Road King Blog

In order to obtain a motorcycle license in the State of Florida, a person must successfully complete a motorcycle operator’s course.  Following completion of the course, a graduate of the program can have a motorcycle endorsement added to their driver’s license.  The written and riding tests are administered in the course, so no further testing is required at the DMV.

The training program I attended was put on by Florida Motorcycle Training of Lake County (www.floridamotorcycletraining.com).  Like all MSF sanctioned BRC programs, they provide the motorcycles and basic safety equipment, and the training is conducted on a closed “range” facility.  After a morning of lecture and video presentations, we hit the range to begin learning how to safely handle a motorcycle.

The riding instruction is broken down into logical steps - literally steps in the first part.  After reviewing the controls of the bikes, we pushed them to the starting points on the range, and in a line abreast we first learned to gently let the clutch out into the “friction zone” (the place in the travel of the clutch where is is transmitting some power to the rear wheel, but is not completely engaged) and duck-walked the bikes across the range.  After a few trips back and forth in this manner, we move to picking up our feet and riding in a straight line across the range.

The range session gradually moved into turns, shifting, braking and then emergency maneuvers (hard braking and swerving).

Although I had never ridden a motorcycle before (and despite my shaky initial riding on the range), I aced the written exam and sailed through the riding test (with one 3 point deduction for crossing the edge of the U-turn box slightly).

So there I sat, with a shiny new MSF card in hand, ready to go ride the land.

OK, not really.  What I was qualified to do at this point is ride a small motorcycle on a closed parking lot under supervision.  There was still much learning left to do….