That’s right boys and girls. The eagerly anticipated (at least by me) Quentin Tarantino produced film, Hell Ride will be in theaters this summer on August 8th. As you know I’ve been keeping my eye out for this movie, my last post was back in January and the first time I wrote about the movie was back in December.

Now, i don’t know how good this movie is going to be, but I’m hoping for high camp factor. I figure with the likes of Dennis Hopper, Michael Madsen and David Carradine there’s definitely a good chance!

When I started this site a year ago, I really didn’t know what the goal of the site was going to be. Initially I wanted to put the call out to other young, rockin’ biker women (like me!), who maybe were part of Gen X and not quite ready to be a grown up (like me!). And quite honestly, I wasn’t even sure if I could maintain posting consistently week after week (I’d be out riding in the summer and motorcycle news is scarce in the winter months-or so I thought) to make this blog worth reading. It was difficult in the beginning: I would sit in front on my keyboard, staring at the screen wondering what the hell I was going to write about.

But something weird happened: I finally found my groove, my posts started getting attention and I found not only was I enjoying the whole blogging thing, I was “meeting” a lot of other my fellow biker bloggers and people who were becoming regular readers and I was also getting great blog reviews and awards from my blogging peers.

I didn’t really know the first thing about blogging. I’d kept a personal journal but a motorcycle blog is different. How would I find people to read my blog and who would care anyway? Through some cool blog communities like BlogCatalog I met a bunch of people and learned lots of things about writing a blog. And through social networking sites like myspace and BikerWorlds I found other bikers who are interested in the same things I am.

Traffic started increasing, people were linking to the site and honestly the highlight for me last year was when Greg White and Kawasaki asked me to test ride a Vulcan 900 Custom. I mean, who the hell was I? Just some biker girl from MA who happened to start a blog a few months before…

In one year, I’ve gone from a few readers a week to tens of thousands of page views. I’m not going to make any grand claims like you see on other blogs, but I will tell you that I’m happy to see my google page rank on the rise (link to me!), my Alexa rank continues to move up and the number of people who view the site goes up almost every week. Fellow bikers in 114 different countries have checked in on the rippin-kitten.com blog. And I’ve been getting inquiries from major companies regarding advertising opportunities. Not too shabby.

Anyway, enough of boring blog stats and me marveling at my own success. Stay tuned later this week as I roll-out a new feature for Rippin-Kitten.com and share some other things that I’ve been working on.

Thanks to everyone for making my first year of blogging a great one. It’s been a great learning experience and I’ve enjoyed our many discussions. Looking forward to another year!

It seems to me that women-only motorcycle events are starting to become a big trend in our motorcycle world. I’ve always struggled with women specific events because for me, personally, I don’t think they’re necessary to make me proud of being a female rider. I like to hang with the boys anyways!

I was perusing my news aggregator this morning and Steve over at Biker News Online mentioned the second annual International Female Ride Day on Friday, May 2, 2008, with lots and lots of sarcasm and even raised the question: Why do women riders need a special day to celebrate themselves?

Now, here’s my disclaimer: I’m not attacking or singling out Steve’s post for any detrimental reasons, I’m merely highlighting it because for the first time, someone posted about a women-only event with the question: Who gives a f**k?

That’s what I’m wondering. While the women’s ride to Daytona was kind of a cool thing, I also just read on Women Riders Now about the Diva Custom’s Divas Only bike show that’s happening at the end of May. Are these events a good thing or is this women-only madness spiraling out of control? Is it helping female bikers or is it setting up a precedent for women to segregate themselves from the biker community rather than being a part of it?

And just like Steve at Biker News asks: If a chick can master a motorcycle and hold her own among the biker crowd, does she need empowering?

Whenever there’s a bike week somewhere in the country it seems the accident/death toll always trumps other events that are newsworthy. Daytona 2008 is no different, with the death toll reaching seven as of Friday.

So, here’s some good news for a change, regarding the first ever Harley-Davidson Woman’s Day Ride:

Some 500 women cruised into Daytona Beach, Fla., March 4, as part of the first ever Harley-Davidson Daytona Women’s Day Ride. The event garnered a whopping $60,520.50 in contributions to help send children with neuromuscular diseases to MDA summer camp, the Muscular Dystrophy Association announced today.

Harley-Davidson Motorcycle Company of Milwaukee organized the historic ride, the largest women’s ride in the company’s 105-year history. In addition to providing recognition to women motorcycle riders, the event will enables MDA to send more youngsters to camp, where they’ll enjoy a week of accessible activities such as swimming, horseback riding, fishing and arts and crafts.

Karen Davidson, great-granddaughter of one of Harley-Davidson’s founders, William A. Davidson, led the group, including the six winners of Harley- Davidson’s “Get Down to Daytona” contest. They left Atlanta March 1, and were joined by the rest of the riders for the last 10 miles of the approximately 500-mile trek, which ended at Ocean Center.

Three women received special recognition as the top fundraisers for the event: Joanne Mold of Forest Hill, Md., ($3,055 raised), Dee Roberts of Bernville, Pa., ($2,717) and Lynne Cone of Houston ($2,715). Each received a 105th Anniversary Harley-Davidson women’s jacket, and had lunch with Karen Davidson and the six “Get Down to Daytona” contest winners and MDA ambassadors.

Story source and full article: The Auto Channel

As I’ve mentioned before, I don’t need to be involved in women-only events to show my pride in being a female rider, but I think this would have been a cool event to be a part of and for a really great cause. And for that, kudos to all those ladies who participated!

About a week ago I was going through my news reader and came across an article on Custom Motorcycle Talk about a new website for the ladies called Garage Girls. The beginning of the article really pumped up the site and immediately my interest was piqued:

WOMEN RIDERS HAVE A NEW WEBSITE TO CHECK OUT

www.garage-girls.com goes live covering everything a girl wants to know about motorcycles and so much more…

Minneapolis, MN— The launch of www.garage-girls.com was well received by female motorcycle enthusiasts around the world. The new site created and maintained by Sara Liberte and Jody Perewitz presents motorcycling and everything that goes along with it from a female perspective.

www.garage-girls.com is a unique, exciting new website developed to meet the growing needs of women seeking information about motorcycles and their maintenance.

Wow! I couldn’t wait to go check the site out!

I have vague knowledge of both ladies who are involved with the site. Sara Liberte, as far as I knew, fashions herself a photographer and her images usually consist of a portrait of a person photoshopped with motorcycle parts. I’m not a big fan of her images (I’ve seen better “image fusion” done by other artists) but that’s just my opinion. As it turns out she owns a bike shop as well. Jody Perewitz, well, the only thing I knew about her was that she’s the daughter of famous bike builder, Dave, and that she and Sara are doing a bike build for charity.

Needless to say, I was more than disappointed when I got to the site. The overall design of the site is lackluster and the footer navigation doesn’t even work. Also, it’s never a good sign when the homepage of a site that claims to be a “motorcycle resource for women” is chock full of too much info about the two women who involved with the site. Sigh.

Moving onto the Body & Machine section and it doesn’t get much better. I do think it’s interesting that they’re trying to incorporate fitness information in the “Body” section, but there’s not a whole lot of helpful info there (and I can’t tell who wrote the copy. Since the main graphic says “Sara Liberte’s Garage Girls” I’ll assume she wrote everything). In the middle of the page is a video of Jody and Sara interviewing each other that seems really out of place, even though they do talk about their favorite foods among other things.

The “Machine” section is comprised of two videos of Jody and Sara and a section about battery maintenance. Yawn. “Events” is where you can see them on tour building their Bobber for a Cure and “Sites2See” consists of links to Sara’s photo site and bike shop.

“Cruisin’ companions” has nothing to do with fellow women riders but riders of the fuzzy, four-legged kind. It’s a cute spin on the request for users to upload their photos (and let’s face it, animals on motorcycles will make anyone’s heart melt).

Overall, Garage Girls seems to be a narcissistic venture for these ladies rather than a site providing “everything a girl wants to know about motorcycles”, which totally bums me out. For that, I’ll stick with Women Riders Now, which I still think is the best site for women riders yet.

My personal riding preference is either alone, with my husband or with a small group of people. I currently do not belong to any kind of motorcycle group but I could see why joining a group would be appealing.

Many women join motorcycle clubs for camaraderie and to ride with other like-minded people. And let’s face it, who wouldn’t stop to watch a large group of ladies ride by on their shiny motorcycles!

I recently found an informational article that goes into depth about the differences of a motorcycle club and a riding club, which I think could be helpful if you’re thinking of joining one.

Here are just a few of the nationwide groups/clubs out there:

• Chrome Divas - a group for riders, passengers or enthusiasts-no motorcycle required. They are a socially conscious group that strives to give back to the community and support worthy causes.
• Devil Dolls MC-a badass group of women with a love of their motorcycles and a love of the ride- so you do need a motorcycle to be considered.
• Motor Maids was founded in 1940 and is still going strong for women who legally own and operate their own motorcycle or one belonging to a family member.
• Women on Wheels -open to women of any age, experience and make of motorcycle. They have many chapters across the country.
• Women in the Wind strives to educate our members in motorcycle safety and maintenance unite women motorcyclists with friends of common interest, and promote a positive image to the public of women on motorcycles.

I don’t know a whole lot about one specific group but I know there are a lots of groups to choose from!

Here’s a clip of another inspiring woman, Sasha Mullins from the 2003 Discovery Channel documentary “Motorcycle Women.” Sasha has been busy writing books and making music with her band Motoroadeo.

P.S. Rippin-Kitten.com is mentioned in the latest (and fabulous) blog post by GO! Smell the Flowers! So, a big thanks and many flowers to them!

The latest contest from Harley-Davidson got me thinking: who are some female riders who have inspired me?

When I decided to get my motorcycle license I didn’t have a female motorcycle “mentor” so to speak. I hung out with a lot of guys that ride and spent plenty of time on the back. I watched all of the Motorcycle Manias, Motorcycle Women and even the first season of American Chopper. I began to see more and more women out riding their own and when the opportunity came up I went for it. So, I guess I inspired myself (with the help of some anonymous biker girls)!

But since I’ve started this site I realized that there are many influential women out there. One who I admire is Genevieve Schmitt.

Genevieve Schmitt is a former television producer and magazine editor (anyone remember Woman Rider magazine?), is the founder of the fantastic website Women Riders Now and her blog is always a good read.

From WRN: Genevieve has been working in the motorcycle industry since 1993 and is recognized as a leader in motorcycling journalism focusing on the area of women. She is an inductee in the Sturgis Motorcycle Museum Hall of Fame for her journalism work on raising awareness of the female motorcyclist. She is the leading spokesperson on the subject of women and motorcycling.

You can read her monthly columns in American Iron, Dealernews and Midwest Motorcyclist. She is also a frequent correspondent for Speed TV and Outdoor Life Network (now called Vs.). This is a busy woman who has made huge strides getting women motorcyclists the attention they deserve.

Honorable mention:
If Betsy Huelskamp looks familiar to you it’s because she was one of the Magnificient Six featured in the 2003 Discovery Channel documentary “Motorcycle Women.” She was also featured in that fabulous “Live By It” commercial that Harley Davidson ran over the summer. She has 20+ years riding experience, is a personal trainer and recently attempted to climb Mt. Everest which was documented in Discovery Channel’s “Everest 2: Beyond The Limit.” She also writes “Backroads with Betsy” on her best gal-pal Genevieve’s site.

Geneveive & Betsy at Sturgis 2007

Does anyone out there have a story to share about someone in the motorcycle world who has inspired them?

I’ve made the decision that come hell or high water I’m getting my ass to Daytona next year. I’ve never been and really want to go since I wasn’t able to attend Sturgis this past summer.

Since there is usually snow & ice on the ground here that time of year (and I don’t relish the idea of riding to Florida in 20 degree weather) getting down there may present a challenge. And shipping the bike could be costly. Needless to say, I have some big planning ahead of me!

Unfortunately, I’m not eligible for Harley-Davidson’s Get Down to Daytona contest. If you aren’t aware of the contest, if you’re a woman you can win a spot on a bike trip to Daytona with Karen Davidson.

From the site: To enter, submit a video, 90 seconds or less, describing how your riding mentor helped you improve your confidence and riding skills, and what riding means to you. Make sure to include your riding mentor in your video or a photo of her or him.

You have to own an HD and been riding for less than 2 years (I’m out on both counts) but if you’re a woman who fits those requirements…well stop reading and go submit a video, dammit!

I’m not a super-fashionista by any stretch of the means, but I do think that I have a semblance of style. I know what I like and why I like it. And here’s a couple of things that I’ve found recently that I like:

From mooshoes.com: this is a non-leather engineer boot. But I don’t like them because they’re vegan-friendly. I like the style, the rubber sole of the boot and the matte black finish on the buckles. They’re comfy and really easy to break in. I wish I got them earlier on in the riding season, but at least I will be able to enjoy them for fall riding.

Chopper Couture has some really cute clothes with biker-esque designs on them. I don’t love everything they have to offer, but I could see myself in a few of these shirts.

And of course, there’s Juicy Couture. I would never normally spend my hard earned money buying anything “designer”, but these gloves are really frickin’ cute.

Do you guys have some “biker” fashion that you like and want to share with me?