Grow up with a dirt bike? ATVs and Off-Road bikes are NOT the same!
Apr 15 '01
The Bottom Line If you mastered hills and deserts on a dirt bike, those honed reflexes will KILL you on an ATV!
Today's most significant moment was that split second when the pressure of my heel against the foot brake had the exact proportional effect on the speed at which I approached the bottom of a near-vertical 15-foot slope of powdery red Georgia clay on a friend's 4-wheeler. I remember thinking, as I forced myself to make this descent through the fear at the top of the hill, that if this thing feels like it's going out of control, it won't do any good to sling my foot out for balance or to catch the ground out of pure reflex from my younger days of conquering hills 5 times that size on a light and lean dirt bike.
Playing on this ATV, the exhilarating addiction was immediately revived! But I found myself torn equally between taking on that hill without fear, and the maturity and common sense to instantly recognize the dangers. God how I wanted to open the throttle as far as it would go and pull the handlebars into my chest white-knuckled to make that heart-stopping climb, up and in control, OVER the top! But this is a 4-wheeler, NOT a dirt bike!
In a mere few seconds of rational thought, I came to the conclusion that the 4-wheeler is all wrong. My instincts were tuned with a dirt bike, small and lightweight. You could grab the ground with both feet and control the behaviour of the bike. You're heavier than the bike, your weight can shift in a second to counteract gravity's devastating forces to keep the bike in an upright position. You can't do either with a 4-wheeler. You can't negotiate with the ground nor with gravity on a 4-wheeler - it's too heavy, and it's too wide to have any control over it with your feet or legs.
On a bike, the front brake is on the right hand, forcing you to ease up on the throttle to slow her down, and the clutch is on the left, allowing for that instinctive split-second downshifting to maintain control over the bike before it chokes out under its own weight. These types of lightning-fast responses are required to successfully engage an unsteady and unpredictable earth under your wheels.
On a 4-wheeler, the front brake lever is on the left hand, where the clutch is supposed to be. Suicide in the making: when you descend a hill in third gear and instinctively downshift to second to help slow her down by distributing the stressful task between the brakes and the transmission, on a 4-wheeler you'll flip yourself right over the top with perfect alignment for the machine to grind your spine into the dirt in a matter of seconds! Reflex cares not what your brain may say, and by the time you realize that you're grabbing the front brake instead of the clutch, the darkest clouds of unconsciousness have already descended on your chance to fix it.
If you grew up on a dirt bike and you get the itch to start riding the trails again, on a dirt bike is where you belong. Not on a 4-wheeler.
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