Motodisiac

Back in December of 2007 I was riding around West Hollywood when I heard the siren and saw a motorcycle cop in my rear views. He ordered me to pull over and cited me with two violations - speeding (55mph in a 35 mph zone) and license plate not visible. As hard as it is to believe I was not speeding and was going with the flow of traffic. And yes my license plate was not street legal. But I did not know about that till the cop had pointed it out to me. All my arguments about me being a new rider and not knowing about the license plate deal were futile.

I was really upset and decided that same day that I’d fight this ticket. That would be my first time pleading not guilty to a traffic violation.

This is going to be a long post. So if you do not feel like reading the whole thing the winner is … Sideout. Yes, I succeeded in beating my ticket. It was dismissed and I will be getting the bail money in the mail. Now goes the longer version.

Back then I was still riding my first bike - 2005 Suzuki SV650S. And while I was thinking up strategies of how to fight this ticket an opportunity came along and I had bought my second bike - 2003 Aprilia Futura RST. My license plate violation (California Vechicle Code 5201) was a correctable one. What that means is that you correct it and let the court know that you did that. However I was selling my bike. So I thought the correction was not necessary. And once I get to my court hearing I’d just let the judge know that the bike is sold therefore I no longer have to correct it.

So as of January this year here is what I knew:

• my due date to pay the bail and plea guilty or not guilty was Jan 29
• my ticket stated two violations - California Vechicle Code 5201 (correctable) and California Vehicle Code 22350.
• I am selling the bike that I allegedly committed those violations on
• I have absolutely no idea how traffic courts work

Armed with this “extensive” knowledge base I decided to do the following:

• request extension to make sure I have enough time to sell my bike as I was convinced this way I did not have to correct the violation
• at the end of the extension term plea “not guilty”
• get my ass ready for traffic court

Requesting extension is really easy. The Los Angeles Superior court website lets you do this in no time. So that was promptly done. And right then my due date became April 1. Great. After that I sort of put everything else on hold. I was enjoying my new bike, travelling and so on. Then came end of March and I almost forgot that I had to plea not guilty. It was already late to mail it in. And I was forced to go to Downtown LA and pay a visit to the traffic court.

Visiting the LA Downtown traffic court was far from pleasant. Unfriendly cops at the front door managed to drop my Z1R helmet and scratch its shield, the signs inside the building were neither informative nor intuitive, the line to the clerks window was enormous and there were only 3 windows open out of like 12 of them. I hope you already got the picture. 50 minutes later I got to the next available clerks’ window. So as it turned out the fact that I had sold the bike (although luckily at that time the bike was still in my possession) does not make me ineligible to pay the fine for the illegal plate. How unfair. So on top of my $169 for alleged speeding I had to add another $68. The court date was set to Jun 24 and off I went. Upset, frustrated and tired from the experience.

Now the time came to do my research. Thankfully Internet is not only the endless universe of porn. With the right amount of effort one can seek and successfully gain useful knowledge. So with a bit of luck I found these two websites that went into very thorough details of how to contest your tickets and be successful at that - http://www.mothercopper.com/ and http://www.helpigotaticket.com/. I am not going to go into every little detail and option of what could be done and how. If you are curious I hope these sites are of proper help for you. What I will mention though is that I did file an informal discovery request on Apr 23 requesting the copy of officers notes, engineering and traffic survey for the area I was cited in and a couple of other minor things. I never got this information. That was a clear violation of California Penal Code Section 1054.5(b), 1054.7 and California Penal Code Section 19.7.

Still thinking that won’t be enough to argue my case be dismissed I came up with … 3 more strategies.

Strategy 1 - go after the fact that the violation
I was cited with does not state maximum speed limit. The most detailed description of this strategy is described here - http://www.helpigotaticket.com/speed/30questions.html. The bottom line is that CVC 22350 does not say anything about a posted speed limit. So if the conditions are good and there is no threat to property or persons you are not guilty as charged. December 15 was a clear sunny day, the violation had occurred at 4pm in the afternoon on a 3 lane street. With all this said it would be really unlikely that the conditions would qualify.

Strategy 2- go after the cop motorcycle speedometer calibration.
The cop had stated on the ticket that the speed was measured by means of pacing. What that means is he was riding behind me for some time while looking at his speedometer. A friend of mine gave me this book to read and I took some pointers about how to go after the speedometer calibration - http://www.beatmyspeedingticket.com/. What it comes down to is the fact that you can question the accuracy of the officers speedometer and the calibration unit that was used to calibrate it.

Strategy 3 - embarrass the cop with a simple math.
Google Maps is your friend. I know for the fact that he did not ride behind me long enough to gauge my speed. He just saw me and decided to catch up and fine me. How do I know that? I heard the siren almost right after I made a safe left turn onto a street. I must have ridden less than 1/8 of a mile when he’d already pulled me over. I had measured the distance from the point of my turn to the point where I had been caught, built a very nice looking Excel spreadsheet with times, distances etc, and was ready for battle. Numbers never lie. And what the numbers showed was the fact that the cop did not have enough time to pace me.

I decided to use these strategies in succession. In case Strategy 1 fails move on to Strategy 2, if that fails then employ the last resort - Strategy 3. Armed and ready I was patiently waiting for my trial date - Jun 24.

I arrived to the court house 20 minutes prior to the time of my hearing only to see this picture:

The line was really long and there was no way I was going to make it to the court room on time.

Fortunately the line was moving. And I got to the court room only 5 minutes late - at 8:35. To my surprise the courtroom doors were locked. About 10 people were nervously waiting in front of it. What I noticed right then was the lack of paperwork other than actual tickets and court notices in the hands of the people who were wating for their hearing. A couple of officers were pacing back and forth in the hallway. I did not seem to recongnize any of them.

The courtroom doors opened 10 minutes later at 8:45. As you probably know first they make you do is check in with the bailiff. When my turn came the bailiff whispered to me “You can go”. I was stunned. “You can go” - he said again, this time a little louder. “The officer is not going to show up. You case is dismissed. Check in the mail within the next 2 weeks”. That was great news. Although I would be interested to see how I fare against seasoned professionals I also did not mind this ending at all.

In conclusion here are the pointers and observations I made on this journey:

• looks like the fuss I had created with my discovery request made them realize I was not going to be an easy target like the rest of the people I saw in the court room. So instead of wasting time on me they can easily cycle through 10 easier targets and accept a defeat in my particular case
• informal discovery request is a must if you want to go to court and be somewhat successful, it puts a lot of burden on the prosecution and cops shoulders and makes them do work (for once). This can lead to some loop holes and can potentionally let you win the case (see the two sites I had mentioned above for more information on that)
• it is totally worth it to fight your ticket, especially if it is a speeding ticket. Don’t be lazy, spend time on researching what section of CVC were you cited with and try to find inconsistencies, they might hold the key to your win
• and the last but not least - I am DEFINITELY fighting my bogus ticket.

By now you probably know that both Motodisiac and I really like Rev’it. We both own various Rev’it gear. And despite the very underrepresented nature of this brand we still somewhat stand by our gear preferences. Well, at least till a couple of weeks ago.

About 2-3 weeks ago I had noticed that one of the top pocket zippers on my Airforce jacket no longer operates properly. Not a big deal. Except the jacket is not even one year old. So this was clearly a warranty issue. Although not a show stopper I still thought it would have been nice if all zippers worked. So I decided to call Rev’it and ask if they could either fix it or replace my jacket all together. With this exactly 2 weeks ago I called the Rev’it corporate office in New York. Aron, the person I’d spoken to had agreed to replace the jacket. He said they had my size and color (M52 in silver) and the moment I ship out my jacket he’d reciprocate without actually waiting for my jacket to arrive. Excellent plan. However the reality was very different.

On Wednesday, June 11 I had sent a formal email with the description of my problem and my home address per Aron’s request so he could have a paper or rather e-trail. There had been no reply till next Tue, June 17. On that day a very apologetic Aron had sent me the return order number along with the prepaid UPS call tag. All I had to do was put my Airforce jacket in the box, print the UPS label, slap it on the box, drop it off at any UPS facility and let Aron know of this so he could send me the replacement jacket. That was promptly done by yours truly on Thur, June 19. On the morning of Fri, June 20 I had notified Aron of the above said event via email requesting the UPS tracking number for the new jacket he’d supposedly sent out as he’d promised.

Came the afternoon of Mon, Jun 23 and still no word from Aron. So I decided to press the action and call Rev’it. After speaking with Ally (hopefully the correct spelling) it had been established that not only Aron was out of the office and that him and the rest of the team were going to go to Holland for a week to come back on Jul 1 but also the fact that they were backordered on the silver Airforce jackets till at least Jun 30. Something Aron failed to mention to me.

At that point I became really frustrated and angry. Not only I was misled and tricked into giving up my jacket with no exact date of when I’d get the replacement. I was forced to ride in the 80-90 degree weather wearing a winter jacket that I don’t particularly enjoy to begin with.

Ally apologized for the inconvenience and had offered a very viable solution. Per her they did have the black Airforce jackets in stock and she could send one to me instead of the silver one as early as that same day (yesterday, Monday, Jun 23). She’d promised to email me the tracking number later that day. Great news. I was ecstatic.

Come today’s morning there was no email from Ally. I decided to check in with her in the early afternoon. Guess what? She made a mistake. They are actually back ordered on both black and silver Airforce jackets till at least Jun 30th. And as she’d forgotten to ask for my phone number she could not let me know of this unfortunate mistake. Well, it is 21st century, emails are a something of a useful commodity as well. I was getting increasingly pissed. So now the whole Rev’it team goes to Holland for a week to visit their head office while I am boiling in my winter Fieldsheer jacket out here in Southern California. On top of that there is no guarantee that the jackets will actually be available on Jun 30. Ally had promised to overnight me the replacement jacket the moment they become available. Though at this point I am not sure if I can take her word.

Currently I am really frustrated with the way Rev’it goes about their business over here in the US. Had I not called the first time (yesterday, Mon, Jun 23) I would have been patiently waiting for the news to come probably for one more week only to find out about their little field trip to Holland. Had I not called today, Tue, Jun 24 I as well would have probably been patiently waiting for the email from Ally to arrive in my inbox to no avail. And it seems that at this point there is no set date as to when I am going to get my replacement jacket.

So let’s review the overall timeline of this affair:

• Jun 11 - first contact made, replacement requested.
• Jun 17- prepaid UPS label received from Rev’it
• Jun 19 - my jacket shipped to Rev’it, replacement requested per agreement with Aron Ahlstrom
• Jun 20 - notification of my shipment is promptly ignored, replacement jacket not shipped
• Jun 23 - silver jackets are backordered, per Ally black Airforce jacket is to be shipped the same day or the next day at the latest with UPS tracking be emailed to me
• Jun 24 - after me calling Rev’it turns out that all Airforce jackets are backordered till Jun 30 at least as that is when they EXPECT them to come in. They are back from their trip to head office in Holland on Jul 1 which is when Ally had promised to call me with an update.

Almost 2 weeks into this affair and not only I don’t have the replacement jacket I don’t even have my own jacket. That is really bad. Kind of reminds of the Stoafer’s Alpinestars experience. Although the principle difference is that I am actually not talking to a middle man here. This is a perfect example of how a brand can easily loose a loyal customer. Updates on my Rev’it affair will be posted promptly.

In light of my recent purchase and the fact that my Aprilia Futura is sitting in Motodisiac’s garage awaiting 10K mile maintenance I have been consistently riding the Dakar on a daily basis. It was some hundred miles shy from 18K when I had purchased it. Now at almost 19K and freshly serviced it was ready to take on the toughest challenge of them all - daily commuting on the 405 freeway :).

My first few street rides on it felt awkward. The bike is tall with a high center of gravity. It’s 650cc single felt really underpowered comparing to the Futura. The handle bars seemed to be way too wide for lane splitting. The suspension was way too soft, hard braking would make me dip forward all the time. One of the good things however was the seat comfort. Also the riding posture was reminiscent of the Hypermotard which I thoroughly enjoyed demoing some time ago. With that thought in mind I went into the day 3 of street riding my Dakar.

I no longer remembered that the bike was underpowered, that the handlebars were too wide, the center of gravity was too high. Leaning forward pressing on the handlebars made me an aggressor. I felt like a total hooligan except without the ability to do wheelies and stoppies (yet). The Dakar was happy to oblige as I was zipping through dense traffic. The more I rode it more I realized how convenient of a daily commuter this bike really is. The handle bars are actually at prefect height as they go way above the car mirrors and below the tall truck mirrors. Yes the engine is slightly underpowered especially going uphill. But that also gives a chance to redline it pretty much in all gears and still stay within the speed limit. The seat is comfortable enough, although not as comfortable as the Futura’s. ABS helped me a time or two when I had to abruptly stop. I was finally getting the feel of why Supermoto bikes are that fun to ride. Of course it won’t hurt to replace knobbies with sport tires, to add more power to the bike. But for right now the Dakar will do just fine. I can and will have my fun with it.

And while I am writing this I just stumbled upon this article on one of my favorite blogs - Autoblog. They got a new toy in their garage - Aprilia SXV550. The article is well written and goes into details of why Supermoto bikes are fun. Of course Aprilia SXV is no Dakar. I am sure one can have way more fun with it. And you can not overlook the fact that it is just beautiful. May be now that I got that familiar with the way you ride these machines I’d revisit some of the Ducati dealers in the area to have a second look at the Hypermotard. You just never know :).

This information has been circulating the web for the last couple of days - it looks like the Transformer sequel will feature a motorcycle-based fembot. And according to the leaked documentation from this movie set the fembot will be a pink colored Buell.

Some other sources featured pictures of female stunt riders that according to the leaked sheet go by names Melissa Hartman and Jessie Graff. Supposedly they should be doubles for Megan Fox. Although if you compare the pictures of the stunt women with her the stunt girls look much more athletic.

In any case I am sure a lot of people are anxiously looking forward to the sequel. I am sure many of you are looking forward to Megan Fox’s memorable performance in the first movie :). Per this movie review Megan Fox’s performance was so-so, but she has nice… earrings.” Hopefully her “earrings” don’t disappoint us in the upcoming sequel.

I’ve been hearing all these stories from a couple of my friends of how great their offroading and adventure riding experiences were. I kept seing all these pictures of remote places with beautiful nature and noone around. And finally my mind was made - I wanted to try it out.

One night I came over to Motodisiac’s house, we started browsing the web and found a good deal on a 2003 BMW F650GS Dakar. It looked really cool, had really good reviews on it. So the next day we went out and made a purchase. That is how I became a proud owner of this motorcycle:

I rode it a couple of times, only streets and freeways. The bike seemed to be fun enough, with a good amount of torque, comfortable seat and riding posture and seemed rugged enough to be taken offroad. It bears the name of the toughest race in the world - the Dakar Rally. Allegedly more people have died in the Dakar rally than people who tried to ascend mount Everest.

After performing some maintenance on it the bike was ready to go. We decided to go offroading on Sunday. I figured for the first run the only piece of gear I’d need is the offroad boots. With a huge help from the Advenure Rider community the selection has been made - the Alpinestars Tech3 boots.

We took off around 9am last Sunday. After an eventless 30-40 min freeway ride we arrived to the spot. After a brief do’s and dont’s from Motodisiac there we went - Motodisiac, myself and one of our friends.

The first half of our offroad trip could essentially be described by the picture below:

Being used to street riding I was using my front brake a lot which is a no-no in the offroad riding. The moment you apply your front brakes a little stronger than you should you bike wants to go down to the ground. And pray that you are not on a slope at that time. In our case it was mostly slopes. So one can only imagine how many times I had to pick up my bike. And that is 420lbs to lift each time around. Motodisiac was making fun of me as I was huffing and puffing. “Well, you thought you were athletic”. I wish I had his Suzuki DRZ instead, it weighs at least 100 pounds lighter.

After an hour of this gruelling workout I started getting the gist of it. The second half of our offroad ride did not see me drop a bike even once. Although there were a couple of close ones when I managed to stay on and maintain control of the Dakar. By the time we got to the paved road I was dehydrated, exhausted, frustrated and hungry. I did not have fun. I broke the LCD screen of my digital camera in one my spectacular falls, I was covered in dust, so was my motorcycle, I could feel every little muscle in my entire body and all in all did not feel like trying this ever again. The only up side was that we did see some beautiful nature scenery.

Riding back home on a freeway I actually was glad that I did not have the Suzuki DRZ. Otherwise my ass would have been in major pain. I kept seing the other 2 rides in our group (Motodisiac and our mutual friend) rise up and down and slide their asses to the side of their seats. Yeah, the Dakar seat is much more comfortable.

The aftermath of my offroading:

• sore all over the place
• dirty helmet (thank God I did not bring my new Arai)
• dirty riding pants (required thorough washing)
• dirty riding jacket (required thorough washing)
• soaking wet t-shirt
• soaking wet socks
• dirty bike (took to the self wash today’s morning)
• cracked LCD screen on my digital camera

Will I do it again? Time will show …

Today I decided to take my old Z1R Blade helmet to ride in instead of the Arai Quantum 2. After a little bit of “dusting off” I was on my way to the office. I was surprised how much different the Blade felt comparing to the Quantum. And not in a good way.

First of all as I mentioned in my Arai Quantum first review it felt much snugger and softer than the Blade. I attributed that it to the Quantum being brand new and not “broken in”. Two months have gone by and the snugness and softness did not go away. And aside from not being as snug and soft the Blade’s interior liner just fells umm, what’s the right word, cheaper. Much cheaper.

Another thing I noticed about the Blade is that it feels much bulkier and at the same time less durable if that makes any sense. Its visor movements do not feel as crisp as of the Quantum and rather flimsy.

Also as I noted earlier the noise level of the Quantum is much lower. And I think I just figured out why. The lower rim of the front part of the Quantum helmet tilts in closer to the neck area. So when you ride on higher speeds the Blade well “suck” more air in under it therefore creating more air noise. And probably that is why my neck felt cold when I was riding in winter.

To wrap up this quick comparo all in all Z1R Blade is not a bad helmet at all and a definitely YES as far as what you get for what you pay. You can find a good deal on the Blade starting $50. That’s really good. But again you get what you pay for. Not to justify the jacked up MSRP of the Arai helmets. But still the quality of Arai shows in every little aspect of the Quantum 2.

It is true that motorcycle riding becomes dangerous once you are over a 3 month term into it. Tonight I had yet another close call in my short riding career.

To refresh your memory I had a number of them already when

• I was attacked by a Prius
• I was attacked by a woman driving an SUV
• a passenger decided to get out of a car right in the middle of the freeway
• a cell talking woman merged right into me

All these cases fall under the same category - the “it wasn’t my fault” category. it was always someone else who’d get me in dangerous situations. I was just a rider in the wrong place at the wrong time. Well, today’s close call was entirely my fault.

I was riding from work today, splitting lanes at a moderate pace when I saw a rider on the opposite side of the freeway. His riding posture looked strange as he was leaning forward way too much. I got curious and concentrated my attention on him while he zoomed by. Less than a second later when I took my eyes off of the opposite side of the freeway and looked ahead I saw a pickup truck right in my way and its right side mirror flying towards me. Again years of competitive sports played to my advantage. Not being able to change my trajectory that quickly all I could do was dodge my head left. And the right side mirror almost stuck me on my beloved Arai helmet. The truck bed was so close to me, or rather I was so close to it that I had to lean right to avoid scraping it with my left arm. Once I got past the truck I altered the path of my bike a little to the right to stay in between lanes and continued on.

Target fixation is a very dangerous thing. And tonight I truly experienced its wrath. I will make sure to remember this lesson. I also hope you’ll learn from my mistakes and not yours.