My Ride Chicago Experience: Part IV - Range Day Two
Sunday’s Class 9/18/2004: Riding Day Two
Location: 185 S Damen (Damen & Monroe)
Again, I arrived early... first in fact. After a bit of time Brad arrived. I helped Chris set up the chairs while the European dude helped him remove the bikes from the big sheds. Soon after I noticed that someone busted the lock on the porta-potty and vandalized it. The vandal also shit all over the seat! Bunch of savages in this town!
After everyone arrived, we quickly realized that our class of 12 was now down to 9! 3 people didn’t show up for Sunday!
Luckily, I was able to use the same bike I rode on Saturday. The class began with several laps around the course clockwise & reverse. It was quite fun and relaxing. I hopped on the bike, started it up and took off like an old pro. I could have done that ALL day!
After the relaxing warm up it was back to business. Some of today’s exercises included...
Riding over obstacles: Steps: first, throttle up, stand up, release throttle, go over object at 90-degree angle, and sit down once you go over it.
• Slow speed maneuvers such as U-Turns, right angle turns, S-Turns, and counter-balance techniques.
• Signal and shoulder checks before a lane change.
• Higher speed maneuvers such as swerving and emergency braking.
• Minimum-distance stops using both brakes while simultaneously disengaging the clutch and downshifting
• Collision-avoidance swerving
The day ended with about 90 minutes of practicing the State of Illinois test.
I was so damn fatigued by the time we started practicing for the test, I wasn't exactly doing my best work. In part 1 I probably aced it 10 out of the 20 times. Part 2 was another story... I only did it error free twice! I did very well in parts 3 & 4 so I wasn't worried about those. My main concern is getting past part 2 of the test. I'm feeling very confident about parts 3 & 4 and somewhat confident about part 1.
At 2:30 the class was over. Brad handed each of us our Certificate of Completion, shook our hands and gave us the info we needed for the test.
I grabbed a soda from my cooler and headed home. I was in some serious pain. I ached everywhere. It’s like every muscle in my body had gotten a work out and still being sick didn’t help any.
As I write this on Wednesday evening, I’m feeling a lot better, though I do have a cough and sore throat. Everything else from the weekend “work out” is back to normal. I’m fully prepared to go downtown in the morning for the test…. But I’m betting that I’m going to fail it the first time. Wish me luck!
On to Part V
