It’s surprising to me how far I’ve come with my dirt skills in the past 3 years.
Here’s a picture after I had someone else ride my new Tiger through a puddle.
I was afraid I’d slip or tip over in the mud. I totally freaked, stopped tried to figure how to completely go around it. When that didn’t work I tried to skirt around the edge of the puddle. Got mid-way in, and it got slick so I stopped, I asked one of the guys with me to ride it out. I wasn’t brand new to riding dirt, but I didn’t really have much seat time in the dirt on the little bikes. I had NO Time on Adventure bikes. This was my first time riding a “big” bike on the dirt.
Fast forward 3 years, this is a picture from last weekend.
When I too the tiger out to scout out a dirt ride for the Tiger Troop. I was leading the group. I this time I saw the puddle, I didn’t even slow down, instead of panic, I thought, oh goodie, I get to splash through… I just was too far off to one side and there was a slope to the sides. So down I went. I knew the bike was fine, just as I was…. It was just covered in mud. This was at the start of the ride. I needed help getting the bike up. It was sliding each time we tried to pick it up. Once up, I walked it out of the puddle, just hoping that I didn’t slip and fall in the slick stuff. It might hurt to pull the bike down on me. Once out we geared up and continued on with scouting the route for the Troop ride.