Thursday, February 04, 2010

Better Tires for Better Riding

I gotta say, I absolutely love my Pilot Road 2 tires.

Tire quality makes a huge difference in the overall motorcycle riding experience. My experience with the previous incarnation of Pilot Roads was that they had no grip (leading to a lot of scary moments) and they caused sluggish handling.

Not so with the Pilot Road 2 tires. I feel like I could drag my knee all day with these tires. I'm going to have to see how tight I can get my figure-eights one of these days...

In the parking garage at my office, there is a turn where the floor is painted all the way through. I have NO idea why they did that, but it resulted in a slick, low-visibility nightmare. On the old tires, that turn was usually the scariest part of my ride.

But the new tires stick like velcro. I no longer feel like I'm suddenly going to lose traction and eat pavement in every curve. It's nice. In fact, it's made a huge difference in how much I enjoy riding.

So, if you're buying tires, spring for the good ones. It's completely worth it.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Lucky:

On my old bike I purchased a set of Michelin Pilot Powers and I thought they were good, but then I found out about the Road 2 .

Nice to have the security of good tires . . .

bob
bobskoot: wet coast scootin

irondad said...

The trouble with all that grip is that it makes me lose my grip on responsibility. Hope you do better!

Hope you're better, too.

Lucky said...

bobskoot - I'm just amazed at what a difference they've made. I had some serious lean-anxiety on the old tires. I'm working past that issue on the new ones...

irondad - Well, the only real way to get rid of temptation is to give in to it.