Registering the Ninja400R

So today is the day I decide to transfer the bike into my name.  I wake  up nice and early, about 8am, so that I can make it to the place by 9am, thinking it will all be over by 10am.

Since my brother, Sam, is visiting I decide to bring him along and take him on his first ride with me.  It starts off alright, a bit cold, but I soon got a feel for how the bike handles in city traffic.  The brakes feel a little weak, but that's partly due to the fact that my forearms still hurt from rock climbing on Sunday.

We make it there safe and it's time to go through the process of changing the Shaken 車検 and getting a new license plate.   I get to the first counter and pay my ￥20 for my documents, and I'm told to go to the next window.  When I get there the same guy runs over to the new counter (20 feet away) and is there to serve me.... weird.  So I hand him my license plate, he stamps something and tells me to go to the next building.

I line up and get called immediately, it's still early and not many people here today.  First thing she asks me is if I have my Jyuminhyou 住民票, which is basically an official document proving your residency in Japan.  With my luck I FORGOT IT.... but remember that I might have one extra copy at my house, a 25 minute ride one-way at best.

I head back home with Sam as fast as possible..... with no license plate on the bike, grab the last remaining document....phew... and head back to the office...still with no license plate.

I fill out all the forms and read a particular line where I have to fill my name into boxes, and my name is too long.  I'm sent an another round across the lot, to get a special form for extra boxes to fill out the remainder of my name, pay another ￥20, and trek back over to the second building again.

They make me wait a little and hand me my new Shaken 車検 and send me back to the first building where I get my new license place ￥520.

I'm done at around 11:30am and I'm able to make it into work at 12:30pm.

I'm so glad I didn't get caught by the cops with no license plate, because knowing Japanese police they would lecture me about how not having a license plate is somehow not safe or something (albeit riding a registered vehicle).... :-/

I really don't want to go to register any more vehicles ever again.....but at least it was cheap....

Third track day: Yamanashi Sportsland adventure

On Saturday morning (May 25th) went in to service my bike to get it ready for the track day.  Got my chain tightened a little bit and everything else looked okay.

As usual I got lost on the way back and made an illegal right turn when it was a forward+left arrow (oops).  Somehow my brain lapsed and I thought it was a green circle so I went to the middle of the intersection to get ready to turn right.  However there was a cop sitting directly in front of me just waiting.  He pulled me over and saw my international license and then quickly gave up on giving me a ticket, instead warning me that I should take care of my passenger, Mako.... true.

Then... I find out the track session is a morning 9am-12pm 3 hour "flex time" so I decided to start the 1.5-2.5hr drive to Yamanashi.

So we head to the inner tokyo highway（首都高速）and try to get on, but get stopped by the gate guys and told to pull over.  We completely forgot that riding with a passenger is forbidden on the inner city highway!

Sign we overlooked at the entrance

It's all because of some law from the 90's to prevent Bosozoku from causing mayhem, even though they could do it without a passenger.... but whatever, it's the law and we broke it.

It ended up turning into a big ordeal where we waited for 2 highway officials to show up and ask for my name, license, and plate number; only then to have 2 cops show up and do the same!  It was officially a big waste of time and it's a stupid law, but what are you going to do.  We got back on the road and headed to Yamanashi, now with an expected arrival quite a bit later into the night.

..........a couple hours later we arrive, it's dark, no streetlights and a very lonely city.  With a bit of luck we found the hotel （旅館）and the old man in charge helped us find a ramen place and kept the hotel bathhouse open late for us to use when we got back.   At the ramen place I think we got stared at pretty intensely, either do the the fact that I'm black or the fact that we are an interracial couple, but it was a little strange to say the least.  The room at the hotel was a traditional Japanese style, which might have been the first time I stayed at a hotel like this, and as excited as I was for the day ahead I tried to get a good night sleep.

Made it to the track nice and early, got my bike ready and met up with my new friend Pete, who I met at Gaijin Riders (handle AntKiller).

I'm still pretty slow, but I think I did alright for my first time on this track.

Sam giving me some tips

Pete, Sam, and Souchi gave me lots of tips on riding position, breaking, etc and helped me increase my time by a second each time I went out.  That's obviously because I'm slow to begin with, but I'll take progress in any shape it comes.












The track may be small but it was an amazing 3hr session, which I rode about 1.5hrs.  The smallness of the track actually helps you with quick transitions and dealing with bumps, cracks, etc.

I think Mako enjoyed seeing me out there, but it was probably a bit long for her, so we made sure to end the day with something interested for her.  We stopped at a local soba shop and had a late lunch.

Last turn before the straight

Taping up the bike

When you go for track days on a street bike you have to tape up all the things that would smash and explode over the ground in a crash, i.e. lights and mirrors.  This time around my friend advised I just remove my mirrors and zip-tie the holes to hold my fairing to the front stay the VFR has; smart idea.

The yellow device on the right side of the bike, attached to the passenger rear sets is a lap timer.  This course has lap timing with 4 sections laid out on the track, so here I can get nice accurate data on my improvement~ (Track sheet 1, Track sheet 2)



On the way home we stopped at a rest stop, the mecca of motorcycle rest stops, where at least 100 bikes were parked.

There were choppers, cruisers, sport bikes, touring, dual sport, you name it....wish I got a picture of it...

Resting up a bit and headed back to Tokyo.  At the beginning of the day I was a bit worried that the thread on my tires was getting low, but we made it home in one piece and my tires weren't slicks yet (phew).  Having that sort of worry on your mind, worrying that you might not be able to get back home because of tire thread or crashing, while at a track is not cool and that's why I need to get myself a track bike :-D