Do We Want Jade or Pink Dirtbike Gear?

Thor's 2014 Motocross women's dirtbike collection includes the Phase Kit Tilt outfit, which includes a jersey, gloves and pants. I'm not a dirty girl yet, but if I were I would totally wear either of these outfits. Two color options including Navy/Jade and Black/Pink are available. Which one do you like? Which one would you choose? I actually like both color sets. I think the pink one appeals to me because of the way they incorporated the pink. Not too loud or annoying, just a few accents and logos. I am partial to magenta/pink and do HATE the light, baby pink options. I'm also a fan of richer colors like navy/turquoise/purple. The jade is more like a light green in my eyes, so maybe that's why it doesn't bug me. Which outfit would you choose?

Ride Report: Philly to Maryland to Virginia to West Virginia and Back!

I've been dying to ride to West Virginia since I moved here. Looking at the maps, it has the twistiest roads I've seen here so far. I had an ambitious plan and didn't pull off as much as I'd hoped but still found some killer roads with a quick stop to Gettysburg on the way back. We left Saturday evening after I got off work, around 6pm.  The day before we left was a bit hectic because someone needed to get new tires mounted and set up. The 2nd tires of choice were Michelin Pilot Road 4 front and rear tires. Unfortunately since this was left to the last minute, the first choice was out of stock. But, these performed very well apparently, certainly far better than the 7 year old Pilot Powers that came with the bike!

creative_motorcycle_tire_transport

So we left Saturday evening around 6pm. My friend and coworker Brian came with us for the ride. I love riding with friends!

riding_with_friends

The plan was to get to Hagerstown, MD because it was fairly close to the cluster of roads in W. VA that we were trying to get to for Sunday. Given that we didn't get in til after 11pm, it was definitely a good spot for us. We avoided the Interstates and decided to stick to Route 30. As we got started on 76W, I saw this cool car and had to take a pic. Someone told me that old cars were hard to see on the road in the East Coast, because of the weather. But I guess Philly doesn't fall under that statement, because I've seen so many classics around town. It was really nice to see this one.

coolcar

Map: Part 1, Philly to Hagerstown 170 miles

Our dinner stop was along Route 30 at this awesome local place called Jennie's Diner in the heart of Amish country.

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I had the biggest country fried steak, ever! It was delicious. This is what was left after I couldn't fit anymore in my tiny stomach

.

I booked us rooms for the weekend at the Country Inn & Suites, which I highly highly recommend. It's a very clean, non smoking hotel that you can pretty much find everywhere. I would say they were pretty affordable, $89-99/night with free breakfast and parking. They even let us park our bikes right out front! It's also pet friendly, which worked well for us when we drove across country.

country_inn_suites_motorcycle_hotels_hagerstown

Green, lighter green and blue. Not a bad group! (Left: Brian in his

Revit Ignition 2 Jacket

 & 

Gear 2 pants

 &

Sidi Adventure GTX Boots

; Right: Evan in his

Dainese Air-3 Jacket

and old Rev'it Gear 1 pants)

The gem in this route was Route 77 through Catoctin Mountain Park. A really nice, twisty little road which was beautifully paved too. Even in the pitch black, it was pretty nice. Luckily we got to see it in daylight on the way home. We rolled in rather late, after 11pm since we took the scenic route to Hagerstown. We were definitely happy to get in and climb in bed to get ready for our long day into W. VA.

Map: Part 2: MD to W. VA 413 miles

This was definitely the best riding I've had since moving to Philly. The roads were smooth, hardly any cars but lots of twisties! If you just look at the map, you can tell that the roads are fantastic. Route 250 was definitely a favorite, sweepers & twisties stretched out over ~20 miles. The roads were very quiet, hardly any traffic and not much time spent stuck behind cars.

Since we were riding as much as possible, we only took a few photos along the way:

riding_with_friends (1)

Needless to say we had a really really great day riding around WVA. I wish we had one more day to ride further south and west of Elkins, W. VA, I hope I can try again soon, because those roads are calling me back already. I definitely loved 50 and 250, I think those were my favorite. If we had more time, I would've checked out some of the roads off the highway, but since our time was so short we decided to try out the highways first.

Here are a few more shots I managed to get along the way while we rode through W. Virginia:

riding_with_friends 2

riding_with_friends 1

riding_with_friends 3

Day 3: Hagerstown to Gettysburg

On Saturday night we rode this highway in the dark which we definitely wanted to see during the daytime. It was twisty, smooth and glorious. It turned out to be Route 77 through Catoctin Mountain Park between Highway 15 and Smithsburg, MD. It was short, but sweet and a nice surprise. I managed to take a picture on Monday morning:

route77_catoctin_mountainpark_md

After this we took 15 north to Gettysburg. We did the auto tour and saw all the beautiful, historic sites that basically created this country as we know it. Riding through the park was beautiful and humbling. We saw battlefields, cemeteries, and monuments. I highly recommend visiting the park and seeing how the war was essentially won. Here are some photos that I took along the way:

The way home was uneventful, just a lot of traffic and slow going. We did have to stop and take pic in the buggy at a Hess though:

riding_to_gettysburg22

783 miles later, it was back to Philly. I had a blast, and can't wait to go back to W. VA!!

Stay Tuned! Ride Report Coming...

Just finished a 785 mile ride through PA, to MD to VA to W. VA and Back! Stay Tuned.

Back Protector Issue

Reader Emily wrote me recently about a back protector issue she's having while riding 2-up. Check out what she had to say along with my reply:

Hi there, I live in Berkeley (I know you've decamped to Philly) and my b/f and I ride a BMW 1200GS Adventure with me on the back. We recently upsized from an 800GS. Because I found it hard on my lower back to not have no backrest, when he got the new bike he had a box put on the back with the backrest cushioning installed.

Now I am getting a bruise mid-spine from the top of the box (even though it is cushioned as well). I have a FirstGear Kilimanjaro Air jacket that I've liked but the back armor goes down just to the place where the top of the box hits. I went into the BMW dealer in SF yesterday to try their jackets and found they have the same problem. I am 5'8" and long waisted and BMW jackets for women don't come in long sizes, though their men's apparel does. Kent in the BMW store suggested I try Rev'it because they make better apparel for women then BMW (actually he suggested I start my own company making women's motorcycling appa rel).

However, I note in looking at the Rev'it website that the women's gear also does not come in long sizes. Do you know how long the back armor is in the women's jacket (I wear an 8 in the BMW GS Dry) or do you have any other suggestions? We're taking a two week trip in Montana in September and I've got to have this figured out by then or I will be be super uncomfortable.

-April

I have a couple ideas for you:

1) Rev'it Levante Jacket + Seesoft Back Protector

This combination gives you two things including a longer cut in the torso and sleeves as well as a back protector that's fairly long. It shouldn't be taller than your shoulder blades but I think it'll alleviate the issues you're having with the top box. This jacket is one of the only ones that work well for women who are looking for a jacket that's multi season (removable thermal layer with a mesh shell) and have a longer torso fit as well a sleeve length. Unfortunately you have to use Seesoft with the Levante because the pocket is specifically cut out for Seesoft. Alternatively, you could also use D3O instead, you'll just have to trim the sides to fit. To find out more about this jacket, check out my tall co-host's review here.

Keep in mind that all back protector inserts will never be higher than the shoulder blades because it's just too uncomfortable in riding position and the jacket just won't fit right. It would really restrict the driver's ability to fully turn their head from side to side.

 

2) External Back Protector

If the previous combination doesn't work, try wearing an external back protector underneath like this one by Spidi. I like this one because it's pretty long but really thin. You can also adjust the waist belt to your height via velcro. I think this would fit perfectly underneath the Levante as well.