Well it turned out that passing my Mod 1 test involved some very early starts, two 150 mile round trips to Swansea, and some good luck with the weather.
If you haven’t been following the ‘Learner’s Journey’ blog, the fantastic team at Michelin UK very kindly agreed to sponsor me to get my bike licence, and after a bit of a layoff over winter I’ve finally found some time to complete the next piece of the puzzle.
But first up, if you’re local to Aberystwyth then unfortunately I have some bad news for you – your nearest Mod 1 test centre is at least 70 miles away…
The good news is that Jeff at JK’s Motorcycle Training in Swansea is brilliant at getting you up to speed for Mod 1, and I’d highly recommend contacting him once you’ve done your CBT locally. His Kawasaki bikes are also currently fitted with Michelin’s Pilot Road 2 tyres, which have proved to be a great all-weather option for his training school in terms of both price and performance over the last few years.
Following last week’s snowfall my Saturday lesson with Gerry’s of Lampeter was cancelled, and I was a little concerned that I wouldn’t be going anywhere with many of the main roads out of town still blocked.
Come Sunday morning however, the route down to South Wales was clear and at 8:30am a trio of twin-cylinder ER6-N bikes were being wheeled out of the JK’s container and the rain was falling.
Unfortunately within two minutes I’d stalled the twin, which I soon found out needs more revs to get it moving that the 4-pot Yamaha I’d been learning on.
We spent the morning getting rather damp and recapping the slow-speed maneuvers – manual handling, slalom, figure of eight and U-turn, before heading down to the official DVSA Test Centre down towards Swansea Marina.
Thankfully the sun came out soon after we arrived at the centre, and our gear finally started to dry out as we ran through the avoidance exercise and emergency braking. Avoidance seemed to be my Achilles heel once we hit the required 50kph, as I kept clipping the cone, which would most likely be an immediate fail on test.
With that in mind, I’ll be honest by saying that I finished the day on something of a downer because my final few attempts just weren’t good enough, and it would be a long trip home in the car if I failed the test the following day.
An even earlier start on the Monday meant jumping in the car at 5:45am to get down to Swansea in plenty of time, and although the last of the snow had melted away, it had been replaced by very heavy rain.
Arriving at the test centre feeling cold, damp and rather nervous isn’t the ideal way to kick things off, but on the plus side the portable radiator at least warmed my gloves up before the examiner called me out to the bike.
All I can say is that a pre-test trip to the DVSA centre is well worth the investment if you can get down to Swansea for two days, and with Sunday’s run-through with Jeff fresh in my mind I felt more and more confident as the examiner worked through the various parts of the test.
One minor hiccup was a stall at the end of the slow-ride as I brought the bike to a stop, but the controlled braking and emergency stop both went to plan with just the avoidance test to come.
If you don’t do the avoidance test at the required minimum 48kph speed on the first attempt, you do get one more shot at it. On my way around the course I was more focused on not hitting the cone than judging the speed and as a result I shut the throttle off too soon. As I pulled up next to the examiner he confirmed I was too slow so I’d have one last attempt, or a long drive home feeling sorry for myself.
The Kawasaki’s vibey twin engine gives you a lot of feedback, so it quickly becomes easy to judge the speed you’re doing without looking down at the clocks, so all that was required of me was to focus. On the second attempt the speed-trap recorded 48kph, enough to pass with a minor fault, although I had no idea as the examiner didn’t say a thing until the bike was parked up and we were back inside the adjacent building.
The wait felt like forever, but once he said “you’ve passed” I realised that I’m almost there – just Mod 2 to complete, and that full licence is mine!
With that in mind, hopefully there’s a slot with my name on it in early April in Aberystwyth.
A huge thanks to Jeff at JK’s for the great instruction, and also to the team at Michelin for their support this over the past 8 months – it’s taken longer than anticipated, but it’s just how things have worked out.
And sorry about the fleece, my Michelin one is in the wash….
You can find out more about Michelin’s motorcycle and scooter tyre range here.
