I once tried to teach my cousin, Bryan Hartley, how to ride a motorcycle. We rode my 1991 Kawasaki Zephyr 550 out to Grenada Lake and found an empty parking lot. With him in the driver's seat and me standing next to them (him and my bike), I said, "Just give it a little gas, let the clutch out a little bit. I'll walk beside you and tell you when to shift into second."

And, man, this bike looked good! It was a dark blue, in-line four, retro-styled, piggyback rear shocks, 4 into 1 exhaust, five-spoke wheels that looked exactly like the Honda Interceptor's back then, big round tach/smaller round speedo to the left, cool bike. The Zephyr had a 6 speed gearbox and topped out at 115 mph. I totaled it in '95 (not my fault) when a girl pulled out in front of me.

Bryan gives the bike some gas, and let's the clutch out a little. It starts to stall.
I panic and insist, "Hurry! Give it some more gas."
He gives it more gas and it's revving quite a bit but not moving.
"You've got to let the clutch out some more!!" The bike revs even higher. Maybe his foot is on the brake?
"What the FU*K?" I wonder out loud. "Let go of the..." The bike takes off!
:run
And STOPS! And takes off again! It shakes down the parking lot like a horse trying to buck off its rider.
Bryan yells, "I'm SORRY!", and goes down on the left side. I remember the glass breaking (mirror) and how it sounded when the bike hit the asphalt. The gear shift toe part broke off, but I could still shift well enough to get us home. Other than that, the bike was fine.
Luckily, Bryan was not hurt either.
The moral of the story: You should KNOW HOW TO TEACH someone to ride a motorcycle before trying to teach someone to ride a motorcycle.
He's been talking about taking a Motorcycle Safety Foundation (MSF) course ever since. I tell him that's the way to go. Tomorrow, I'm going to give him my favorite helmet so he'll be able to take the course whenever he gets ready.
http://www.honda599.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=30547&highlight=#30547

:lol: I've been in the exact situation twice. Once when my friend tried to teach his girlfriend how to ride. I told him it was a bad idea. But oh well. His busted up SV650 is proof I was right.

Second time was when I sold my EX500 and I gave the guy a quick lesson. He managed to wheelie the thing and crash on the neighbors lawn hitting a big rock.

Ha... my friend wants me to show him the basics, which I could probably do decently (I've taught others how to use a clutch), but he wants to do it on my bike. I didn't directly say no, I just asked him if he had $1200 he could part with for a 250... my bike's seen enough of my mistakes, I don't think it wants to be a starter bike again..

:shock: :? Yeaaaah... point 'em to MSF. Makes me go back to that YouTube video of a guy trying to teach his friend how to ride. The dude wheelied off the spot, flew forward and crashed.

Can't do it, sorry, please take the MSF.

ive taught several people the extreme basics of motorcycling on my dads Rebel 250. its not hard, just start them out slow. in about an hour my girlfriend was driving around in second gear having a blast.

i like to get them to go in a straight line with no gas, just clutch, until they get the friction point down. then stop and go and stop and go in first only. basically i repeat what the msf guys did on the first day of riding. i remember it pretty well.

i havent had any problems. nobody has dropped it with me out there. either im an awesome teacher or just lucky... ha. im going with the second one.

p.s. i always make my "students" wear long sleeves, shoes over the ankle, and my helmet + gloves. just like in msf. dang straight.

It helps alot that the rebel is like an MSF bike and easy to learn on. Dump the clutch at 4K and you can probaby catch the throttle. On most other bikes something bad will happen, youtube is chock full clips like that.

The first person I tried to teach how to ride was my high school girlfriend. I should have known better, as she wasn't very smooth with a manual car, never mind a vehicle with half the wheels. She yanked my '72 Honda CL100 to about a 60 degree wheelie instantly- I didn't even think it could do that! :lol: It was all downhill from there.

Back when we were dating, my wife learned to ride on the very same bike. She did much better, although she did lowside once in the backyard. Come to think of it, eveyone who has ever ridden that bike has dumped it... :? What a bike, though- paid $35 for it, and in 13 years its had 2 plugs and 2 oil changes. Never broken down once!

true, the Rebel is what I rode at my msf. it probably does make a difference to teach someone their very first time on a Rebel vs 599.