Personally, I think its a recipe for disaster to put young "kids" (at least from the perspective of 50+ year old like me) on motorcycles with 100+ horsepower and expect them not to give into the temptation fueled by that amount of power under the control of a testosterone drenched mind. One thing that also strikes me when I wander through the m/c shops is just how few options there are for less powerful "starter" bikes to learn on. Unless you are buying a kiddie sized trail bike, almost every street bike on the floor has a 600 cc or larger engine with very few exceptions. I recall when I started riding in the "good old days" here in Alberta you could get a license to ride a m/c of no more than 100 cc displacement at age 14 to 15, but you had to be 16+ to ride anything bigger. A lot of us got our first bikes in the 90 to 100 cc range and spent a couple of years learning how to ride and getting some control skills down before graduating to a "big" bike (you know, like my Honda CB175 or my friend's Yami RD250 or 350). It also goes without excessive comment that even the really big bikes of that age (circa 1970 to 1980) pushing 750 cc's didn't produce anywhere near the horsepower and acceleration that we take for granted from a sport bike of today. While no legal regulations such as graduated licenses will prevent someone bent on ignoring every imaginable law (including the basic laws of common sense) from killing himself while riding without a license, insurance or registration as it appears was the case in this story, having a graduated license system that restricts a newbie rider from jumping on a high powered sport bike for a couple of years would certainly get my vote! It might even prompt a demand for some improved selection of smaller bikes in the 250 to 350 size range that are not race engines dropped into a massed produced frame. Frankly, from my experience with restoring and "tweeking" a vintage 1970's Yamaha RD350 I have created a little beast with more than sufficient acceleration and alround screaming power to tempt me to push the limits of reason on the streets and it is fast enough to scare me if I'm not careful. Except for the constant materialistic drive to have the "biggest and fastest" bike around (hmmm, one wonders about some Freudian interpretation regarding penis envy) the level of raw horsepower being bolted to most civial street bikes seems insane to this writer. As the old adage goes: "There are old motorcyclists and bold motorcyclists, but not many old and bold motorcyclists!"
It just always brings me back to reality that we take our life in our hands everytime we ride.
