RiDE May 2021

RiDE helps you get more from your motorcycle. Put together by a team of enthusiastic experts, with help from thousands of committed readers, every issue of RiDE is full of recommendations on bikes, kit, routes, destinations and technique. We speak directly to our readers about their biking lives & use our expertise to steer them towards the good-value option in bikes, trips and kits. We’re famed for our regular Product Tests and eery month provide a comprehensive used-bike buying guide, helping potential owners find the right bike at the right price. Finally... every issue features touring guides and riding advice to help readers explore the world on their bike.

3,95 €(IVA inc.)

en este número

In This Issue

Welcome...

‘We’re at the start of a great spring and summer for biking’ Welcome to freedom! The last few weeks of biking, encumbered by fewer restrictions, have been pure heaven – just being able to ride for pleasure again has been an absolute joy – and the good news is that, with the wind behind us, it only gets better from here. So, in the last few months, I’ve changed from hunkering down and hoping for all this being over, to being at the start of a great spring and summer of biking. If you’re in the same boat as me, you’ll find loads in this issue to help you get the most out of your biking return. My plans for the year include a big road-trip to Scotland with friends, a couple…

1 min.

FRONT END

STAR PICTURE

Ardvreck Castle, Sutherland I grabbed this picture of my Tiger 800XRX during a break on a tour taking in the NC500 and the Scottish Highlands. I’ve owned the Triumph from new and as we hit 41,000 miles together, I pulled over for a celebratory photo stop at the amazing Ardvreck Castle on Loch Assynt. This was a full dry day of riding (unusual in Scotland...) starting at Gairloch and finishing at John o’Groats. I must say Scotland, especially the Highlands, is absolutely breathtaking and an amazing place to explore on a bike Ben Preston Get your bike in RIDE & win a BikeTrac system Each month the Star Picture will win a BikeTrac security tracker with a year’s BikeTrac subscription. As well as helping recover your bike if it is nicked, it logs…

1 min.

FRONT END

YOUR RIDES

Yorkshire Dales A picture from a fantastic biking holiday in the Yorkshire Dales. As you can see, we had plenty of rain but there is beauty in all weathers, especially when on our beloved bike. Lita Boghurst Coopers Lodge, Co. Sligo This is my Honda CRF250 Rally at Coopers Lodge, reputedly haunted. A very remote corner of Ireland with beautiful scenery and is seldom visited. Glynn Cutcliffe The drive, home Here is a picture of my ten-month-old grandson, Finley, on his BMW GS next to mine. I have to confess he was only one month old when I bought it. He needs to grow a bit before he can ride the white one though. Kerry Briggs Rede Valley, Northumberland It’s seven miles to the Co-op at Bellingham via the high road with the Rede Valley in the…

3 min.

FRONT END

‘I’ve ridden countless bikes on these roads’

WORKING FOR PETERBOROUGH-BASED bike magazines back in the 1990s, there were a limited number of directions to travel to get to decent roads – and with Cadwell Park at its heart, heading north into the Lincolnshire Wolds always proved a lure too potent to resist; it’s a kind of Middle Earth of motorcycling from Hull to Peterborough, Skegness to Lincoln. The combination of rolling hills, clumps of woodland and, frankly, altitude were a marked contrast to the flat expanse of the Fens. From misty early morning starts, blasting through searing fields of yellow oil-seed rape heading for the trackday briefing at Cadwell on a grey import FZR400RRSP, to a decade later tramping across the hills en route to the now-defunct Little Chef at Caenby Corner on the A15 on a ZX-12R…

6 min.

FRONT END

LOCAL KNOWLEDGE

Best day to ride Mid-week is quieter but weekends swap the HGVs for mobile homes and slow drivers. Willingham Woods is always busy with bikers and Cadwell on a race weekend is heaving. Best bit From Revesby to Caistor is pretty much sublime fun. Lots of body English, using the full width of the road to straight-line S-bends, generally holding a really nice, pacey rhythm. It’s magnificent when the oil-seed rape is out – if you don’t suffer with hayfever. Be careful The usual country suspects: piles of heaped gravel, some corking pot-holes, farm traffic etc. There are also a lot of tricky complex bends – you need to really know the road before you can ride it with any kind of spirit. Best place to eat Gotta be Munch & Go – can’t beat a roadside…

1 min.

FRONT END

IS YOUR TFT DASH AT RISK OF THEFT?

‘Until firms improve security, being savvy is the key’ AS IF MOTORCYCLE crime wasn’t bad enough, there’s now a targeted and pernicious type of theft that is leaving riders feeling vulnerable, perplexed, and massively out of pocket. The theft of TFT (Thin Film Transistor) dashboards is now a recognised problem, particularly in urban areas where thieves have easy access to parked bikes. TFT dashboards have revolutionised the way we view and receive information when we’re riding, and they’re being fitted to more and more new models, but these sophisticated displays are also vulnerable to theft. Some can be removed from a bike in seconds, much to the annoyance of owners who return to their bikes to discover instruments gone. Any bike with a TFT dash is a potential target, but certain BMWs and…

4 min.