I‘m learning how to ride a motorcycle and have been waching YouTube videos about basic skills. One if these was a guy starting his bike in his drive way and he fell almost immediately after he sat on it and started it. That being said is there a special way to start and ride a bike downhill ??Link for videoyoutu.be/6WinhypBJhU
Motorcylces are like horses, always mount from the left side. If the road surface is too unstable (gravel) or sloped to get on the bike one must push it to a better spot. Think ahead when stopping and parking the bike and you won't have to push it later. As to hills, hold the front brake lever to lock the front tire the entire time while mounting to keep the bike from rolling out from under you. All this is common sense, sounds harder than it is, but also takes some practice. Another reason not to start out with a huge motorcycle. The vid kid coulda shoulda woulda switched to his rear brake (right foot) after he got on, and then feathered the throttle and clutch after putting it in gear (left foot) to get rolling. Yup. you gotta use two hands and two feet and steer and not freeze during the moment of inertia and turn it into a moment of no balance and then. plop. Starting out on a tiny sidewalk with an immediate left turn was foolish. Better to walk the bike down to the street for a straight ahead level start. Better yet, an empty parking lot.
Special way to start downhill ? Well, if it's a serious hill you need a brake on, especially if there's no room ahead of you and you need to turn immediately. So either you need to keep the front brake on while goosing the throttle to start the engine with the same hand (not impossible, you can roll the throttle with your thumb), or you need to put the rear brake on and balance the bike on one leg not two. Impossible to do on a Jap bike with a kickstart, but OK with electric. Best to learn to ride on the flat, not on a boat launch ramp. But it's slightly easier than stick-shift on a car, as you can in fact work brakes, clutch and throttle all at the same time and not have to jump from the brake to the gas like in the car (or rely on a useless handbrake)
Years and years ago I rented an apartment with two other guys to go to college. When the manager saw my motorcycle her face fell. 'We don't allow motorcycles,' she said. 'They make too much noise'. She got me to agree to push the bike out to the street and coast down the hill to start it up. Which I did for a whole school year. It's not hard, but this guy doesn't really have enough room to do that. You have to 'coast', just like on a bicycle, to get up to at least 10 or 15 mph. Then you put the bike in 2nd and let the clutch out. You can tell to look at this guy, by the way he's dressed, by the way he handles the bike, that he's a newbie. He's lucky he spilled at 0 mph! Newbies on R6s often get into much more serious trouble!
