We have all had to do it. You get a fan that comes up to you to chat about the beautiful bike you are on then they want to tell you about their friends bike that has twin turbos on it.
As i pulled into my driveway a guy walking down the street takes that as his cue to walk all the back to my garage and strike up a conversation. His 1st question was hey your good with bikes right? I said yeah why whats up? Well i have a light that say just FI on a kawi- Do you know what that means? It also is getting to hot. At this point i knew he didnt really know what he was talking about and even if i could have guessed his issue he would not have understood my reply.
I said well it means fuel injection. Thats about the time he catches the fact that im on a BMW.
BMW no ****! I didnt know they made bikes. I said yep its about the fastest bike out there. He says well i know a bike thats faster. I fell for it. Yeah whats that? a um PAN-i-gile. I said are you talking about the 1199 or the new 1299? O yeah the 1299 the new one. I simply said no the bmw is faster but the 1299 is still a fast bike- well man i gotta get inside im hot in these leathers.
His final dumb comment is- well the bike has 2 different turbos on it!
That was my exit point on the topic.
On all my old bikes it was always hey you have a headlight out dude! Im glad i dont hear that one anymore. However that is now replaced with BMW i didnt know...
The only other one i have had this year is the guy that thought my bike looked like the r1 but with a body kit.
I feel your pain. But I really don't have the strength to bring up all the tragic stories I have.. Needless to say there are quite a few just as retarded as your story.
Guy and girl walking past my bike at a coffee shop. Girl says "BMW - I didn't know they make bikes" WHAAAAAAA the guy says and smacks her real hard. That must be a great relationship.
My friend parks his 675 Daytona, some kid comes over "Triumph? Who makes those?" "Honda" I say with a straight face. Kid walks away.
OK one more. I had a Honda Blackbird. Two lights on the dash, green one "N" of course, and yellow one "FI". Kid is looking at the speedo, says "What do the lights mean?" Couldn't resist (again), oh, N is to tell you that you are in the normal riding mode. And FI means F%#king Insane, for when you crank it wide open. "That's KEWL" he says.
Guy and girl walking past my bike at a coffee shop. Girl says "BMW - I didn't know they make bikes" WHAAAAAAA the guy says and smacks her real hard. That must be a great relationship.
Actually the FI light on a Kawi means Fault Indicator, not fuel injection, common misperception even amongst Kawi riders FWIW........
I've been riding for 20+ years so numerous dumb stories as well, the question I'll never understand is the follow up one to "How many cc's is that", upon answering 1,000, it's always "Where can you even ride that thing"??? As if the bike only allows rides of 150 mph......
I had a squid pull up next to me on a beat up CBR600 F3 while I was on my CBR600RR and started doing hand gestures putting up a 2, 5 and 0. Being absolutely confused at what he was doing. I asked him, "what are you trying to tell me." He asks, "is that a 250?!?!" I said, "no, 600." His response, "oh that's cool" and the light goes green and he takes off into the sunset, no helmet and all, almost hitting a car in the process, trying to show off.
Then, when I got the BMW, I've been asked if it's a 1200, a boxer, a 6 cylinder and that it must cost a fortune.
Several years ago a kid pushing in carts at the store asked me if i was on a 600. I said no its an 08 cbr1000. He said he found a ninja 250 that he is saving up for but he might just get a built busa cause he doesnt want to waste money.
We just have a different approach. I prefer to engage people who are interested and happen to have less knowledge than I, rather than ridicule them. I do not find ignorance funny, but instead an opportunity. YMMV
If you want to hear ignorant, ask me a question about pro or college sports, or golf. Wholly uninterested and completely clueless.
Couple times while out karting, someone has come up to me asking if I ride (because of my helmet). I reply yes and they ask what do you ride. I reply BMW S1000RR. They have all had this empty glare trying to figure out what it is. Someone has replied of that's a nice off road touring bike.
Had a coworker (who rode but was on the American Chopper bandwagon buying crowd)say the S1000RR sucks because a Haya, Haya something oh wait Hayabusa is faster.
Favorite was, riding in a group. At one of the stops, this lady (hottie)riding a CBR250 asked if the BMW was a 1000cc. I replied yes, she said her bikes 4 times smaller. I replied I like to think its 4 times larger.
Favorite was, riding in a group. At one of the stops, this lady riding a CBR250 asked if the BMW was a 1000cc. I replied yes and she said oh its ber bikes 4 times smaller. I replied I like to think its 4 times larger.
I typically try to educate them in a nice polite way.
However, if it becomes obvious that they aren't trying to hear what I'm saying I begin with the sarcasm.
I've found motorcycle ignorance ranges the entire spectrum of person.
I buddy of mine used to ride a Kawasaki ZZR 1200 (I did too). It is a fairly obscure bike here in the U.S. There are even motorcycle enthusiasts that haven't seen one or heard of one.
Anyway, he took off all of the Kawi badging and glued a Mercedes emblem on the front of the fairing.
You think people are surprised about not knowing BMW makes motorcycles!
I have been asked by a few people on my S1K if its a 1000 or will that thing do 250? I always am friendly and say yes its a liter bike and point out the sticker in plain sight that says 1000. I also tell them it wont do 250mph.
I get few thumbs up or chats from other sport bike riders. A lot of the harley guys wont wave even though I always do haha!
But most of what I get from non bikers is. Be careful on that thing! But not in a friendly caring way. Its always in a condescending tone like they know your time is coming. Like I am an idiot for riding and they have the foresight not to make such mistakes. Or they will say things like GOOD LUCK!
Or I get mountains of stories of how they themselves were in a bad car wreck and had they been on a bike they would now be dead etc.
My VFR750 gets alot more compliments and people think its brand new even though its a 93. The pure sport bikes seem to elicit a worse notion from the general public.
I just wanna go enjoy my bike and be ignored haha!
i enjoy talking to the people know all about bikes, but actually know nothing since its been 10 years since they rode and are so self righteous, superior and condescending etc because 'they moved on / grew up / realized the dangers (and you are just a death waiting to happen), had an incident etc.
When the real reason they gave up riding is because their wife made them.
i dont go more than a couple of days without crossing these people. it makes me feel good because i'm living their dream.
When people say "If I had one of those I'd kill myself" I'm not sure if they think I'm about to die, or it's a compliment that they think I have more self control than them. Can never tell which side of the fence it sits.
OK, one more funny. Was riding the Texas hill country on my K13, rode down from Canada for a few weeks to visit friends. 3 or 4 kids on R6's started cutting up my bike at a rest stop. Too big, doesn't have this, should have that, look how stupid the forks are, blah blah. Finally one of them says to me "Isn't it harder to turn left with the single sided swingarm, the bike should go right all the time like that." I said, yeah, but after you get used to it and sit a bit crooked it's OK. Then I said "But you guys didn't notice the big time custom mods - I took off the chain and sprocket because it always made a mess of the back wheel, look how clean it is." There was mostly silence after that, when I took off I gave them a nice run through the gears with the quickshifter at warp 9 (for a K13 anyway).
I would not openly ridicule anyone, but it's fun to give them something to ponder, like there actually is other types and styles of motorcycles that work quite well, sometimes even better than the Yamahonkawazuki that you ride. But damn that new H2 is NICE.
Here's what I think (not that it matters) - People who strike up conversations with you, no matter how imbecilic it may seem to you, are actually admiring what you represent...independence, strength of will and the ability to take risk without (so far) killing yourself. They subconsciously recognize their lives may lack these traits, and by positioning themselves in conversation with you they are hoping to absorb some of what you have.
It's a compliment, even if it seems otherwise. I had a situation the other day when a car full of two old couples parked next to my bike. The guy driving just kept looking at my bike, like it was the Hope diamond or something. Finally, I geared up and walked out to my bike from the bench at the visitor center I'd stopped at, and the old guy looked at me and said, "Nice bike", but there was a lot more in those two words that just an acknowledgement of the bike's attributes. It was him looking over the possibilities of life, and the path we each choose, and I could see the dreamer in him for just a moment...and then the moment passed.
Just to add, the next time you see the "Old" folks admiring your ride stop and think of what they may have done in their youth for adventure. It might amaze you. I say this because I have three people well into their 90's, My dad and two others that got me my break into my aviation career that when seen by today's youth pass them off as just old geezers but if they could see the guys that would drop through a cloud deck at night to straiff a train with rockets and machine guns with less navigation equipment than we have in a smart phone or the test pilots bailing out of projects gone bad, dog fights over Germany, riding old Harleys standing on their heads they might think of those folks differently. We will all be those old folks some day! (Me sooner than most) :grin2:
I had a stranger walk up to me and the first thing he said was " with those bikes it's not if your going to crash but when your going to crash " my reply was " it's not if your a man but if your man enough to ride it "
Have another good story . So many years ago 2 buddies and I were riding some wheelies on the back roads . We pull up to a gas station and this old guy " at least 85 " comes up and says " you guys gotta be careful your going to hurt yourself and their are so many woman out there you can be enjoying ! " What an awesome old guy we laughed so hard after
The number one comment I get is " I didn't know BMW made a bike like that" or I'm asked what I ride and I say a BMW S1000RR and they reply "the one with the bags". I'm then forced to say "No, the one that looks like a Ninja". Number two is "How fast have you had it/does it go?".
My pet peeves are grown men asking me to wheelie or making the "wheelie motion" and young guys in imports, muscle cars, or decade old Japanese bikes asking to race. In which case I nod my head, blip the throttle and hunch down until light turns and wait until they peel out while I leisurely pull off
Overall, I DETEST people talking to me while I'm riding or stopped on my bike. I ride for solitude, not to hear people's opinions or stories...had a guy the other day ask me at a light "what you got on the dash" I glance at tach and said "16 thousand"...
I DETEST people talking to me while I'm riding or stopped on my bike. I ride for solitude, not to hear people's opinions or stories...had a guy the other day ask me at a light "what you got on the dash" I glance at tach and said "16 thousand"...
I have to agree D40. I constantly am around kids that either make the snap the throttle motion or wheelie motion at me. Its just annoying. I have then had them act like or yell I am a ***** for not doing it. I have even had several grown me do it to men aswell. Some times I give them a little rev to humor them but some just won't get off it.
I was up on the highway the other night and some kid with shorts sandals and no helmet ran up on me on a GSXR 600 at double the speed limit and then proceed to stare at the S1K for about 2 mins then started goosing the throttle back and forth trying to get me to race. I just had the cruise control on and shook my head. After about 5 miles he took off and gave up but made me lol. Sure he went and posted about how he smoked an S1K on the highway.
Same day I had a guy in a 525i try and beat me out of a light so I goosed it a little just for fun and got in front of him as I needed to turn. Then a block down the road on the onramp he came flying past me at probably 100+ flipping me off like I couldn't keep up. I just laughed.
Sometimes its more fun to just be the old fart and cruise just to mess with people.
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