What a beautiful sunny Sunday, a great day to take the Multistrada on a shakedown ride, a great day to be reminded of how great this motorcycle is.

The Multistrada on a Sunny Sunday

This has been an unusual year in terms of my riding priorities.  Up until this year the Ducati has been the go-to motorcycle for me, the unambiguous favorite, the one I pick when I open the shed, and it is always ready to go for a ride.  This year it is June 12th already, we are almost half way in 2016 (scary, uh?) and today was only the second time I took the Ducati out for a ride.  No wonder, with all the work on the CB500X, and how much fun it has been to ride that little bike… and then I rode the WR250X in the Death Valley as well (I took both bikes on that trip), and there is the Triumph with which I’ve enjoyed a few rides with its new exhaust (Yoshimura), and all along the Ducati has been patiently sitting there on the trickle charger.  This is not right.

Pink Roses and the Red and White Ducati

This ride of today was a wake up call.  Thank goodness I have some action scheduled for this bike this coming week! I will take the Ducati on my annual trip to Northern California. Today I wanted to see if the bike’s systems are in top shape, hence the shakedown ride.  Well, the shakedown was for me as well, I needed to get reacquainted with this bike’s weight and power again.  And the lesson learned was the  reminder about how nice it is to ride this machine.  And I’m glad it is so, as it energized me to get everything in place for the upcoming 1,000 mile trip.

Here is a video compilation of today’s ride and for the first time I say a few words about the ride and the motorcycle during the video.  At the end of the video you will see (and hear) that while at the gas station, the attendant said: “nice bike, uh… (about three times)” and then he added “it’s a lot of CC’s for such a little guy” or something like that. It was worth keeping it and documenting it because it is exactly how I feel about this bike: I respect each and everyone of the 150 horses that offer a measure of this bike’s power.

So, how was the the shakedown ride?  The bike is running great, all horses are accounted for and at the readiness for this next trip.  By the way, I find it incredible that this motorcycle, despite its 1.2 liter motor and 150hp can still run at about 45 mpg, giving me a solid 200 mile range from a full tank, time after time.

201 miles with 9 miles to go (it took 4.45 gallons to fill so in reality I would have some 20 miles to go)

Thank you for reading!

Upcoming stories:

Not necessarily in this order, here are a few stories I’m organizing and should be drafting soon:

CB500X: I will continue the CB500X Adventure series with post number 4 where I will document its adventure on the Death Valley.  What an awesome adventure it was, including a rainstorm, several bikes’ being dropped – one of these drops could be called a crash – riding through a sandstorm, some drama, and strong winds on the way in and the way back!  I will include and a few observations about the CB500X Adventure and Rally Raid products on that post as well. Maybe it will be a separate post so I can talk about something that went wrong with the bike (partially my fault) and the after ride maintenance, such as oil change and air filter change – I wanted to make sure I cleaned the sand that went everywhere from riding through the sandstorm.

Ducati XDiavel: I have ridden the Ducati XDiavel as well, which is something completely different than the bikes I usually ride.  I’ve been looking at reviews of cruisers lately: with the new crop of sport cruisers and heritage motorcycles, there are a few interesting motorcycles out there and a lot of interest from riders. I will post here the ride on the XDiavel (I actually rode it twice) and my comments and observations on cruisers and heritage bikes.

Ducati Multistrada: As I mentioned earlier on this post, I will be on a trip to Northern California on the Ducati. I usually don’t document those rides here, if I remember correctly I only documented the first one, in 2013. Just in case, this will be my forth trip to meet a group of Ducati owners in California (twice to Graeagle in the Sierras and now a second time to Weaverville in the Trinity Alps).

GPS: Use a motorcycle specific or use a car GPS on your motorcycle? I’ve been using car GPS’s on my motorcycles for almost 10 years already, I’m on my second one, the first one still works, just that it is so out dated it became obsolete.  Car GPS’s are not waterproof, they are not advertised as shock resistance, and whatever else people claim they need to be for a motorcycle application, and still the two Nuvi GPS’s I’ve used for almost 10 years have worked very well under all weather conditions and types of riding.  I will tell the story of how these car GPS’s work and how I prepare them for a motorcycle application.  And I will discuss why I haven’t bought a motorcycle GPS!  Yet.

Stay tuned!