New Graphics

Sorry it’s been so long updating my blog, but to be honest, the weather has been rubbish and I haven’t been out riding much at all because it has been too cold, and then the snow caused many tracks to close, and then christmas happened.

For one of my christmas presents, Dad bought me a new set of graphics for my bike from Danger UK. After some design work and emails between us all, I decided on the Monster graphics idea that some other Kawasaki bikes have because they look great.

Here’s a picture of me taking the plastics off my bike.
















You have to remove all the plastics so they can all be washed properly and cleaned with chemicals (isopropanol, which is pure alcohol) to remove all the grease so that the graphics stick on to them. It’s best to fix the graphics to the plastics at room temperature so that the glue on the back of the stickers works well. Then just let them cool naturally in the air for a day so that the glue sticks really well.

With the graphics fixed, this is what the plastics kit looks like before fixing them all back onto the bike.










For christmas Dad also bought me a new seat cover too. This time it is black, instead of the blue and pink (girly) one I had before.



This is what my KX 80 looks like when I put graphics on it.

















I hope you agree, now my bike looks wicked.







































Now it will soon be time for me to go riding again.

Come on you Blues

My 2nd football match !
Birmingham City vs Blackpool at St Andrews.

Mr Taylor, my teacher, pulled some names out of a hat in school and the winners were given 2 tickets to go to the match.



It was great fun- some of my mates went too with their parents.
I had a hotdog that was delicious.
We sat in the corner near the flag- the tickets were right at the front.

Blues won 2:0 of course!
What else did you think would happen?

My First Proper Motorbike Riding Lesson

Today was my first proper lesson with a qualified instructor in controlling the motorbike. My instructor's name was Paul and he was from http://www.midlandschoolofmotorcycling.co.uk/

Slowly to start with at first, the main thing I learned about was how to control the clutch when starting off.



Then, after that, I learned about how to change up the gears to accelerate, and then change down the gears while slowing down, using the brakes.
This was hard because I had to use both hands and feet all at the same time, so they could all do different things, yet still keep the revs up so the engine didn’t stall. The important thing is that when braking, use a little bit of front brake, then apply a lot of rear brake- that's hard to do because the front brake means I have to use my right hand, and the back brake means I have to use my right foot- at the same time as pulling in the clutch with my left hand and kicking the gears down with my left foot.

I’ll keep practicing this- I’ll need to do this sort of thing lots when riding the bike, so the better I become at these skills, the better rider I will become.

The other different thing I learned about was how different the bike tyres feel when riding on the road tarmac- I could feel the vibrations of the knobbly tyres coming through my hands- that’s something I don’t feel when riding on grass or dirt.

Next time out, I’ll be using these skills to climb small hills, and control the clutch while standing up, so the bike doesn’t flip backwards and tip me off. I think that’s going to be really hard, but we’ll see...

My First Motorbike Ride

Hello.

I'm Kyle, and right now, I'm 10 years old.



I've saved up all my pocket money, and bought myself a Kawasaki KX80 2-stroke Moto X bike, helmet, gloves, body armour, boots, trousers and shirt. Lot's of money- about £1000 over the 5 years I've been saving for. Anyway, I'm broke now, but at least I've got this great bike now.

I bought the bike from a guy who lives near Tewksbury for £350. Dad had to sell his car to get a van to collect the bike in, and also so we can get to and from the tracks I'll be riding on eventually.

I bought all the gear from Throttle Spec who are great.

Today me, my Dad, brother Ben and his mate Shane went to Long Marston Airfield, Stratford upon Avon (UK) for my first test ride on my new bike. I've never riden on my own before until today.

Here's a video of how I got on.