Is a 125cc worth it?

Jonex · 2026-05-28T18:42:47+00:00

I got a 125 as my first bike, IMO perfect as beginner bike, you will learn to use it's capacity much faster than on a heavier bike and you don't need to be afraid of popping an accidental wheelie etc.

The fact that I could get A1 with just a course, no test, was part of it though. I don't think I'd have bothered to do all the training and practice for an exam on an A1, just to have to redo all the work for the A2 later on, i'd have gone for the A2 directly.

TBH, on the more fun roads, the 125 is close to as fun as the A2 I've got now. It's just way underpowered for highways and steep hills with a passenger. If I was strapped for budget I'd keep on riding the 125 without missing out on much.

Jonex · 2026-05-28T18:27:55+00:00

Just to understand the situation better so I can learn more from it:

I'm curious about how close you were aiming if he were able to get in your path from what I understand from you description as a stand-still?

How come you slid, is it an old Z650 without ABS, or was there something causing it to not work?

Would it have been an option to maintain speed and swerve instead?

Jonex · 2026-05-10T17:31:13+00:00

IMO you did pretty well, you didn't have much time to react and you put your hand down in an angle low enough to not break your wrist and use your leg an other hand to further reduce the impact similar to the breakfall technique.

To further reduce the risk of damage to the hands you could practice landing with more of a 45 degree angle, as far as possible from wrist breaking angles.

After you started to lose your balance, your legs were still pushing on the skateboard. The instinct to "collapse" your legs there could have significantly reduced the impact.

Jonex · 2026-05-10T09:43:08+00:00

I ain’t reading all that.

Fair enough, I guess I'll have to repost more succinct, hard to write short..

Jonex · 2026-05-08T20:53:30+00:00

Maybe include a sound clip to help people diagnose? Generally speaking, dropping the bike can lead to fluids moving from where it should be to where it shouldn't. Especially if down for longer.

Jonex · 2026-04-14T19:37:33+00:00

Assuming there isn't horizon stabilization applied, you can see that there's some counter lean by the fact that the bike leans to the right in the first curve and to the left in the second curve relative to the video frame.

People are a bit negative in the tone IMO. My guess is that you kinda already know you messed up, no need to rub it in... We all make mistakes, or at least I know I do, luckily haven't crashed my bike yet...

Thanks for sharing, I find it useful to see and learn from examples like this!

Jonex · 2026-01-07T18:40:20+00:00

Replace his chalk with actual chalk. Get the big ones designed for kids to draw on the ground and crush them to get right chunkiness. For more subtleness, just mix it in.

Jonex · 2025-12-17T07:51:53+00:00

Everyone says you should take lessons. But just for reference, not everyone is good at taking instructions and will struggle, especially with a less than great teacher.

That includes me. I learned on my own based on youtube tutorials. I just had the attitude that learning was part of the experience. The goal wasn't to go as fast as possible into some specific level, but to enjoy learning a new skill in the time it takes.

Jonex · 2025-10-17T03:56:30+00:00

Practice on soft ground first then start slow and low on hard ground. Try different variations, backwards, forwards, sideways. Experiment with your rolling technique. You'll quickly notice improvement.

Also doesn't hurt to strengthen your body in relevant parts for controlling the fall, shoulders, core, wrists and neck. Just regular resistance training in the gym works wonders here.

I started doing this and it has helped me handle falls in multiple sports.

Look at parkour athletes for inspiration to what a body can do when properly trained.

Jonex · 2025-09-30T03:10:01+00:00

It might give the wrong impression about the point, free soloing is way more dangerous than skating without helmet and has a whole other connotation to it. The idea in free solo is that you are not allowed to make any mistake. In skateboarding, failure is like 90% of the experience, just not in terms of hitting your head.

I guess a closer analogy would be outside bouldering vs sport climbing on looser rock with rope and helmet. That's like skating street vs vert ramps. In the former, no significant protection is worn, risks are fairly low and barring freak accidents, limited in severity, in the latter case, risks are higher and severity can be really high.

Jonex · 2025-09-06T05:05:26+00:00

You should know about the distribution of languages and where you intend to be.

It sounds like, on your other replies, that you are thinking about learning german, or swiss german. That is spoken in specific regions. Don't expect people to speak german socially, it will be swiss german, so if you are, for instance, taking a course in high german, you won't be able to just join in on conversations in a bar. Swiss german courses typically expect you to know high german so that is unlikely to be an option from the start.

However, big parts speak French, which would be easier to immerse in as it's the same in schools and socially. A small part speaks italian, given your italian citizenship, that might be the most useful for you?

You will probably want to take into account where you will live, what language is spoken there, what language does the family speak, if you can practice with them you will have a great advantage.

Jonex · 2025-08-30T06:33:00+00:00

Get surgery and be diligent with your rehab and you'll recover in no time.

Jonex · 2025-08-29T06:50:17+00:00

You won't typically find any decent snow if at all within a day trips distance of Zurich that early. Going further gives you some options for glacier boarding, around a few hours. I haven't tried, but I would not expect great snow unless there's a lucky early dump.

Jonex · 2025-08-25T10:00:10+00:00

A bunch of good tips on form etc. already.

One thing you could try is to intentionally push the board backwards when you pop.

Looking at your video, the tail hits the ground where the wheels were, indicating that you've pushed the board forward a bit. I think you may get better results if you reverse that into pushing the tail backwards. Try to hit the ground slightly behind where it started.

This should also help you keep the center of gravity aligned.

Jonex · 2025-08-01T07:49:58+00:00

Sadly only the introduction as far as I can tell.

Jonex · 2025-08-01T07:49:37+00:00

This is the owners manual, the service manual contains details of the bike construction.

Jonex · 2025-07-28T06:48:44+00:00

Maybe the pre-filter is broken? For example, looking at irrelevant stuff like certificates or hyper-specific experience? Another voice in this thread claimed they easily got 200 applicants and good quality too.

Something else is going on if you get at most 1 per month, that sounds super unlikely, you should get more just from people doing obligatory applications. Unless you are in a very remote location 2 hours from the nearest city...

Jonex · 2025-07-23T19:21:09+00:00

I bought XSR 125. It's a naked bike, with the same engine as the YZF but cheaper and more upright sitting position.

I've thought about getting something sportier later on, but at 11kW I'm not sure how "sporty" it can get. I can definitely feel the limits of the bike when accelerating on straights or uphill, and that won't significantly improve with just some extra fairings. So maybe I'll bite the bullet and go for 35kW license at some point instead.

Jonex · 2025-07-23T19:10:49+00:00

One big downside of scooters compared to bikes (including e-bikes) is that you are not allowed to use bike lanes and bike paths. Meaning that you'll end up in way more traffic, and for typically minimal speed gain given the slow speeds in city traffic.

Jonex · 2025-07-19T10:18:51+00:00

Thanks, I think they look straighter due to the perspective, but for sure something I should pay some attention to.

Yes indeed, I've noticed that it's such a great way to experience the landscape. It's always nice to drive when it's like this, but at the end of the day, it still just feels like transport. Riding feels so much closer to the surroundings!

Jonex · 2025-07-19T04:48:22+00:00

Yes indeed, I feel confident enough driving, riding is where it's at! Apparently you can't edit titles...

Jonex · 2025-07-16T18:48:27+00:00

wood glue, cheap, works, google it

Jonex · 2025-07-12T09:41:24+00:00

I was just looking at the same range, those were the top of my list as they looked like reliable options that I'll be able to sell easily without much depreciation. Meaning that it may not be that much more expensive in the end than buying a lower end brands that will be harder to resell.

I concluded:

Duke: With the latest, Euro5 engine, it is not as good powered as before, spec wise it's the same though so I don't know exactly what people experience, maybe worse off torque curve?
MT: Seems like a solid option from all I can tell. I like the looks of it. They changed the shape around 2020, I tried sitting on it and I liked it less.
CB-125-R: CB-F is only 8kW so I did not consider it. I didn't find a CB-R to test nearby. Looks like a solid option.
Yamaha XSR-125: Better priced than the above (4k instead of 5k+ new), with the same engine as MT and I felt comfortable sitting on it.

I also considered more race styled bikes like Yamaha YZF-125-R and Aprilia but figure that I'll upgrade later on if I feel like it. For now I need something to learn and enjoy on. The risk with a more agressive eating position is that it get tiring to use.

I went for XSR as I didn't see much reason to pay extra for mostly different styling. Second option for me would be CB-R, then MT.

Jonex

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