This week, my family and I went to Southern California for Christmas and one of my gifts was a day of riding a rented Triumph Daytona 675 motorcycle.

We rented the 2009 Triumph Daytona 675 (Red) from Racy Rentals and after a brief signing of documents and go over of the bike we were off. With my step-dad on his BMW F800GS and I on the Triumph Daytona 675 we headed east from Melrose Ave to Highway 2.

I took it easy on the first third of the Angeles Crest Highway (ACH) to get used to the bike and make sure the tires were warm. After that I started pushing (while staying within my and the bike’s limits). It was a lot of fun and man can that bike handle a corner. It has enough power high up in the rev range that caused me to really hold on because it slid me back in the seat.

I found these roads and this bike allowed me to focus on my weak points because the bike does what you expect it to 99% of the time. I discovered that I was much more comfortable turning right than left. Since I had just watched Twist of the Wrist II, I was armed with enough knowledge to make me dangerous. After paying attention to this I realized two things: I wasn’t locking in my lower body on left turns, like I do on right turns, and I was pulling with my right hand instead of pushing with my left to turn left.

Locking in my lower body made the greatest difference but focusing on both really improved my comfort and consistency on both left and right hand turns.

The ACH is a great mix of technical and fast paced turns. We went all the way to the closure of the road at the Highway 39 junction after 4 miles of snow and ice on the road. On the way down we took the Upper Big Tujunga Canyon Road which was a very fast newly paved road which would be perfect for a liter bike.

We crossed over on the Angeles Forest Highway back to the ACH. We then made our way to Highway 39 which was the most technical of them all, especially at the top. An unfortunate miscommunication between me and my riding buddy caused us to miss out on some more roads but that would have sent me over the 200 mile limit anyway.

So back down the 39 we went and back to Racy Rentals with only 3 miles to spare on the 200 mile limit.

If any thing outside of my family makes me want to move back to California its California’s awesome motorcycle roads that are the best in the country.

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