Discussion on Mentor Programme

[wybmadiity]

How are the mentors picked?....some are outstanding candidates, others have lost licences, binned plenty of bikes and/or appear to be poorly qualified.
Along the lines of Devil this is a question!

I must agree that just because someone bins often or has lost a licence that it does not mean they will be a bad mentor.. My mentor binned all the time and lost a licence, yet taught me the right lines etc..
Just my 2c

[Katman]

My mentor binned all the time and lost a licence, yet taught me the right lines etc..

Precisely the sort that doesn't make a good mentor.

[nodrog:Me]

You poor unfortunate thing, being taught by such an inept teacher.

isnt there some sort of saying that goes "those who cant do, teach"?

[Big Dog]

I must agree that just because someone bins often or has lost a licence that it does not mean they will be a bad mentor.. My mentor binned all the time and lost a licence, yet taught me the right lines etc..
Just my 2c

Yet or in spite of it?

I know plenty of people who have been taught / mentored / whatevered by exceptionally bad riders and turned out good anyway. Some people just develop that way no matter how bad the advice.

[FROSTY:Me]

Easily cured by KB showing no tolerance to people who misguide others in regards to riding skills and concepts.

But who decides that its misinformation?
Without digging into old sores that is EXACTLY the problem I had with moderating the Mechanical forums. I was alone moderating deciding what was good information and what was just dumb shit--ie the crc sprayed on a disk issue.
Mate Im not saying this is the best system just that its one that deserves to be given a go at least.

[thehovel]

To be a mentor,forget your ego,forget the flamimg ,just if you have something to cotribute,JUST DO IT. On the NASS night we do bike exersises. All newbies need to talk to all mentors, some of the advice is not relivant to you but just file it untill you do need it. Big Dog as keeping Wednesday night going by himself when I rocked up to learn to teach. My only claim is that I have grey hair (what's left). See you all to night. Regards Richard

[Mikkel]

I am being entertained... Here you are discussing a programme for helping out newbies and yet there are people standing in the corner comparing penis sizes...

I think the mentor system is a good idea, but I can see where Devil is coming from... Why institutionalise something which doesn't need to be?
It's pretty simple though. Not everybody getting into motorcycling and/or KB are necessarily very outgoing and as such having a formal system in place might make it easier for these people to get in contact with someone who can help them get their head around biking.

The longer somebodies been riding the more situations they've experienced. Someone riding for a year is extremely unlikely to have have the depth of knowledge and experiences of someone who's been on bikes for 20 years. Mentoring is all about experience and passing it on.

I don't agree with Boomer about much (and if you hadn't quoted him I would have missed this) - but he's right in this case. Not everybody learn from their experiences - which I am sure nobody here can deny. On the other hand, whether you learn from your experiences or not, you'll need experiences to learn...

Talent is no substitute for experience - but neither is experience a substitute for talent. And neither are acceptable excuses for not applying the grey matter, all the time.

Brow beating is a waste of time - can we have a show of hands how many people actually consider anything Katman said when riding - other than "damn, I wish Katman were here to see this crazy shit" - despite his heart no doubt being in the right place.

Well, that's the funny thing about making people pay attention - it's not about saying the right things. It's about saying the right things in the right way - something Katman is absolutely incapable off.

This is why, I suspect, that one of the requirements for the KB mentors is that they need to have good person skills.


And all the effort spent on distinguishing between tuition, instruction, mentoring, etc. is redundant. The mentor programme is not mandatory for any of the involved parties, it's free(supposedly) and there are no formal programme. As such just consider it something more alike to a dating site - the idea being to hook up a virgin with a pornstar to teach the virgin a few tricks of the trade. I think it's a bloody good deal for any virgin TBQH

[Pedrostt500]

Wow this mole hill looks like a real mountain now. All I thought the mentoring would be about, is to help a Noobie through their first few steps into the world of motorcycling, there are proffesionals who can teach a noobie all the real neat tricks, that I wont or cant.
Ive held my bike licence for the last 27 yrs, not all of those years in the saddle, but most of them.
What have I learned in that time, Every one kisses the pavement at least once in their first couple of years of riding, hope fully with only a bit of bent pride and scratched paint. you can beat the Law of the Land, but the Laws of Physichs are a different story.
Treat Every other motorist as an idiot, untill proven other wise.
Its good to know your road rules, but it doesnt pay to be DEAD right, as defensive driving / riding is about some times thinking for other road users.
There are worse things that can happen to you than death, having ya mum wipe ya bum feed you by hand and wash you for the next 40yrs, and not having another Girl / boy friend ever again would top my list.
Some of the best people I know ride motorcycles, and Ive enjoyed riding my old bikes and hope to ride untill Im 100 yrs old, then I think Ill ride some more.

[Mental Trousers]

I don't agree with Boomer about much (and if you hadn't quoted him I would have missed this) - but he's right in this case. Not everybody learn from their experiences - which I am sure nobody here can deny. On the other hand, whether you learn from your experiences or not, you'll need experiences to learn...

Talent is no substitute for experience - but neither is experience a substitute for talent. And neither are acceptable excuses for not applying the grey matter, all the time.

That's why it's possible to be a mentor without 10 years experience. We've got 1 going through the process at the moment who hasn't had anywhere near the 10 years baseline.

[MyGSXF:Me]

What have I learned in that time, Every one kisses the pavement at least once in their first couple of years of riding

Sorry, but you are wrong there. In 16 years & 140,000ish ks of riding.. I've only ever had 1 "bin".. & that was a very minor rear ender, at walking pace!! I had been riding full on for 9 years before that happened.

[Mikkel]

Sorry, but you are wrong there. In 16 years & 140,000ish ks of riding.. I've only ever had 1 "bin".. & that was a very minor rear ender, at walking pace!! I had been riding full on for 9 years before that happened.

I personally don't believe in absolutes - which is why I am very much opposed to anyone considering binning inevitable.

However, if you are the kind of person who can not resist exploring the capabilities of your vehicle of choice you are bound to touch upon the boundaries of what is possible and what is not. As such the chance of not binning is pretty darn slim.

Now Jen, you strike me as being very un-aggressive - a friendly sort who's very conscious about your riding and about how to improve it and be safe. (correct me if I'm completely derailed here - I've only met you at the RRRS course)
Still, if you managed to have an incident - no matter how minor - where would that place the odds of your average, young, testosterone fuelled, newbie biker?

As has been touched upon already - those who seek guidance/mentoring/instruction/teaching/WTFever are not necessarily the ones that need it the most. Quite the contrary. Anything that can be done to make such opportunities more visible and more accessible are welcome in my book.

[FROSTY:Me]

I'd like to put a different spin on it. some of us have "been there done that". We've been the testosterone filled youth. We've had the stupid crashes. Weve ridden ill prepared buckets of shit that threw us off first chance it got. We've lived through it Learned from it and are now benifititing from our mistakes.
That experience of farking it up is worth passing on so newbees DON'T have to learn it the hard and painfull way like we did

[xwhatsit]

Here's a young beginning rider sticking his neck out in expectation of it being hacked off --

Everybody loves to get the shits with Katman, and laugh off Ixion as a cynical crackpot. But, from my perspective, they bring up a very valid point. Forget lines and gearshifts and peg-weighting and all of those technical sort of things; attitude and a general philosophy of not getting into strife in the first place should be far more important. The aforementioned person with his `mentor' who taught him how to corner yet had lost his license multiple times etc. should be right off the books. IMHO, beginning riders should be kept away from the toothpaste-tube GSXR brigrade as long as possible. I say this as somebody who was lucky to fall in with the `right crowd' right from day one, and as a result that's certainly had an effect on my frequency of hospital visits.

Once I finish building my sister's bike, I want her to be mentored by somebody who will show her the correct (using this word again) attitude towards motorcycling, not how to corner well and use the brakes to stop quickly -- that will follow on. You can read books on that.

MHO. I may have got the wrong end of the stick here, but it really worries and saddens me when I see a lot of the guys in the SMC and the way they approach motorcycling.

[justsomeguy]

I want her to be mentored by somebody who will show her the correct (using this word again) attitude towards motorcycling, not how to corner well and use the brakes to stop quickly -- that will follow on. You can read books on that.

Two people who have EXACTLY the skills and attitude you request are ManDownUnder and Ixion, YES Ixion. Sure he can be a cynical crackpot, so can I and you too given enough shit. But he knows quite a bit about biking and his attitude towards biking itself (forget KB and it's crap for a second) is spot on.

Both of them have several years of riding experience (the kind of riding 99% of us do 99% of the time), good mature attitudes, mechanical know-how and most importantly life experience. In addition they both are intelligent enough to know how to teach too, instead of simply telling. I trust that you understand the difference between teaching someone as opposed to simply telling a person something.

There is no substitute to good old-fashioned experience gained over time, despite what some may claim. There may be others around here who are greater, but straight off the top of my head I'd say those two guys would get my strongest votes. I say this to you in good faith.

I don't give a flying fork if they are designated mentors or not.

MHO. I may have got the wrong end of the stick here, but it really worries and saddens me when I see a lot of the guys in the SMC and the way they approach motorcycling.

By SMC do you mean AMCC? Aren't they just a bunch of fellas who hand out race licenses? Come on you don't expect them to be much different than the Gixxer brigade do ya?

[Katman]

Forget lines and gearshifts and peg-weighting and all of those technical sort of things; attitude and a general philosophy of not getting into strife in the first place should be far more important.

Absolutely. With the right attitude towards motorcycling new riders can safely learn the skills gradually, at a rate that doesn't put them in the position of having a split second to think "Oh fuck, now what was it that my mentor told me last week".

Without the right attitude, we will still have new riders thinking "I bet I can keep up with him now with my new found skills".