Modern Vespa

My wife is very sensitive and competitive, not to mention easily embarrassed. So when she said she wanted to learn how to ride a scooter, I quietly pointed her to the local MSF course. She would not have been amenable to any suggestions I might have made, and, while I enjoy quiet, it tends to get a little frosty after a while.

Be aware that learning the physical skills are the least part of the course. Learning to read traffic, identify threats, and how to avoid them, not to mention heightened awareness of your surroundings, are the real skills that will save her life.

Not suprisingly my wife was a much better car driver after the course as well. Prior to that, she did not drive defensively, did not look out for traffic hazards, drove too fast for her skill, and followed too close. Oddly, she was not willing to accept my suggestions on those topics. But happy to comply with the instructor.

If you decide to teach her anyway, I'd suggest one exercise to start, whether on a CVT bike or a clutch bike.

Have her move forward five feet, and stop. Repeat. Then 10 feet, with her feet up. Then 20 feet. Make stopping natural, learn to take off with your feet up. Learning to balance while stopping is very important, and sometimes not natural at all.

This is applicable to skiing, swimming, driving, sailing, you name it.

I hope the lessons go well, and you enjoy riding together. My wife will not get on any of my bikes, not even for a picture, lol. She knows lots of my scooter friends and is ok with my hobby, it's just not for her. We travel quite a bit together, just not on pTW.

I have to agree with letting a professional do the training! When My wife bought the GTV300 in fall of 2013 she took the local course, think it was three Saturdays. I stayed home and waited to see how she did. Only dropped "their" bike once! She had a bit of trouble with the shifting and clutch but only a little.

Trying to recall if she rode the GTV at home while taking the class, might have decided it would be too confusing going from a shift in class to the GTV.

Once she passed the road test she was ready to ride anytime it was not raining. Even, purely by mistake, got her on a couple roads that were freshly chipped handled it just fine.

Another time she was out riding while I was at work she found one of those bridges with the expended grating, again no problem!

Then one day she came around a curve to see a dead dear with it's legs right in her lane! She said her first thought was: "OK this should be just like the 2X4's they had us running over in the class." No problem!

If I was to point out one problem she had for a little while was pulling out of a side street on to a road to the right. A couple times she crossed the center line before pulling back into the correct lane. Those two times got her attention and now no problems.

If you will teach your wife to ride, it should come with the stipulation that you will have an extreme amount of patience, you aren't allowed to name call, cuss, or get mad for any reason. This includes when she dumps your mint condition scooter on the ground because she didn't do what you told her to do. You only get to say, "We can fix that" and/or "you'll get it right the next time".

Women are not children. Just like a man, if they have the desire to ride, they can. The same physical limitations apply, height etc, to a man or woman. Most women riders, i mean those who actually put time in the saddle, could outride the majority of mv posters here.

I don't think he's planning on teaching her himself - he said several times early in the thread already that MSF is a must. Probably just taking her to get acquainted with the bike and give it a little trial before the class.

Okay. My comments were not about who was teaching who, but just about women riding in general. Students usually work their way down to the teachers expectations.

That's exactly the plan. The real training I'm going to leave to the professionals however letting her sit on the Vespa and ride around the parking lot we can do together. She's also excited to ride the scoot as it will be hers to ride whenever she wants it. If there are days that I can't ride the Vespa and have to slum it with one of our other bikes I'll somehow manage.

I can tell you one thing she has done her homework! She's a senior accountant and thinks like one so when she sets her mind to learning something she does a thorough job. She knows the Ontario regulations better than I do, that much I know for sure. She's also studied the basics of riding theory so she has that going for her and wants to see how these things work in reality. It's one thing explaining push steering to someone, it really needs to be experienced.

Hopefully she'll be fine on the GTV. Maybe not the ideal starter bike especially with the modifications but it should be fine. Fortunately it's not too blippy off the throttle and the kitting really only kicks in when you get moving.

No problems!!!

Well she is out this weekend on the course and if all goes well will have her license by end of day tomorrow. Fingers crossed but so far no panicked texts. I know she was a bit nervous. Glad she is with a friend and she said the class has at least 10 other women in it.

My BMW bike club has found a substantial increase in the number of lady riders.
The club assists by partly subsidizing training courses for both genders, but there seems to be a propensity for men to shy away, whereas the ladies are keen to take up the offer.
"I know how to ride!" versus "I would like to learn to ride properly!"

Well so far so good and she is surviving the day riding a 350CC motorcycle. She said things are going well but shifting gears is annoying.

So it sounds like she will get thorough it and I had to send the below email to my Piaggio dealer. I love my black real leather saddle but need to do something for my wife as she will be riding the GTV.

Hopefully I can find a saddle that looks good and is comfortable while being an inch or so shorter.

Hi Lou,

Wife is doing her course this weekend and will be riding the GTV soon. She can't really flat foot with the current saddle and so I said I'd ask you about options.

I love my current saddle SO... Is there anything black and good looking you can source or can we shave down my current one? I'd buy her a 150 but she doesn't want anything less than the 300 because well... reasons.

I'll drop by next week to say hi anyway and we can have a quick talk about it and there is no real rush.

Thanks and I hope things are going well in the new location.


*EDIT* Lou got back to me about 5 minutes after I emailed. He really is awesome and man are we lucky to have him in TO. He has black bench saddles in stock that can be shaved down if needed. I'll go see him early next week.

Well she did it! So some Champagne tonight and time to get off my tush about getting a lower saddle for the GTV.

Wow you are one lucky guy!

My wife's interest in riding is so low, like methane on Mars, or plastic bags in the bottom of the Mariana Trench, it requires serious scientific effort to measure.

That's a good thing because her bicycling skills are... poor. She gave that up after slowly crashing with our daughter in the baby seat when mis-negotiating a sidewalk ramp (front wheel made it, rear wheel, not so much).

The thought of her on a powered two-wheeler would give me sleepless nights.

Couples who ride are uniquely blessed.

Harb,
What about renting a 50cc? Something light and nimble before getting on the "Grande Vespa"? I think confidence is the key here. Just my 2¢

Thought about it but nope she will not do it. She will not ride anything less than a 300. "Tough" is not something someone would associate with her but her dad is an ex NHL player and then Chief Detective and her brother was a Chief Fire Inspector. So she grew up around "real men" for lack of a better way to put it. She has her heart set on the Vespa and with the Ural and C650GT for a condo yeah I'm kinda out of room for even say a kids push scooter.

She is a brilliant woman and very methodical and committed to how she does things. On the course they told her she was a natural but just needs to learn to not get in her own head. I do understand what you mean about the 50 but that is a non starter as much as I tried with a 150. With a lower saddle she will be fine on the GTV Malossi kitted and all. It is a well balanced scoot when at speed though yeah the "wobble" she isn't thrilled about. I told her it just adds to the charm.

If she drops it.... yeah bummer but it's reparable as we all know. I'm not worried about her hurting herself on it and any drop would be as most at about 0 kmh.

I'll let you all know how it goes.

On the bright side when we ride together I will be on the BMW and she at least will have a Vespa that can keep up. The Ural I imagine she will be in the sidecar with a dog or us going out to pick up supplies.

Très cool. One determined gal! Respect!

Hey, I'm writing an opinion from another side of such situation. My boyfriend teaches me to ride my Vespa and I think that his methods really work for me. Basically, yes, I don't agree that if you are able to ride a bicycle, you will ride a scooter like a charm. Not really, or I am too complicated myself
Anyway, my methods of learning were the following:

- First two lessons in a parking lot - kind of freestyle. Firstly, I was told to easily turn the throttle and start "walking" with the slowly moving scooter, just to feel, how it goes. Walk - stop, walk - stop, till I felt comfortable to put on more speed. Then I started going faster, around 20-25 km/h and stoping, doing wide turns.
- On the third lesson I started to practice slower and smaller circles. This is where the challenge came, because riding in a straight line or wide turns wasn't that complicated. So, here I had to get the feel of how to behave in a small circle and low speed. Probably all of you now, that low speed + small circle + all the weight inside the circle will result into a crash. So, here I got a lot of "close calls", but finally I mastered the idea - scooter in, body out, voilla!
- Fourth lesson. We took some cones to the parking lot and went through all the motorcycle driving license exam exercises. Including figure 8 in a small area, tight turn to the left/right, tight U turn, speeding till 50 km/h and performing an emergency stop, weaving through cones (distance between cones 3 m) in a free-speed, weaving through cones (6 m distance betwen cones) in speed no lower than 25-30 km/h, in a restricted lane (1.5 m width, 17 m distance) speed up to 30 km/h and stop on the finish line.

So, that's it, I believe I will do one more lesson including those exam exercises and I'll be confident enough to go out on the streets. Can't wait to finally try it out in the traffic and see how I feel. Though, being vertically challenged I have an extra issue with being able only to tip-toe and other problem is that rear brake lever is really far away and takes a lot of effort to grab it. Vespa hates short people, but that will not stop me

Well here she is, her first ride on our Vespa. She did good . Of course this is after she got her license after taking the course so her confidence was much better than before. After I took this she disappeared for about 10 minutes and rode around Exhibition Place.

Had a relative in his fifties, who has been riding dirt bikes since his teens, recently get a street bike. His technical skills are excellent. But he has had two accidents in the first year, one traffic-related, one liquid on the street. Trying to get him to take a class.

While the technical skills are necessary to be safe on the streets, they are not sufficient. Need to work on the mental game of what to look out for and be aware of that you never learn driving a car. Other drivers react differently to a scooter/motorcycle than a car, and you need to be prepared. Not to mention be much more conscious of potholes, gravel, liquid, or other obstructions on the pavement. As well as learning which side of the lane to ride on under which circumstances, and the traffic situations most likely to result in a crash, and how to deal with them.

We leave Monday for 10 days at a cottage and while I usually ride up on a different (bigger) bike this time I'm going to ride up on our Vespa. So it should give her plenty of time to practice on nice country roads. The plan is once she has a little more practice she will take another more advanced course. They really are very adorable and I recommend them to anyone who rides. I've already taken all the advanced courses offered here but may do one again next year as a refresher. They really do help.

Who drives a scooter drives even better the car ... Harb ... excellent description.