Up To Speed

By Bud Wilkinson of RIDE-CT.com A little more movement to report today in the bill moving through the General Assembly in Connecticut that would establish an all-terrain vehicle division within the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection to create and maintain ATV trails in the state. It has now been voted …

By Bud Wilkinson of RIDE-CT.com ATV owners in Connecticut can stop worrying about a bill that would have required the registration of all off-road vehicles, including quads, dirt bikes and snowmobiles. As originally introduced by state Rep. Debralee Hovey, a Republican whose district includes Newtown and Monroe, proposed H.B. 5183 …

By Bud Wilkinson of RIDE-CT.com Dr. Mike Maroon, a scooter-loving dentist who has worked at Advanced Dental in Berlin, CT for the past 25 years, is the new owner of Scooter Centrale/Vespa Hartford in Plainville. He bought the business from Doug and Sue Day. In a Facebook post yesterday, Maroon …

By Bud Wilkinson of RIDE-CT.com Which is quicker – a 162-horsepower Ducati Diavel or a 542-horsepower Audi R8 V10? Autocar in the U.K. recently put them in head to head test: zero to 150 miles per hour. Which do you think won? — It was Jay Leno to the rescue …

 It’s a bike brand that most riders probably don’t recognize – Brough Superior. Only 3,000 or so were ever built, fewer than 1,100 exist today worldwide and there may only be 175 in the entire United States.

As an avid reader, I sometimes wish that I kept a yellow felt-tipped pen on the nightstand beside my bed.  That way I could highlight catchy phrases and memorable passages in the books that I read. This would make it easy to locate them at a later time because you never …

By Bud Wilkinson of RIDE-CT.com The arrival of spring means the resumption of Connecticut Rider Education Program courses across the state. For example, Basic Rider Course classes offered at Naugatuck Valley Community College in Waterbury begin Friday, but are already filled through mid-May. BRC classes at the UConn campus in …

By Bud Wilkinson of RIDE-CT.com Suzuki Motor of America, Inc. is now the sole U.S. distributor of Suzuki motorcycles, ATVs, marine outboard engines and auto parts and service. The new company arrives following the restructuring of American Suzuki Motor Corp., which resulted in the discontinuance of Suzuki car sales in …

By Bud Wilkinson of RIDE-CT.com By a lopsided margin, RIDE-CT.com readers have said “no way” to a proposed law in Connecticut that would require the registration of all ATVs. That means quads, dirt bikes and snowmobiles – even if they’re used solely on your own property.  Results of the website’s …

By Bud Wilkinson of RIDE-CT.com Seeing a rare motorcycle is always a treat, and Easter unexpectedly brought such a treat in the form of a very uncommon BMW. Friend Gary Randall and I had taken an early afternoon ride to Toymaker’s Cafe in Falls Village on Sunday where we ran …

MotoFIT, the Aprilia-Ducati-KTM dealer in Danbury, finalized a deal today to become a dealer of Kawasaki motorcycles. Western Connecticut has been without a Kawi dealer since New Milford Cycles closed a year ago.

By Bud Wilkinson of RIDE-CT.com A subscriber squealed. “Consumer Reports” yesterday came out with its first-ever motorcycle reliability survey, with an online tease only saying that “Japanese bikes have fewer problems than BMW or Harley models.” Only subscribers were allowed to read the full story. Well, a subscriber sent it …

By Bud Wilkinson of RIDE-CT.com If the forecast is to be believed, the temperature is about to climb (at least modestly) to the point where more of us will be getting out bikes out of winter hibernation. Some riders never quit, though. Snow doesn’t deter them. A video posted on …

Safe Riding columnist Steve Smith’s contribution last week titled “Getting Ready for the Riding Season,” in which he suggested that it’s a wise idea to give your bike(s) and your gear a going over now that the weather’s changing and the riding season approaches, got me off my butt and moving. …

***CLASSIC RIDE-CT*** (Editor’s note: Because they’ve never appeared on online, RIDE-CT.com today begins reprinting in edited form some early RIDE-CT columns that appeared in “The Republican-American” newspaper.) By Bud Wilkinson of RIDE-CT.com The outlaw image of motorcyclists, personified by Marlon Brando in the 1953 biker movie “The Wild One,” got …