Major Road and another Night Ride

Went out on my first ride on a Major Road on Friday. It was fun. Being around traffic is definitely a new experience. Also, having cars merging into your lane was also a new experience.

Here is a rundown of the things I've learned:

What I've gotten better at/learned:

• Shifting: I've gotten quite a bit better at downshifting. One of the things that I truly had to learn on the bike that I never had to worry about in the car was downshifting when slowing down. I guess if you've driven a manual car, then this would come more natural to you, but I've driven an automatic my entire life. It finally "clicked" and I figured out that I should stay in gear, with the throttle on most of the time, even while slowing down. Let the engine braking slow me down, and if I ever need to speed up, I just need to open up the throttle a bit. Before this I would simply clutch in, and use the brakes. Then when I stopped, I'd downshift all the way to first, and get ready to launch. This never felt natural, so I'm glad I know what to do now.

• Launching: Speaking of launches, I took my friend's advice and have been giving the bike more, smoother throttle. Its helped quite a bit with my launches. I'm more prone to dumping the clutch with a bit more throttle than I should, but its cut down on stalls quite a bit. I think the next phase will be for me to find the right amount of throttle, but not stalling is having a good impact on my confidence level.  
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Things to improve on:

• Distractions: I noticed I get just as distracted riding as I do driving. My amount of distractions when driving is pretty low, but I think its still too high for if I'm riding. Riding requires 2x more concentration than driving does. I need to be a bit more focused when riding. But not soo focused that I'm over analyzing and actually working against myself.  
• Speed/Follow distance: Follow distance is something I haven't had to worry about before. Usually I'm going pretty slow in the residential areas, so any cars in front of me will leave me in the distance quickly. In traffic, I'm keeping up and trying to maintain speed. I had to remind myself a few times to keep more distance between me and the next car. But not so much distance that its an opening for another car to fill the space. 

So things are improving I think. I want to ride to work within a month or so. A few more runs through some major roads and I think I'll be ready to try the apt->work route on a weekend. After that I'll try riding to work.