The 390 Adventure Project – Day One in the Dirt

Throwing the 390 Adventure into some dirt at the bottom of a hill wasn’t ideal, but as I was nearly at a complete stop, it wasn’t the dramatic dismount I had pictured when worrying about the training I was in the midst of. My friend Hailey was cruising down the trail after me and coasted to a stop as I hit the kill switch and turned to look at the bike, splayed across the silty clay colored dirt like a bright orange toy. Another rider stopped just ahead of us, throwing his kickstand down and yelling ‘I’ll get it” over the sound of other passing bikes. “Don’t help me!” I yelled back. This was the first time the bike had been on its side and I was eager to see how it felt to pick up 387 pounds of small adventure bike. Grasping the handlebar closest to the ground and the grab bar at the back of the seat, I was surprised when the bike lifted clear of the dirt on the first try, and with a pause and some extra effort, it was vertical again a few seconds later. Maybe she’s born with it... maybe it was the adrenaline. I didn’t get a chance to test the theory again during the full day ADV Class I was participating in, though if that was due to skill or caution, we’ll never know.

Small Adventure Bike, Big Adventure Dreams

I had clocked about 500 street miles on the KTM 390 ADV before turning up at the Sedlak ADV training set in Campo, California, so while I felt relatively comfortable with the bike on pavement, the combination of dirt and dirt gear had me a little nervous for how the day was going to go. I had taken Sedlak’s class once before at Over and Out Moto in Tamaqua, Pennsylvania, so while I had an idea of what basics the class may cover, I had no idea if any of my previous dirt experience would translate into usable skill on a proper adventure bike. This bike was almost a full 100 pounds heavier than my previous dirt-scoot: a 2021 Yamaha TW200. And while I’ve had a turn or two on some bigger off-road motorcycles, I hadn’t really been able to put in consistent time and effort to see progression in my riding skills on those bikes.

Hopefully this was all going to change. As I donned my layers of riding gear in the chilly SoCal morning, a few dozen other riders had assembled in the staging area, all with a decent assortment of Ducati, Yamaha, and even Honda adventure bikes lined up in the dirt. My 390 Adventure was definitely one of the smaller bikes present, though not the only KTM.

I had already discovered a bit of a shortcoming in the combination of seat height, leg length and a just-out-of-reach kickstand, so the addition of mostly rigid Alpinestars Tech 7’s moved that target a bit further out of range. Thankfully, I had turned up to the class with a host of friends, all vastly more experienced than myself, and with some creative thinking and zip ties, we fashioned a bit of an extension that allowed me to tip the kickstand up a little easier. I can’t guarantee that this is a KTM-approved mod, but maybe at some point we’ll have someone clever coming up with a bolt-on extension that recreates what this suspension-tool-turned-kickstand-tab is doing.

The class started as most do, with the riders circled up as Daniel Sedlak and his co-trainer Edgar Cota demonstrate the one technique that would be called back to throughout the days training, the standing body position: toes in, heels down and letting the motorcycle do the work of moving through the terrain. We start on the clay oval track as a group, utilizing the technique and feeling out what applying pressure on one foot then the other does to coax the bike into a turn. For some riders, this is the first time they are working through this body positioning, and admittedly it takes a bit to really figure out what your body is doing while weaving through cones or zipping around a tighter turn. Spatial awareness is something that I’ve struggled with in the past, so in this instance it was helpful that Daniel and Edgar were taking videos and photos of each rider as they were moving throughout the course, and I was able to stop and ask for pointers from Daniel to get an idea of what I needed to work on.

From there, the class was split into two groups, the first were those who were just starting on their off-road learning experience, and the second group moved to a more technical course to give the more experienced riders a bit of a challenge. The first group stuck to the oval dirt track to expand on the slow speed drills we had started with, and I was pretty relieved to get some more time to work on maneuvering the bike around corners marked by cones and not actual obstacles. I benefit from being able to repeat a drill a few times, each pass focusing on something different – increasing speed one lap, then honing in on timing with the clutch and brake, and finally a few more times to make sure all the little technical skills are working together to give the best result. The course was made a little more difficult as the morning went on, and soon we were consistently hitting the marks for the corners.

A break for lunch went by all too quickly, and we headed out onto a nearby trail to put our brand new skills to some real world tests. The trail in question led us uphill through some scrub brush, around a rocky outcropping and back down the far side of the hill. I could tell that some of my classmates were a bit hesitant to speed up the uphill section, so I left a hefty space before charging up the slope myself. My entire skill set from the TW200 era of riding was just ‘pin it to win it’ and I had absolutely no fear on steep rocky uphills with that little mule. The 390, however, was still so new to me, I had no idea what to expect if I ended up a gear too high or too low for my speed on uneven terrain. A stall on a silty spot might mean a complete tipover if I couldn’t manage to get my toe down in time on the correct side, and as I had yet to let the handlebars grace the dirt, I wasn’t eager to find out anytime soon.

Rounding the corner at the top of the hill, I recalled the drills from last summer in Pennsylvania, where we had done similar uphill/downhill sections and focused on controlling our speed without the clutch by applying a slight pressure on the front brake, to lightly drag the lever while rolling in first gear. Happy that I could recreate the lesson on the 390 successfully, I was confidently rolling faster downhill with each practice lap we took. Eventually I turned the corner at the bottom of the hill to find one of my classmates had wiped out, and while I stopped the bike smoothly and just in time, I failed to stick my toe out far enough, and over I went, bringing us back to the introduction of this story.

Now that I had the first tip-over out of the way, the rest of the training went by with lightning speed. We had moved on to a tighter single-track section, and tight off-camber turns. Rocks, and a sandy pit at the bottom of a small hill were checked off the list next. After a quick water break we wound up back on the oval track with the intermediate riders to work on skid turns as a group. It was helpful to see everyone else take a turn at the course they had set up, and it was encouraging to get to cheer for each of your friends taking a stab at the skill as well. This was one section that I really wished I had more time to practice, as I was just barely getting the controlled skid without the turn down before it was time to end the day.

Looking back on the day, I had noted a sizable improvement in both my confidence in the dirt as well as translating my previous skills onto the 390 Adventure. Most remarkably, I had gone from struggling to get the kickstand up while on the bike to being able to flip the stand up, then hop on and take off almost in one move. While it may seem like a small thing to other riders with longer legs, this was a fairly big deal to me. A lot of my insecurity on this bike in particular is centered around the seat height, and adding a trick to my bag of skills in this category was a huge win. While it may take me another few weekends of riding to go from “I know it’s possible” to “doing it without thinking”, I was glad I had the chance to figure it out in a controlled environment.

Daniel Sedlak offers a range of classes throughout the spring and summer, with a handful of onsite training at events like Get On! ADV Fest or Over and Out Moto, so if you’re interested in finding out what class may be best for you, don’t hesitate to reach out to Sedlak Off-Road School with questions.

So, what’s the next step in this 390 ADV Project? I have a few fixes to chase down for the bike. First and foremost being the seat. I’ve sent the one-piece rally style seat off to get carved up by Seat Concepts, and hopefully it’ll be back in time for some rides I have planned in early March. I really believe that you can never have too much training, so the next step for me is a weekend adventure training class in Austin, Texas with ATX Moto Adventures. I’ll be flying with my gear and borrowing a KTM 390 Adventure when I get there, so rest assured, the bright orange scooter won’t be left out! As always, stay tuned and if you have any questions about the bike, the process, or the class, drop a comment below!

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