So I needed a new hobby, and decided to go with motorcycles!

I signed up for the new rider course next week.

Any recommendations on riding gear I should get, especially for summer time?

Helmet

Good gloves and helmet at a minimum.
I rarely ride without gear, and by gear I mean pants, boots, helmet and gloves.
For bigger rides I wear a jacket with armor and armor pants.

I take it you are a beginner?
Stay alert my friend. Roads are dangerous these days with distracted drivers.

Riding gear can be expensive, but worth it in my opinion. I buy used stuff sometimes. Join this forum and go to the flea market/gear section.

https://www.advrider.com/f/forums/ge...f-you-wear.54/

If it's anything like the course I took when I started they wouldn't even let you get on a bike without boots that covered your ankles, gloves, a jacket, and a helmet. They didn't make you wear more than jeans for legs though, just needed to be covered.

I would recommend getting leather and not the textile stuff. There's a reason why professionals wear leather and its required for tracks. It sucks to wear during the peak days of summer but it wont melt away if when you go down.

If you do get textile because its cheaper and not as hot to wear in the summer, at least get the shit that has reinforced armor for all the high impact areas.

And something to plug your ears. If you want to be legal then just get plugs. I started wearing in ear headphones under my helmet and listening to music, which is illegal in Illinois but **** it - cant hear shit but wind anyways, on a low enough volume that I could still hear cars if I needed to but kept my ears from bleeding because of wind noise, not literally but its way too ****ing loud and I dont care how quiet companies claim their helmets to be.

Sweet!

dress for the slide, not the ride.

I'm riding later today.

I passed my motorcycle class this weekend at Rawhide Harley-Davidson in Olathe!

Can't recommend it enough to any noobs wanting to learn how to ride.

https://www.rawhideharley.com/riding-academy/

Ok CP Motorcycle folks. Anybody have any opinion on KTM motorcycles?

They are certainly more affordable than some of the other options in the beginner sportbike class, but is a few bucks saved worth it over a Honda/Kawasaki, etc.?

Specifically, here is what we are looking at:

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Thank you in advance for any comments/suggestions.

Take the MSF course first, that goes without saying.

KTM is a quality marque with a good reputation.

Traditionally the negatives of a bike like this for a beginner would be common to sportbikes. It's not going to be comfortable for taller riders. I dealt with it, but for longer rides it's not great.

With lowish bars (though not as low as some from the looks of it) and a short wheelbase, the steering is also going to be pretty snappy and not very forgiving of beginnerish inputs. If you are in a younger age bracket, you might find the insurance rates to be uncomfortable as well.

Usually, you would expect a single-cylinder bike to shake quite a bit at idle, and not be as smooth riding as a parallel twin or an inline 4 would be. I have some time on 90 degree twins (SV650, RC51) and I didn't find those too disturbing, but I can't speak to this one. You'd expect the torque to be good relative to its displacement.

Another thing to consider is that if the bike ends up sideways that fairing will be expensive to replace, so you might want to see if frame sliders are available for it.

I have been out of the saddle for a few years now and it's interesting to see entry level bikes come with traction control and ABS now.

Looks great and does makes me miss the R1 :D

Thanks for all the feedback!