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Motorcycle Safety and Awareness
Welcome to Think Bike, the podcast about all things motorcycle and the voice of motorcycle safety and awareness in Alberta. Your host is Liane Langlois.
Liane:Hey, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of think bike. I'm excited to have Kirk Pelletier come on. He is a senior instructor and there's always all these questions about what it's like being an instructor, what makes somebody wanna be an instructor and so we're gonna chat with him about this. But first, welcome to the show, Kirk.
Liane:How are you today?
Kirk:Really good, Leanne. Thanks for having me.
Liane:I'm happy to have you here. So let's tell a little bit about who is Kirk and what got you into riding?
Kirk:Oh, what got me into riding? Well, I I grew up. I always liked anything that had wheels, skateboards, bikes, unicycles. And, you know, as as I got older, eventually, you know, it's things got bigger and faster and got engines in them. And, yeah, I got my first motorcycle when I turned 18, and that's pretty much taken over my whole life since then.
Liane:Just a little bit. What was your first motorcycle?
Kirk:I bought a DRZ 400. I was tossing up whether to get a dirt bike or a street bike, and one of my coworkers at the time actually had a conversation with me. He's like, oh, have you ever considered this, like, Enduro dual sport thing? And I had never even heard of that as an option. So, yeah, I went wandering around the dealerships and found one that I liked and ended up settling on that DRZ and, yeah, I haven't haven't looked back since.
Liane:That's a good starter bike, think. I get a little bit of both and it's not too big to get you into trouble.
Kirk:Yeah. Yeah. It's it's it's quite tall. It's a bit of a parasail on the highways, but other than that, like, power delivery is amazing. The thing's a tractor.
Kirk:Like, it you you cannot hurt it. It it just yeah. It just fires right up and and trudges along. So, yeah, I agree. I think it's a good one.
Liane:That's awesome. So where have been some of your favorite places to ride?
Kirk:Oh boy, I all over and everywhere. I one of one of the most memorable trips that I ever did was a few years into riding. It was a a friend of mine that I went to school with and we rode from Edmonton to to Vancouver Island. So we rode through Mainland BC, crossed the ferry. We rode up to Tofino, Route 4 through Cathedral Grove, just amazing, and then down to Victoria and then all the way back to back to Edmonton from there.
Kirk:I have to say that's probably some of my favorite part of the country to ride in there.
Liane:I have actually never ridden, I've been out to Vancouver Island, but I've never taken a motorcycle out there and I should sure do that because Tofino, that whole area is so beautiful.
Kirk:Oh, it's amazing and it's like a roller coaster. The highway just kinda goes up and down and side to side. It's beautiful, beautiful riding there.
Liane:That's awesome. So you got your first motorcycle at 18. Did you do a riding course, like a learn to ride course?
Kirk:I absolutely did, actually. Yeah. I I had recently moved to Edmonton and I was looking into, you know, what it what it would take to ride a motorcycle. I didn't know anything about it other than, you know, I grew up like, I rode mountain bikes and I'm like, it's about the same concept because it's two wheels and you kinda balance it. But other than that, I didn't know anything.
Kirk:Like, I was I was like, I don't know how the clutch works. I don't know how to shift gears with the thing. So yeah. I did. I did.
Kirk:I actually took my ride learn to ride course with Alberta Safety Council, and they had a great program at the time. And, yeah, they've recently closed their shop up, so they don't they don't offer their course anymore. But I can't say anything but amazing things about about their program there. So
Liane:I am also an ASC grad.
Kirk:Awesome. Possibly
Liane:before your time. I'm not gonna get into dating anything on that, but, yeah, I enjoyed my time with them as well. Was really sad to see them shut down and, you know, obviously they have their reasons and we wish them well with the next things. So then when did you decide that you wanted to become an instructor? How long before you're 18 and you get a motorcycle to I wanna help other people get out there?
Kirk:For me, I was instantly hooked. So as soon as I got my bike, I was telling all of my friends. I was like, hey. You guys need to you guys need to get out here. You need to do this.
Kirk:You need to take this course. And through through doing that, I was also giving pointers. I was like, hey. This is what I learned, and these are some of the things that I found helpful from it. And so so to answer your question, it's it's I I I want to say immediately, but also, like, not not to the full effect of, you know, going through the process and and being an instructor right away, but, you know, I've always been one to share my experience and to share my passion and and to help other people learn and do things that I quite enjoy.
Kirk:So within the the the few years following that, I I had recommended a lot of people, like, at least five to seven of my friends and family through the through the courses at at safety council there. And then I I want to say that it was about five years into my riding that I I looked into actually becoming an instructor because that was something that I like, I I kinda feel like I was already doing to a point. Like, I was it was it was it was it was one of these things that I, at that point, was when I put the serious consideration into it that, hey. This is something that I would actively like to do. At that time, they had a little posting up.
Kirk:It was like, We're looking for instructors. This is how you get into it. And unfortunately, at at that exact time, my other career, I was I was working out of town. I just didn't have the time commitment to be able to do that. So just to put a number to it, like, would have been about 23 or 24 at that time.
Kirk:Kinda looked into it, and then but now that I now that I knew that this was an avenue, like, was something that kind of stood in the back of my mind for a a few more years. Then yeah. It would have been four years ago now was the last time that they that there was a a big push for them to train up some new instructors for themselves and that little posting went out, Anybody who's interested, come to this information session. So I went, I sat down, they said, Hey, these are all of the things that you need to do to be an instructor. I checked all the boxes, and at that time, I I did then have the time commitment that I was able to to do.
Kirk:And, yeah, throughout that summer, I did all the things that I needed to become properly licensed and I started working with ASC.
Liane:Yeah, they were on me when I did my course because I'm a little bit of a lone wolf in my family, not a lot of people. I mean, we had little Honda fifties on the farm growing up, but no one really rides in my family, my immediate family. And I just took to it like instant. Like it's just, it was something that awoke something in me that I needed to do. And as someone who naturally likes to always be helping other people, they were on me to like, oh, you should become an instructor.
Liane:And I'm like, maybe someday, but I wanna enjoy this for a bit. And then I decided to start the AMSS instead of instructing, but it has a place as well to bring everything together. So I never went through the process. So can you give me an example or explain to me what the process is to become an instructor? Because it isn't like you show up, you apply, and off you go and teach.
Liane:There's a whole thing to it, right?
Kirk:Yeah. There's kind of two parts to the process. So the first part is that whatever driving school that you're going to be working for, you need to learn their curriculum and, you know, what what they're going to be teaching exactly, as well as there's a government portion to actually get your driver's instructor's license. The driver's instructor's license is it's similar to any other class of driving license. Like, if you've taken a a class five driving school or a professional driving school, it's all licensed through the same government agency.
Kirk:And then the school, as as you've as you've completed the the training that's required, so there's some classroom time, there's the on lot practice time. The school will then apply for you to become an instructor to do the government testing, and that kind of comes in a few steps as well. So the three big steps is the first one is that they have a multiple choice written portion, and that one has a handful of questions that are pulled from a whole bunch of the traffic safety laws in Alberta as well as a few of the the niche ones that surround the, you know, the laws that apply to driving schools and motorcycles specifically. The second big part of the the government testing is gonna be a on lot test. So they come out and they have a half dozen patterns that you set up.
Kirk:You explain, and you say, hey. This is set up as if a student was going to be riding. You're gonna start at the start gates here. You're gonna drive in a straight line, and you're gonna stop at the end, and you need to do it in whatever amount of time. So there's just for example, a few of them are driving slow in a straight line.
Kirk:There's an exercise that's a curve. There's an exercise that's a tight turn from a stop. And then there's obviously a handful of others that they test you on. And then they just they kind of grade you based on the way that you deliver it and that you deliver the information that they expect you to deliver as if you were instructing a student to do that. Then the third part is a road test, which is very similar to your class six road test that you would have done to get your class six license already.
Kirk:And the only difference with that is that they give you less demerits. They expect you to be a, a skilled and a proficient driver who's knowledgeable of the rules of the road and follow those.
Liane:Did you do a road test? That's gonna date how old we are.
Kirk:I did a few of the road tests, yeah.
Liane:Oh, you did more than one? Okay. So then I was licensed before you because we didn't have a road test back then. Yeah. Yeah.
Liane:We block tested.
Kirk:Yeah, okay. Yeah. No, so yeah, for myself when I did mine, I came up when they had the GDL program, so I actually had to do two tests.
Liane:Oh, right, there, okay, so just to avoid any confusion, there still is a GDL program, you just don't have an exit exam to get off GDL. You have a tougher exam for the first one to get your license, and then if you have zero demerits in the last twelve months of the second year, then you automatically get removed from GDL. But you would have done the motorcycle one and then two years later GDL'd, or did the exit exam, correct?
Kirk:Yeah, that's exactly it.
Liane:The old rules.
Kirk:Yes, yes.
Liane:There's so much confusion out there about GDL, and people are just like, that doesn't exist anymore. It does, it does, it's just not an exit exam.
Kirk:Yeah. And that's questions that we get all of the time at the school, and it is. A lot of it is, I will say because the rules do change and they, you know, it's part of part of our job is keeping on top of, you know, what the what the current rules are, and and I will say that a lot of people there are saying, oh, yeah. Well, my friend who did this ten years ago, he said that he did this, this, this, and this, and it's like, okay, well, yes, they do they do this, this, but instead of this, they do that now. So it's yeah.
Kirk:That's that's
Liane:That's your job.
Kirk:Yeah. Exactly.
Liane:And and let's face it, registries has a hard enough time keeping up with that, and there's some misinformation that gets put out by registries, and it's at no fault of their own. The government changes everything almost every year.
Kirk:Yeah. Between the government changing, and and to be honest as well, motorcycles are a very small population in Alberta because at the end of the day it is technically a recreational thing that people do and not because it's not as common, these questions aren't getting asked every day there, that they do the best that they can with Absolutely. The information that they
Liane:So now you're licensed, that seems like a really heavy duty process. There are some people out there that think that they can just go and teach somebody, but let's be clear with the rules on this. In order for you to get paid for your services as an instructor, you must be a licensed instructor through the province of Alberta?
Kirk:Correct. And then the the second half of it is then you have to be working through a licensed driving school in Alberta. And there is I actually have the document up on my side here. It is called the licensed driver training instructor code of conduct, and a very big part of this document is stating explicitly that that, yes, you you are a licensed instructor. You're going to provide professional instruction, and you're only going to do it at a licensed training school.
Kirk:And the reason for that is so that they avoid people that come in and say, hey. I'm a I'm a driving instructor now, and then just go and don't follow the processes properly and don't give the instruction following, you know, the the approved curriculums and everything that the government has already deemed acceptable through the driving schools. Because, again, like I said, part of part of opening the driving school is is, you know, we've been prechecked, and and they've come in and said, yeah. We we like what you're doing. You know, you're meeting all of the minimum requirements, and and you're going to give the students the proper training that that they are required, not only, you know, for themselves, but also to meet whatever minimums that the the government has set out.
Kirk:And the only way that they can ensure that you're doing that is by you as a licensed instructor instructing with that licensed school.
Liane:Yeah. No. Exactly. So let's let's this is gonna kinda lead us into where we are in 2026, which is super exciting, you know, with ASC shutting their doors and leaving us with only one school. But let's let's go back a year or two because you know our friend, Leroy Victor, quite well.
Liane:Yes. And we will get into Motto Instincts as of 2026 again today. But Leroy in the last couple of years has been building his name and his reputation by mentoring people in learning to ride who maybe couldn't afford a course. He wasn't charging them for the course. He would supply a motorcycle for a fee for a road test.
Liane:That is all within the confinements of what is acceptable in Alberta, correct? Like he couldn't charge for his time teaching because he wasn't a licensed instructor, but he could offer his time as a mentor for free.
Kirk:Yeah. So this is where there's a little bit of confusion. So in in Alberta, if you are a I'm just gonna say that you're a class five driver who has your driving license and you want to become you want to ride a motorcycle. You, in order to learn, are allowed to drive with a non GDL class six driver, and they just have to be following you on either their own motorcycle following you in a car, or they can be on your own motorcycle. However, I don't recommend
Liane:I don't recommend that either.
Kirk:You as a learner.
Liane:That one that one boggles my mind. Would never be a passenger with someone who doesn't know how to ride, but I digress.
Kirk:So strange. May maybe if you're in a sidecar, but that's but yeah. So, anyway, so to to answer your question, let's say that, you know, you have you have a friend, you have anybody that is out there that has a motorcycle that they are willing to lend you. There are certain things that you have to have, like you should be insured, whatever. Let's say that you have you're you're you have you have a motorcycle, whether it's your own or you're borrowing it, and you're going out riding with anybody who has their class six non GDL license, you you can go out and ride and practice and and do all of that on on your own.
Kirk:Absolutely.
Liane:Yeah. And so, again, like there's hypothetically or allegedly little operation that may have popped up in the Edmonton area that is advertising full learn to ride classes at a full fee, not necessarily licensed, might not fit within the boundaries, which is why Leroy, I think, has done it the way that he's done it, and which I appreciate that he's always never stepped over the line of charging for his teaching skills because he, again, not a licensed school, not a licensed instructor. But now in 2026, you have become a senior instructor for a newly licensed school in the Edmonton area called Moto Instincts. Go figure. How does that feel?
Kirk:It's it's amazing. And you know what? I guess to really describe how I feel and what I'm going through with this, when I met Leroy, he was in the process of he's always been in the process of developing. This is this is what he has wanted to have as long as I've known him. And when I when I had first met Leroy, he was actually developing a program for, I'm gonna call it more intermediate riders, which was a huge gap in the market here, especially in Alberta, but, you know, really everywhere that locally, have great schools that you can go, you can learn to ride.
Kirk:You've never seen a motorcycle before. You come out and you have, you know, the skills that you need to to pass your road test and get started, but that's not where the learning stops. Know, myself personally, I'm always learning new things. Every year that I ride, pick up, I make changes to the way that I ride and the skills that I have. So so Leroy's program at the time, he was really looking at, you know, the people, I'm gonna call it with, like, that three to five years experience who have the basics down and they want to, you know, get get a little bit more, like, fine tuned skills or start doing skills with a motorcycle that you're not necessarily going to use every day, but they do transcend and help you with your riding, your day to day riding.
Kirk:The first the first session that I actually did with with Leroy, we went out to the paddock area at Castro Raceway, and we did some, like, medium to high speed type drills. My favorite one that we did that day was a it was it was a spiral. So we started on the outside. We started second gear. We were going about, I wanna say, about 50 kilometers an hour as we entered the spiral.
Kirk:And as we go, it got tighter and tighter, so you had to shift down into first gear and eventually using your clutch control, slow speed, and coming to a stop with the handlebars turned all the way against the gas tank, which was a ton of fun. That was super cool to be like, oh, man. Like, I have the skills to do this. It's not something that I would say is necessarily something that I would use day to day, but it but it gave that huge confidence boost of this is what I can do with my bike, and so when I go out and ride, I always think about that. You know, I'm in a parking lot and I'm like, oh, this seems like a really tight turn to get into the spot that I'm looking at.
Kirk:Well, I I've done tighter turns, you know, coming from a faster speed, slowing down, and and doing this. So so that was really, like, my my introduction to, you know, Leroy and Leroy's ideas and what he wanted to put forward for, you know, his his ideas for what a driving school could be.
Liane:Mhmm.
Kirk:And then, yeah, last year with Alberta Safety Council shutting down, that left a huge gap in the local market for, you know, people who are just trying to get their license, you know, all of a sudden, they there's only one place to go if you wanna get that professional training. And Chris at TNT, he's an amazing gentleman. I have nothing but great things to say about him and the program that he runs. There's just so many students that are looking to get in and get through that there needs to be more options locally here. So that was where, Leroy and I, our conversation very quickly shifted gears to, hey.
Kirk:Maybe we can fill that gap. And then the other thing that that that does for us is we want to bring people up in our in our program, and we have it built very modularly that, you know, you come in as a as somebody who has never ridden before or maybe you've taken a a course somewhere else. You come in, you you go through our program, and there's always another level. There's always more to learn, so we wanted to present it in a way that it's like, you've taken the first step. You've done our basic learn to ride course, but hey, there's another one that you can come back to here.
Kirk:Go ride for six months. Go ride for a year and we'll teach you more things. We'll help guide you along this path of this constant learning and constant improvement in yourself. Again, I like that you used the word mentoring because that's another big mindset that we have at Moto Instincts that's we're using to set ourselves apart is that we want to be a mentor that's there along your journey from start to finish instead of an instructor who just said, yep. You did this.
Kirk:You did this. You passed the course, and here's your certificate. See you never. So we're we're, yeah, actively building in a way that, you know, we want we want people to constantly come back and say, hey. I had this experience, and and this was my outcome, you know, whether whether they can teach us from their experiences.
Kirk:Or I like when people toot my horn and say, hey, you did a great job and I did good because of it, so.
Liane:The pat on the back is never a bad thing, and I think that's the biggest thing that I think that people can expect from your guys' teaching style and with you leading as the senior instructor. I mean, you're obviously super passionate about what you do, which is great because then you're the right person to be the senior instructor there. But you guys are bringing something new to the table. Again, it's that continuous learning. There really is no start to finish because there shouldn't be a finish, you know what I mean?
Liane:Like we keep growing and we keep learning.
Kirk:Yes.
Liane:Yeah. Kirk, this has been great and pretty sure I need to come and see you guys at some point to maybe work on some, undo some bad habits I may have picked up over the last couple of decades because that happens.
Kirk:It does.
Liane:It does. But I appreciate your time, Kirk. Thank you so much. If anybody wants to figure out what's going on over at Moto Instincts, I think it's motoinstincts.com, correct?
Kirk:That is.
Liane:Yeah. And you can find all the information there. Look them up on Facebook, on the socials, whatever. The guys would be happy to hear from you. Kirk, thanks again for your time today.
Liane:Everybody else, hang tight for the mixed bag. On today's mailbag, the question is, what is the suggested minimum insurance you should carry for a motorcycle? We once again reached out to our friends at Klondike Insurance for an answer, and it is as follows: Insurance for bikes really depends on the value or the purchase price of a motorcycle. If you pay only $1,000 for a bike, most times your deductible is that amount, so why would you buy full coverage? It really boils down to how much you want to protect your investment and what the deductibles and premiums are in place for that coverage.
Liane:Motorcycles that have financing must carry full coverage as it is a requirement of the loan. The minimum coverage for motorcycle is liability coverage. While the province says 200,000 liability is required by law, we will not sell a policy with less than 1,000,000 liability coverage. This protects the rider for damage they do to someone else or their property. Again, reach out to klondikeinsurance.com to learn more.
Liane:And that's it for another episode of Think Bike hosted by me, Leanne Langlois, produced by Bryn Griffiths at Mighty Mouth Communications. If you have an idea or a question for the show, reach out to info@ab-amss.org or find us on all the socials. Always remember to ride smart, ride safe, and think bike. We'll see you out on the road.