What do you do when you just stop riding?

[charlie b]

I had that choice to make when I was 40.  Sold the bike.  I wasn't in love with it that much anyway so the decision was easier.  Working in the desert made the choice that much simpler (it was my commuting vehicle).

At 56 I bought the T5.  Won't ever sell it.

[Tobit]

Thanks guys.  I'll sit on it for now.  First cooler day I'll take it out.  I'm pretty sure I'd miss it if it was gone and as someone posted, the cash would just vanish into the household and for what?  A new kitchen sink and refrigerator?  Something I've shared with my dear wife.



Tobit

[SPEIRMOOR]

other than the rare 50 mile jaunt

Thats all you need in the short term and later when you have more time you'll be glad you kept it

[Rich A]

Like some others, I'm riding less these days. I've taken up target shooting, specifically small bore hunter pistol, which is both challenging and enjoyable.

Rich A

[alanp]

I say keep her and don't let the fact that are not riding that much bother you.  Things can and will change.  You can always sell her later if you so decide and and will probably get more. 
The thing about turning old(er) is it happens a lot faster if you let it.  I bought a new bike when I was 57 (2012 Suzuki Vstrom) and it has 25,000 miles on it now.  Friday I am flying to Minnesota to pick up a new to me V11 Lemans to ride it home to Colorado.  Last year I did my first Saddle Sore 1000.
Owning a bike for that many years is an accomplishment.  Hang in there and the time and urge to ride will come again. 

[brlawson]

Hey you young whippersnapper. I'm 72 and still riding, had three teenagers in High School at the same time.
I'm heading out tomorrow morning for a 7 1/2 hour ride to the MotoGP at Indy. I don't ride a bunch but when I do I have a ball.

Keep the bike and ride it or you can give it to me.


Dean

About to turn 58 and I did cut back during the high school years but now my son and I ride together. He and I will also be headed to the MotoGP this weekend (on Guzzis). Hope to see you there.

[lucydad]

Tobit,

I just think you have the summer blahs.  Lots of that hot sticky sludge around here this time of year too.  Bit down eh?  Busy and stretched too many directions?  Family and kids? 

Perhaps maybe the best thing you can do for yourself, to stay healthy is to get on that bike and ride like the wind.  Take time for yourself.  Make it a priority.

Hell we reopen the Alzheimer's Clinic for Grandpa Larry starting Saturday.  And one of his younger brothers just died of liver cancer, so we get to be care takers right after that emotional event.  Its hot as hell here in Houston.  Work drags on.  We are building our retirement house.

Last bike at 57?  Baloney.  Keep riding to keep your skills up, they do deteriorate.

Find a way. 

[Tobit]

Tobit,

I just think you have the summer blahs.  Lots of that hot sticky sludge around here this time of year too.  Bit down eh?  Busy and stretched too many directions?  Family and kids? 

Perhaps maybe the best thing you can do for yourself, to stay healthy is to get on that bike and ride like the wind.  Take time for yourself.  Make it a priority.

Hell we reopen the Alzheimer's Clinic for Grandpa Larry starting Saturday.  And one of his younger brothers just died of liver cancer, so we get to be care takers right after that emotional event.  Its hot as hell here in Houston.  Work drags on.  We are building our retirement house.

Last bike at 57?  Baloney.  Keep riding to keep your skills up, they do deteriorate.

Find a way.

You could be right on a lot of points.  Come September I start accruing 4 weeks of leave a year.  One of those should be used on a trip west, in winter.

Tobit

[critter]

Tobit :
You love your Guzzi and you love riding. Priorities change and you are making appropriate decisions. Avoid the snare of thinking "if I can't ride the way I want, I don't want to ride at all". This is never true of the person who loves a given pursuit. Keep all your gear. You chose it carefully and it has served you well. Nothing will feel as right as your gear. Scaling back is not giving up. Put a trickle charger on the battery so that you can let the Guzzi talk once a week. Keep the bond alive especially when you can't ride. Crank it up and let it idle. Sit beside the Guzzi on a work stool and feel the various components warm and vibrate. Your body is still tuned to all those sensory cues even when your mind is inundated by competing needs. A 30 minute jaunt every two weeks won't satisfy your desire, but it will keep you in intimate contact with the Guzzi. It's sound, it's feel, it's smell - the familiar sensations of your gear. I have three sons aged 34, 33 and 29. My boys have ALWAYS enjoyed knowing that their dad was a motorcycle rider. It doesn't matter how many miles I ride in a year. To my sons what matters is that I always have a motorcycle, it is always ready to go whenever I am and that I still have new tales to tell.
All best wishes.

[Furbo]

Well,

Here's an odd suggestion....keep the goose, pick up a different 'easier' bike. If I just had the Guzzi (Sport 1100), I wouldnt ride it much either as its a horrid commuter/errand runner.

The bike I put alotta daily miles on is a Honda NX650 Dominator. (Kinda like an XR650L but more street friendly). It's pretty much a stone axe for reliability...gas-ride-repeat, good commuter errand runner, sits up high for vis.

Justa thought.

[swmckinley54]

You don't stop riding because you get old.........you get old because you stop riding.

[Thunderbutt]

If only one of the kids has an activity, you can always use the bike to take or pick them up from the activities.  Your kids would be the envy to have a "stud dad" with a cool bike. 
I have a very limited edition sport bike (1 of 60) sitting in the garage that seldom gets used.  I have seriously thought of selling it to fund other bike projects but my son who doesn't ride insist I keep it just for the cool factor.  "You know you'll regret it if you sell it".  On the rare occasion I take it out Im always thankful I didn't sell it.  If its not a financial burden hang onto your bike.

[Antietam Classic Cycle]

Well,

Here's an odd suggestion....keep the goose, pick up a different 'easier' bike. If I just had the Guzzi (Sport 1100), I wouldnt ride it much either as its a horrid commuter/errand runner.

The bike I put alotta daily miles on is a Honda NX650 Dominator. (Kinda like an XR650L but more street friendly). It's pretty much a stone axe for reliability...gas-ride-repeat, good commuter errand runner, sits up high for vis.

Justa thought.

Good suggestion. A few years ago I was getting seriously bored with riding, though not to the point that I was considering selling any. Bought my old XT500 and started riding forest roads and places waaay back in the boonies I couldn't do (easily) on my Ambassador. Lots of "new" scenery and places to explore, even helped brush up on my riding skills. Generally cooler in the woods as well.

[wrbix]

You're going through a phase in our life when riding is not high on your list - BTDT - another phase will be along when you'll want those rides again. Don't do something you'll regret in a few years.
Your activity on WG shows that motorcycling has been and will be important to you

[ponti_33609]

I have always been where you are regarding time to ride.

1. I work 1/2 mile from my home.
2. A long ride for me is 20 miles
3. We golf, Play tennis, jog, tandem bike and mountain bike........simply run out of time
4. Aging Parents

But I love motorcycles.  I didn't have to change due to a drop off in time like you did....always had time constraints.  If anyone doesn't need a motorcycle it is me.  Still I have one and always will.....or at least till I can't and will still probably have it in my garage so I can just look at it from time to time..     I agree with others.  Do what you need to now but you enjoy it as you can and things turn around.

[Two Checks]

To answer the question, if you don't put a foot down you fall over. 

[tris]

Maybe the key in the Summer is to get out for a ride early in the morning when it's cooler?

 :1:  Early morning is my favourite time to ride

No muppet cars
No muppet riders

Leave the house early and plan a route that includes your favourite breakfast café

That way you can be back home for 09:00 and still have time to do the chores/family stuff

[cruzziguzzi]

I stopped... altogether, for over four years.

Completely voluntary - considering circumstances - though not deliberate.

When we, in the greater Phoenix area, had our ridiculous boom recently our population was increasing at an absurd rate - monthly. I found the wildly varying driving styles from throughout the U.S. and much of the world as well, to be quite disconcerting for a motorcycle rider. The absolute inability to assess a driver relative to regional driving style grew too much and I found my bikes go out of registration, then dropped the insurance and watched the tires rot. It reminded me very much of military base traffic drawing on drivers from every state, places like Puerto Rico and foreign born spouses from wherever GIs get them.

Doesn't help that few places in the U.S. offer more boring riding to a fella like me than the Phoenix area as far as spirited day-rides are concerned.

Anyhow, as the economy cooled and growth essentially stopped, I found myself looking about for a bike with bags to carry light tools and paperwork to attend to out commercial properties. Enter the Calvin and GS850. Eventually, we got shed of those commercial albatrosses and between not needing to circumnavigate Phoenix and backing into a little Sportster in a gun trade, the Calvin and the rest sit again.

Part of being able to ignore the bikes - in addition to no practical fun rides - was something I came to realize back in the 80's.

Having always a couple-three two wheelers in the Army, I had no way of knowing that the purchase of a surplus fire department Jeep would cut into their attentions... Street and dirt.

At first, the Jeep posed no threat and the bikes likely welcomed the break from my varied abuses. The rub came the first time I removed the top, the doors and lowered the windshield...

Motorcycles? What motorcycles?...

Raise the Jeep windscreen and I start to contemplate the motorcycles, add the roof and the bikes become an option... slip on the doors and I'm wishing I kept the cycle's tires in better form.

Too, to be fair to the sport, I find myself often hauling a dog or three about with me unlike before retiring.

So now, with the fairly recent purchase of projects; CJ-2A Jeep and '63 MG-B, I can't help but wonder if not despair the fate of the Calvin and GS850

Funny what can scratch an itch... One of the reasons I generally temper my interpretations of oddities like Can-Ams, Side-hacks, trikes et al.

Just don't get me started on goofy concepts like Robins and Morgans!


Todd.

[Lannis]

I stopped... altogether, for over four years.

Completely voluntary - considering circumstances - though not deliberate.


......
So now, with the fairly recent purchase of projects; CJ-2A Jeep and '63 MG-B, I can't help but wonder if not despair the fate of the Calvin and GS850

Funny what can scratch an itch... One of the reasons I generally temper my interpretations of oddities like Can-Ams, Side-hacks, trikes et al.

Just don't get me started on goofy concepts like Robins and Morgans!


Todd.

 

It didn't work for me, doing what you're doing, although you've made a good try at it with an MGB and a CJ2.   I quit for a few years in the late 80s early 90s, long story involving the kids ....

.... then it started itching.   I thought "I'll scratch this itch with an MGB" and bought a '73 and drove it until the creeping floor and sill and castle-section rust was making the doors bind, so I sold it.

.... it itched some more so I bought the most basic, most sporty motorcycle substitute I could think of, a '66 Morgan 4/4.   Drove it for a year, the itch got worse, I parked it and bought a BSA and have never looked back .... Nothing substitutes for a bike for me.

When I have to quit riding because of physical disabilities, I'll move on and I'll quit, but I'll go into another phase of life, I won't try to be "substituting" something for a motorcycle ... !

Lannis

[Furbo]

When my kids were young 15yrs ago, I needed something that would scratch the MC itch while doing it 'Family Style'.

I'd always been a VW nut, so I ended up with a '70 VW Carmen Ghia convertible. Smells & feels like a motorcycle, but was able to strap the kids in the back seat and head to Elba, Bretchesgarten, Assisi, and lotsa other places.

[Penderic]

[steamdriven NZ]

I'm kinda in the same place as Tobit......bike not ridden much, other things take my time. But I keep it registered and warranted so that if I really feel like it, and it may be quite a spur of the moment decision, I can take the Monzada for a ride!
I have lived in places where it wasn't the best place to have a motorcycle. But times change, circumstances change, time becomes available, or, like we are currently facing, a location change. If we get the place we're after or near to it, I'll only be able to cycle to work about two days a week coz it will be up to about an hour and a half of hill then flat to go to work and the same in reverse. So the Monzada will be pressed into service more for the other three days. Bonus! I get better cycle rides and more fitness, and the Guzzi gets more use. Yet it was only a few years ago I was seriously considering selling it.

The world turns.

Cheers Kev.   

[Nic in Western NYS]

If you have to have someone convince you to ride, then don't ride.  There is nothing rational or practical about it.  You can find fun in life doing countless other things that don't put your life and limb at risk if you don't fully concentrate.

Cheers, Nic

[jdelv]

My two bikes have sat for a week.  I'm swamped.  This year I'm not going to impress anyone in my group with my results from our annual mileage contest, but there's no way I'd ever be without a bike in the garage. 

The reason why is simple:  I feel better knowing there is a ride in my future.  Today, tomorrow, next week?  Doesn't matter.  I  simply have that to look forward to.  Makes me happier.  And I walk by them carrying in groceries and say, "damn those are cool!" 

The Lemans will sit patiently, just like any motorcycle will. 

I once read a story in the AMA magazine I think about a former board track racer at 100 years old.  He did a certain number of laps around a parking lot on a scooter everyday until the day he died. I want to be that guy.

 

[Travlr]

You're going through a phase in our life when riding is not high on your list - BTDT - another phase will be along when you'll want those rides again. Don't do something you'll regret in a few years.
Your activity on WG shows that motorcycling has been and will be important to you

 

[kirby1923]

Going  from sport type/dual sport moto to
Austin Healey.

Edit: If or when the time comes.

mike

[Lannis]

I once read a story in the AMA magazine I think about a former board track racer at 100 years old.  He did a certain number of laps around a parking lot on a scooter everyday until the day he died. I want to be that guy.

 

Fred Marsh, that was ... old-time racer, Moto Guzzi dealer, and still riding his Indian moped around the shop parking lot at 102 ..... 

Fifty-seven?    Still a child ....

Lannis

[Chuck in Indiana]

Yep..

[bross]

I can't imagine not having at least one motorcycle. Would be my own personal version of "Hell". 

Same here, I cant imagine NOT riding and at 53 I will definitely still be riding at 57 and hopefully well after that. As for the heat, get yourself a cooling vest, you soak it in water, wring it out and depending on temps is good for 2-3 hours, and works amazingly well. Especially under a mesh jacket. You can buy them for motorcycles but go to a work wear supply store and they'll be half the price.

Our kids are all gone but we work 7 days a week for the summer (two seasonal businesses), so don't get much chance to ride in the summer except for commuting and the odd day trip when the stars align and we get staff working in both stores. The commute isn't too bad though as we live on a mountain and ride down into town.



One of the big reasons we chose to move here 7 years ago was because we both love to ride.

[HDGoose]

I golf.