EXAM: Jul 2 (wed) 3.00pm

After all that month of flooding and exam date postponing, I am again up for the exam.

It was really frustrating last month not able to sit for the exam when I was so trained up for it. This week I had to spend 3 bloody extra hours to warm myself up again.

The day is super bright to begin with, and it turns cloudy in the afternoon (I thought its going to shower a good load again), which is PERFECT for riding without the meters glaring.

I did my final hour of training from 1.30pm, checking the routes and practising more figure 8s. It's getting BORING stopping at the lights and waiting for other L-platers, who gets air conditioning from their comfortable 4-wheels. I get some breeze by starting quicker than everyone at every set of lights. Nice.

My right foot landed ONCE in the last three practice - in fact, the final one on today which made me extra nervous. I just lost it when the car queue was snailing its way to the lights. I was so disappointed I bang my helmet on the meters as I made the fatal mistake.

It wasnt too satisfactory on figure-8 either. My upward turn is not as smooth as I could do last month. Then I had a couple of occations sliding back down when I start on the slope.

After my final practice hour, I went for 30min break and return to test the bike I went on the exam. All good. It surprises me that this bike, probably reserved for exams, had a shallow foot break (so I don't have to push too deep for breaking) and closer friction point on the clutch (better for my smaller hands). Now I know what crappy bike they gave us for practice. *grin*

Exam time.

Figure 8. Going up alright, but slight delay re-starting on the slope. Then a few not-so-smooth uphill loops, kinda a bit late to throttle more going up and so the bike jerks a little. Get me such sweating, but at the 3rd loop the examiner waved me down, and so we are off the road.

He chooses the shorter route with more lights. (I really thought) The ride is so smooth without much hiccups - probably until half way on return that I get my gear stuck at gear N for split of a second. Then we get to this "important" giveaway with all these buses coming out of the depot that I spent AGES waiting for my turn to go. "Oh sh!t he's getting mad for me being such a cautious retard!" was what I keep in mind for the next few sets of lights.

Next mistake is caused by not remembering which lane to take - I turn after the lights and switched lanes THEN realize I can only turn again on my original lane. So I kinda do the overtaking action without overtaking any vehicles... In the mirrors the examiner doesn't look that amused...

On the final turn back to school I make another gear N switching again. Oops. But at school we get back safe. I shake more as soon as I get both feet on the ground again. 2 hours of serious riding can be so tiring.

The sheet of result I get afterwards has a lot of ticks on the minor mistakes brackets (13!). I thought it says "If you made 3 minor mistakes or more in one category, it'll be considered as one major mistake..." Most importantly, on the RESULT area, there's the tick at the PASS bracket!

PASS! First try! Truly amazing. Especially I thought I'm going to do something stupid and fail.

One of the instructors catches up with me afterwards and do their usual selling of "Advance course". You know, lessons going to motorways and through tunnels with more powerful bikes... Look that's a Harley! No, wait... I am not really sure if I am actually buying any. Considering the unstable career recently and all these associated expenditures, I probably should wait. But I signed up for it with a bit of the extra cash reserved for failing the exam. So there should be a few rides in the next couple of months.

I need to celebrate more now!