In Praise of Leather

or

How I learned to stop blaspheming

On July 16, 1999, three friends and I attended the Penguin Racing School, the nation's oldest school for motorcycle racers. In temperatures that must have reached 110 degrees, we stood around on the hot pavemement in the sun in our full racing leathers. Still, I didn't regret having bought a brand-new set of leathers in cool black the week before. Style is crucial, I figure, when your regular ride is a beautiful Italian motorcycle.

The school instilled confidence and taught me the fun of learning a small set of turns and being able to practice mastering them in ideal conditions: all traffic going in one direction, no stalled objects in the path, no Volvos, no cellular phones, no debris in the path and if there is, it'll be preceded by a friendly turn worker waving a warning flag. The next day we got our licenses and raced. In my second venture onto the once-again-sweltering track I finished 12th out of 27 entrants in our class.

Unfortunately such ideal circumstances can't be replicated off the track, which means that riding full-tilt on the street is riding under the influence of false confidence.

More!