Honda Riding Academy

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On Saturday I attended the Honda Riding Academy course held at Louvain in the Langkloof. With every new Honda sold there is free rider training as a value add, whether it be a quad, MX bike, Adventure bike or Superbike.

Honda had an open day at Louvain and usual the whole family was welcome. Louvain is a great venue with 4x4 tracks, eunduro & MX tracks etc. All kinds of bikes bikes could be seen in action.







It was nice to see a lot of new Transalp 700's attending as well as some Transalp 650's and some Yamaha's. Also nice to see what farkles other people have added to their bikes. Givi crashbars:



After listening to the theory side of things we went out to test everything in practice. This is the fun part.

We started of with the basics - riding slalom...



... with the cones being put closer and closer together.





Slow riding in tight circles looking at the cone in the middle:



Braking locking the wheels and braking adding some front brakes:





And then we headed out on some portions of the enduro track. This was one helluva downhill



As per usual you do not see the real incline on the photo but suffice it to say it was steep! Can a TransAlp go down there?



Not only is it going down there - it's coming back up! This has to be seen to be believed.

XL700 Transalp, CTX200 Bushlander and TTR250 going down and the TransAlp and Bushlander coming back up:



Wow! I've said many times that this bike handles much better off road than you expect, but I have seen today that this truly is a very capable bike off road.

So the instructor makes it look easy, but can anyone do it?

Transalp downhill:



And coming back up (oops):





Transalp hillclimb take 2:
(on this clip you get a better idea of how steep it really is)



The bike didn't have much damage either. I was really surprised. I thought if my bike even just fell over before I've got my crashbars fitted that would be the end of the fairing, but no. These bikes seem to crash very well. Some dirt and minor scratches only.



Bushlander hillclimb take 2:
(I love these bikes )



Some more scenery out on the Enduro track:



Pretty tame compared to the hillclimb, but not without incidents







Once again minor damage only. Some scratches and 'n broken flicker.



I know of two other bikes (other brands) that's was written off recently. Both had relative minor falls and cosmetic damage only, but due to the costs of repair fixing them was not feasible. It's really good to know that these bikes crash so well. Just another thing where this Honda surprises the hell out of me.

What an enjoyable day!




If at all possible I will also attend the Honda Streetbike Academy on the racetrack in Cape Town. After seeing what it can do off road I would love to see what it can do on road! This truly is an all round bike.

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