of cars. Didn’t have any problems (well, save for stalling once while trying to shift into neutral at a stop sign). Even aced my first stoplight.
• First time swearing into my helmet. Today I made my first (brief) venture out onto River Road — turned left from a stoplight onto rush-hour River Road, a much busier street. Rode up it a few blocks, intending to make a left at another stoplight to get back to puttering around neighborhood streets. As I approached the turn lane, some idiot tried to turn left by cutting across the turn lane — luckily it was before I was occupying that space, but I did feel ready with some swerve skills on stand-by. The idiot turned; I let loose a volley of curses and insults into the padded interior of my helmet. But at least the Patrol and I were still in one piece.
• Shedding ballast. For today’s ride, I felt it was time to start shedding a little ballast. Now my Patrol is riding with 80 lbs. of ballast (instead of the original 120 lbs.) — one 40-lb. bag of stove pellets in the tub, and one 40-lb. bag of stove pellets in the trunk. The next time I shed ballast — probably another week or so — I’ll remove the bag from the trunk, leaving only the bag in the tub.
• 100km! On Saturday, the bike crossed the 100km (or 62 miles). And she’s runnin’ fine.
• The most important first actually merits its own post. On Saturday, Jodie rode in the sidecar for the first time.

10K a Day

My goal for these first couple of weeks has been to average 10km, or about 6 miles, per day. So far that’s been working out well. My “clutch chops” are improving, as is my non-slouchy riding posture (still keeping an eye on that). We didn’t ride yesterday, so to make up for it I did 20km (~12.5 miles) today. Felt great.

Mechanically, the bike and I are getting a better feel for one another (YMMV):

• At start-up, I pull both enricheners before starting the engine. While listening to the sound of the engine, after 15-30 seconds the engine will start to struggle, due to the richer fuel mixture. With the bike in neutral and the parking brake on, I push in both enricheners and let the bike warm up for 5-10 minutes. Am trying to increase the warm-up to 10 minutes consistently — less than that, and the first couple of kilometers are marked by a lot of put-putting, especially while in first. Rolling on more throttle seems to help though.
• Neutral isn’t quite the enigmatic beast it was a few days ago, but we’re still not entirely sure of one another yet. Today at stop signs I was having trouble finding neutral, and stalled a couple of times. Mainly it seems I’ve been having trouble counting down and making sure I’m in first before trying to shift into neutral. To improve this, I’m working on double-checking my shifting, counting gears, and really checking the feel of the bike when I start shifting towards neutral.
• Turns rock. Man do I love curves. And turning a bike is fun too. Even at these lower speeds in the neighborhood, cornering and turning is what it’s all about. Also getting a better feel for how much I need to shift weight and downshift as I enter turns.
• Speaking of shifting weight, I’ve also been working more just on nudging the handlebars and shifting my weight, say to motor past a dodgy-looking object in the road. It’s amazing how little weight shift it takes — even with my wee 135-lb. frame — to affect the direction of the bike.

Overall, I’m feeling really good about my progress on my Ural Patrol so far. There’s still plenty of rough spots to work on (smooth shifting, neutral, etc.), but all told, I’m feeling much more confident on the bike now. Getting to go on a ride with Jodie in the sidecar was also very bolstering. By the end of the week, I’m hoping to be out on more of the “real world streets”, and getting the throttle up some more too.