I’m a member of motorg ry and members have a chance to borrow a motorcycle for free!! It’s a Yamaha MT-07 and I took it for me yesterday. It felt very good to do some proper Street Riding after almost 2 years!!
#MotOrgBike
Then I attached my Insta360 camera to bikes handlebar and went to Hymyilevän Motoristin Kevätpäivä motorcycle meeting and parade. This was my fourth time in this meeting. The #HMKP places I’ve been were Lahti 2011, Jyväskylä 2013, Mäntsälä 2016 and now in Helsinki 2023. Here’s The video I made:
Finally got out with my bike and this interesting camera Insta360 was attached into it. First ride I made a week ago. The camera was in handle-bar and I wanted to check only how it will look? Editing a good video was quite easy (Ok, I dunno about good but it looks quite ok to me!)
Insta360 One X2 attached in handlebar
Second ride I made yesterday. Now I had 2 cameras and my microphone with the wire (I couldn’t find my Rode Wireless!!) My DJI Osmo Action was in the normal place (handlebar) and Insta360 was on the tip of the stick behind me. You can see it from this picture:
Editing with 2 different cameras is much more complicated than you first think! They have dirrent picture style and colors. And my microphone with the wire mostly doesn’t work! I need to find my wireless mic -it has much better sound quality. Here’s video from yesterday:
Riding with 2 different cameras!
3 times in this movie there’s a cut from Osmo Action to Insta 360 when you should “understand” that this is the same place, same time and same ride. But if you don’t get it… It doesn’t matter! You can still watch the video. Maybe I can adjust the cameras so that the picture will look more similar? And maybe I need to make more “sharp cut” to make it more obvious. And the battery of Insta360 lasts much longer than DJI Osmo Action!
I made myself an intro that I will start to use in all of my motorcycling videos! I’m not a graphic designer so I just put a search word to Google “Free animations” and downloaded the first one that looked good to me. Then I added music from my favorite band Tangerine Dream. It’s the first notes from the track called “Kiew Mission” from the album Exit. Here is my Intro that you will be seeing many times from now on:
I hope you like it!! Or at least don’t find it irritating!
Helsinki Motorcycle Exhibition first time in 3 years!!
There was 3 bikes that were extremely interesting for me: Aprilia Tuareg 660, Honda XL 750 TransAlp and Ducati Desert X But lots of other nice bikes too!
Aprilia Tuareg is lighter than Yamaha Tenere 700 (187kg dry weight) but the engine delivers about same power than Yamaha. It seems to have more offroad capabilities and surprisingly low seat (86cm).
To the same “middle weight adventure bikes” comes Honda XL750 Transalp. It’s about same weight than Yamaha Tenere 700 but the engine delivers more power (90hp!) Seat is also quite low in this (86cm).
Ducati Desert X is bigger than those “middle weight” bikes. It has 900 cubic engine with 110hp! And it weights only little bit more than 200kg’s. This would be very very interesting bike to ride TET Finland all around!
It’s not very difficult to guess that New Honda Transalp will be on top of the list about sold new bikes. Let’s hope it is trustworthy bike for the new owners!
Thew web page for this years MAD is now open. Only in few days more than half of the bookings is already made! Today 6th of January there is 90 free places -so I’m guessing it will be sold out very soon! Make you reservation here!
Check some pictures from last years event Here! and my story in this blog you check Here!
We’re actually going back in time to September 25th when I was riding with my friend Lauri from Karjalohja to Muurla direction. This was one of the best rides this year!
Here’s the video of that days ride!
But after about 150km’s My bike wasn’t running properly anymore! The idle running was ok but when I tried to twist the gas it started banging and didn’t take more rpm’s. My friend behind me said that there is gas smelling. We had some tools and we opened my airbox to check if the problem is there? It wasn’t… So I decided to give it a try and that was the correct decision because after few km’s I was able to ride normally…
Trying to give more GAS!
So we were able to ride the whole day but the problem didn’t disappear! One friend of mine took the bike and I asked the he would do “full service” in the same time as he was trying to find what was the problem. He had the the error reader so he just plugged the tablet that was connected to my bike and we got this:
The Speed sensor (RPM) is actually the same than so called crankshaft position sensor that gives the signal to the ignition. So it was no wonder that the engine didn’t run properly anymore. But was the sensor broken? Or was the problem somewhere else? After the engine cover was taken off from the right side it was easy to see what was the problem! The whole sensor was covered with some small parts of metal or metal dust. I had done the last oil-change already more than 2 years ago (and 8000 km’s) so it was a good warning about what happens if you don’t do service often enough! After new oil (Motul 5100 4T 15W-50), new oil-filter, new spark plugs, new air-filter and new coolant water my bike was running perfectly again! So no sensors were broken.
I’ve been the Linesman of Finland now little bit over a year. When I started I didn’t have anything else in my mind except to add more nice routes to TET Finland but during this summer 2022 I finally realized the “Goal” to reach: Finland can be or should be one of the main adventure countries in Europe! Until now we have only been the “ride-through” area on the way to Nordkapp. There’s been too much shortcuts and not riding the whole marked route because we are not interesting enough! This has to end… Finland definitely has more to offer to all adventure motorcycle riders in Europe (and the rest of the world!)
New Section 4
There will be new update coming soon: Section 4 will follow the Russian border very close and it goes all the way to the Raate road and connects with section 1 there. That most southern part between Helsinki – Vaalimaa we already have in TET. After this next update TET Finland will have 4 mainroutes from south to north:
Section 1 This is the main route that starts from Helsinki West Harbour. It goes west from Helsinki until it starts to go north from Siuntio. Like this:
Section 1
Section 2 Was released already before I came as a Linesman. And this is very nice addition to TET Finland because I think I wouldn’t have been thinking this kind of route through Finland myself! This section I will probably update so that it will start already from the south side of Hämeenlinna and the route would go from the west side of Tampere. But this is the section 2 now:
Section 2
Section 3 This was published few weeks ago. The section starts from the north side of Naantali and it pretty much follows the west coast of Finland. At the moment this section ends in Tornio but in the future it will go all the way up to Muonio and connect with Section 1 there. This is section 3 now:
Section 3
The main goal is to make Finland Great again… I mean it could be the main area to reach for the adventure riders to make THE adventure. We have so much to offer! So I really hope more and more adventure riders will find our beautiful country!
Early this year I paid my deposit to join this big adventure motorcycle event. But soon I got a phone call from the person who is one of the organizers… And I was asked to join as one of the “group leaders” to make this event possible to happen. And of course I said “Yes!” Moto Adventure Days is pretty much similar than any other adventure motorcycle event all around the world. This year it was the second time they arranged it and it was already many times bigger than last year, There was more than 180 participants and the event was sold out quite early in the spring.
About 9.30 PM tuesday evening
I started my ride on tuesday evening to Jämsä. It would be about 240 kilometers and I was choosing many times smaller roads. So I was in Himos only after it became dark. After Kuhmoinen I was already riding only the main paved road because it was dark. This was my route:
Route to Himos on tuesday evening
On wednesday all the teamleaders had some practise at Haaralankangas motocross track. We were testing quite many different things about riding enduro but it was too hot! After 2 hours I was loosing my concentration and after 3 hours I simply had to stop riding!
Uphill startSteep Uphill start
We had routes in 5 different categories: Black, Red-Black, Red Technical, Red Tempo and Blue. Balck route was mainly offroad even with swamp and other wet parts and then the categories after were easier and easier. Blue being mainly simple wide gravel road. I was one team leader for Red Technical routes and my team number was 16!
The event itself started on thursday when all the riders started to arrive to Himos. And on thursday afternoon about 15.30 we started the first group ride!
First ride in MAD 2022
I had one 1250GS Adventure that was stuck in the loose sand part in the beginning. But after that we didn’t have any problems. Route was the best of all three different routes I was riding. It had so many different kind of surface to ride! Second time riding was on friday morning 8.30 AM.
Second ride in MAD 2022
On this ride there was pretty much no problems at all! Third ride was on friday afternoon after 3PM
Third ride in MAD 2022
From this afternoon ride I remember that it was very hot! And that in the end of the route I made the water crossing… which was very nice experience! I have low adventure boots so I got a little bit of water inside but much. It looked deeper when I was watching the others riding there… Saturday morning was the next ride. 8.30AM!
Fourth ride in MAD 2022
On this ride there was mainly quite big bikes. All of them were much bigger than mine! The last ride of the event was on saturday afternoon. I was changing the route quite a lot… Mainly because I wanted to make it shorter.
Last ride in MAD 2022
The routemasters had been doing excellent work! These routes were super nice and fun to ride. Thank you again from me as a team leader and I think all of the riders are happy and grateful too! I can only hope I will be a team leader again next year. This was so perfect experience! I was riding back home (or to Espoo) on sunday with 2 friends. Route was pretty much the same that I was riding few days earlier. Only in EVO area we made a little bit exploring… Like this:
Exploring in EVO
In EVO
This was Great and Amazing event. I hope to see you all again in 2023!
Surprisingly june and july were moths (in the middle of the summer) and there was almost no riding at all. But when august came… It was on again! August started with “Tour de Karis” -kind of ride around this village where I live.
28 minutes video of riding in Karjaa – Snappertuna area
And quite soon again I was riding. This time to the north side of Raseborg city. I was especially interested about this road: Malmitie – Malmvägen. It looked interesting on the map and it turned out to be even better!! (in the video it’s from 4:45 to 09:15)
Malmvägen and some offroad
Then on 7th of august I did a ride with friend. That turned out to be excellent tour from Veikkola all the way to Kisko. Best parts were in Fiskars forest and then on the north side of Kärkelä Ironworks area. First Järventaustantie then Ruonankorventie and then Ahvenlammintie. Great Roads! And I made my longest riding video so far (38 minutes!).
Long ridingvideo!
Next week we’ll have MAD (Moto Adventure Days). It’s now second time this event is happening in Finland and I’m one of the guys riding in front of some group, doing so called “punainen tekninen” routes. These are mainly big and small gravel roads added with some challenging tracks and trails. Here is the description in Finnish: Harvaan liikennöityjä metsäautoteitä, polkuja ja kapeita yksityisteitä, joille ei välttämättä kannattaisi lähteä henkilöautolla yrittämään. Vastaan voi tulla pehmeetä hiekkaa, sepeliä, helppoja vesistöylityksiä ja muuta hauskaa. Toki välillä ajetaan nopeampia sorateitä. Sopii jo kokemusta omaaville kuskeille. Kuivalla kelillä pärjää hienosti karkeakuvioisilla kumeilla, mutta kostealla suosituksena nappulat. See you there!
Finally after a winter with HUGE amount of snow it was possible to start riding! And I did it with 4 times riding in one week. The weather was already quite warm -not like I needed to put all possible clothes on me. First day ride was less than 100km like this:
First ride of the season
Second day I was checking one place where was flooding.
Ride to Kärkelä Ironworks area
Here is the short video of the place where the river was flooding! I made a riding video of this next days ride.
3rd day short ride
Riding to the border of Varsinais-SuomiSnow was mostly gone but lakes had still ice!The temperature was something like 10-13 degrees -so not too cold anymore!
And then on saturday I got three friends with me and we did already almost 200km!
Go - Za 