Pretty Much My First Big Boy Long Trip Ever

[DRB146_imp]

Before you blame yourself completely for your slow turns, I guess due to a little lack of confidence, make sure your bike tyre pressures are spot on and that you have increased the rear preload on the CB if you are a heavier guy than the average Japanese man. This bike can be made to corner very nicely and without effort with the right setup.

Heavy? No.
Heavier than the average Japanese man? Yeah, probably...

Congratulations on your achievement! Long solo rides can be very relaxing. It's also quite normal to get tired on a 200+ mile trip, especially if it's your first time and you haven't got the necessary specific fitness. Keep riding and things will get better.

As for cornering improvement, I can tell you what works for me. Every time I get a new bike I spend some time on an empty parking lot with the new bike and work my way through riding fundamentals - stop and go, figure 8s, slaloms, swerving, emergency braking. I find that it builds up confidence as it allows me to understand the limits of my bike and how it's going to behave in a specific situation.

I'm not trying to self-promote but if you are wondering what that looks like - practicing on your own, here is a short video I made a few seasons ago talking about staying alive on a bike while endlessly turning slaloms on my old Tiger 1050.

https://youtu.be/fVf4I8oRZ-Y

And as usually I think every post should have a pic, me slowly narrowing the U-turn radius while breaking in a new set of tires (also on the Tiger)

'14 CB1100 STD 5 speed

I liked the video! Reminded me a lot of the MSF course material that I hadn't thought about for some time.