# Four days from no gear to lane splitting By Warren Pridgeon | Published 2026-08-03 | Category: Life Canonical: https://warrenpridgeon.co.za/blog/four-days-from-no-gear-to-lane-splitting --- Strap in, gear up and hold on. This one starts when I was a wee lad and ends with me doing things no sane person should do in their first week on a motorcycle. Welcome to the asylum, I'll be your guide. ## The RM80 my dad had to hold up From a very young age I can remember watching motocross on TV with my dad. I was glued to the screen, guys jumping bikes, racing around the dirt track, narrowly passing each other. I still remember picking my bicycle up onto the back of my dad's bakkie and declaring at the top of my lungs "Here comes Wayne Smith" (a motocross star of the time) as I attempted to ride off of the back. Let's just say I got a lesson in gravity that day as I used my face to break my fall. I got a bloody nose and a new respect for the madmen on bikes! For my 8th birthday my parents got me a Suzuki RM80 that my dad had rebuilt in his workshop (he was a mechanic and taught me a lot of valuable skills). It was far too tall for me so my dad would hold the bike and I'd monkey up it like it was a jungle gym. I'd ride off and go toddle around the field, when I was done I'd ride back and he'd catch me so I could climb off again. I had an epic time on that bike. I learned clutch control, and eventually how to change gears. But as it does, life happened and the bike got parked. I eventually sold it to buy my first computer. That purchase changed the entire trajectory of my life, but that's a story for another time. ## The SV650 and the four-day plan Fast forward to around 2009. I bought an SV650s up in JHB, 60 to 70km away from home. One problem, I had ZERO gear... not even a helmet, so a buddy rode it home for me. ![A silver Suzuki SV650S parked on the grass beside a river in late afternoon light, with a helmet resting on the seat](https://warrenpridgeon.co.za/uploads/8c28e9d039d94299b02f62a1fddd058a.jpg) That's the silver steed (after a random let me jump on and see where the road takes me trip ended up in Parys next to the river). The helmet on the seat arrived later that week. The bike arrived on the Monday evening after work and every morning before work I'd go and sit on it. Sometimes I'd start it and give it a little rev (braap braap). On Thursday I finally got a chance to hit Full Throttle (the store) and got geared up during my lunch break. ![Four photos of brand new motorcycle gear laid out on an office desk with the tags and boxes still on: a blue and black full-face helmet, a blue, black and white leather jacket, armoured blue and black gloves still in their case, and a pair of black leather boots in an open box](https://warrenpridgeon.co.za/uploads/e8dc17ee369149b1a18a2ed4a291e471.jpg) I couldn't wait to get home and get going! That evening I got home, put on the kit and headed out... Into the night. I had joined Think Bike before I even owned a bike. I'd read all the posts about gear, accidents and the significant chance of more damage to your person should you be "ungeared". There were also a bunch of posts about "starting slow, in your neighbourhood or complex and build up to riding out further"... But... this is the asylum and when I do something I go ALL in (this is why I don't gamble on anything other than myself). I told my parents I was heading to a buddy who lived under 10km away. I got there fine, well I stalled the bike at LEAST 64 times. We had coffee and chatted, but I'd promised another buddy I would bring the bike around for him to see as soon as I was able to. So I jumped back on the steel horse and headed to his place, in the neighbouring town, 25km away. I rode through the town itself, slowly, carefully. When I got there I phoned my mom **Warren:** "Righto, I was at the first friend, now I'm at the second one in the next town. Heading home now." On the way back there's a split in the road. Straight, and you go through town, the slow route I'd just ridden. Left, and you're on the highway. Just like a shallow movie plot, you SHOULD be able to spot which fork I took. If you picked the highway, you're on the money. I took the left split and accelerated straight up to 120km/h (legal highway cruising speed). First night out on my first big bike, cruising at highway speeds, in the dark. Risky? Yes. But I later spent many years commuting home from work at all hours of the day and night. ## Friday: why not add traffic? The next morning was Friday, and Think Bike does Friday coffee stops. I'd been attending them for a while... in my car. Was I going to take the CAGE now that I had a bike?! NO. The coffee stop was under 1km from my office, which was 50km from home, 95% of it highway. So ride number two was a 50km highway commute in Friday morning traffic. Things were going well, right up until the traffic backed up and everything slowed from 120 down to 40. Then another biker came past, lane splitting (it's legal in South Africa). Surely by NOW you can see the next scene unfolding. I hopped into the biker lane and proceeded to split lanes for a solid 10 to 20km. By the end of it I had an actual pain in my lower back, purely from the adrenalin. ## About that gear Here's the part that's funny not funny... About a year after that first adventure out on the bike, riding home from work I departed from the vehicle before it had come to a complete stop. Sky, ground, sky, ground was what I saw as I went rolling down the road... I stuck my arms out to try slow my roll, but after two rotations I figured my limbs slapping the road was a bad idea so I tucked them in. It sounds more dramatic than it was. It happened at 60km/h. I walked away with a broken thumb and some soft tissue bruising. This is the helmet. ![A motorcycle helmet with deep abrasion scarring ground across the chin bar and down one side, right through the paint](https://warrenpridgeon.co.za/uploads/6a09facf787c431c95827c2fd1246e88.jpg) Look at em scratches boyo! Right across the chin and face area. And without it I would have been in some serious (well more serious) pain! The reason I'm typing this with ten fingers and a working leg (the bike slammed down onto my right leg as it went down) is that I'd waited until I had gear before I took it out the first time. So if you take nothing else from a blog post about a bro who went straight onto the highway on night one: **ATGATT. All The Gear, All The Time.** Not most of the gear. Not the gear when it's a long ride. Not the gear when it's cold. All of it, every time, including the ten-minute ride home you've done four hundred times. Have fun, be a little bit wild, but do what you can to protect yourself.
This was the first video I ever uploaded to YouTube, sixteen years ago. 487 views. The algorithm was not ready. Neither was I. (That is our cul-de-sac, by the way. Exactly one house on it. Ours. The tyre also had a hole that was too big to patch.)
The gear is boring, expensive and hot, and it is the cheapest insurance you will ever buy. Skin grafts are also hella expensive! ## The lesson (such as it is) I never do things the easy, safe or conventional way. Never have. Everyone else spends two months circling their complex in second gear. I was on the highway on night one and splitting traffic by morning two. In my defence, I did at least wait for the gear before I did anything stupid. Priorities. And I'm not saying people who take it slower are inferior riders or whatever. Each person's journey in life is unique, know YOUR limits and limitations and work with them. In over a hundred thousand kilometres I've had exactly one proper accident - plus dropping the bike at a standstill in week one, which we don't count. And this includes pushing my limits at the race track... I ran off into the dirt a number of times but didn't crash. My wiring with biking is the same wiring that made me teach myself Turbo Pascal out of a textbook and quit a salary to start my own shop. Throw yourself in the deep end, respect the thing enough to gear up first, and then figure it out on the way through. It can be tougher at times as you end up learning some lessons the hard way. And that was just my first week on the bike. The rest of it, the track days, the pocket bike I flipped at Phakisa, the eight years I spent wanting a blue Triumph Daytona before I finally bought one, and the R350 rattle can paint job I gave it afterwards, those are stories for another post.