A WORD FROM MATT:<\/strong><\/h3>\n

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I\u2019ve always had a love of all things mechanical and as a kid I dreamt of waking up to a motocross bike in my garage.\u00a0 That finally came true when I got my first bike as a 16year old, much to my parents disgust.\u00a0 It was a Yamaha RZ250 and it was black and red with a bikini fairing and I thought it was the sexiest two wheeled machine in the whole world.\u00a0 Unfortunately, I only rode it a couple of times before my parents, rightly so, decided I should sell it.\u00a0 I needed more experience.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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After starting my career as an Aircraft Engineer, I longed to get myself a bike.\u00a0 It was a few years later however, that I started commuting from Wellington to the Kapiti coast on a Honda VTR250.\u00a0 I was living the dream.<\/p>\n

Then, it was time for a new challenge, so for a period of time, I chased my career all around the world.\u00a0 From looking after 45 flights a day for Air Nelson at Wellington airport, to having the privilege of working for Sir Tim Wallis at the Alpine Fighter Collection, maintaining 20 WWII aircraft, before my wife and I moved to France to work for a Swiss Airline.\u00a0 \u00a0So of course I needed a bike to explore central Europe\u2019s best motorcycling roads.\u00a0 I chose a VFR750 for the job.<\/p>\n

Three years later we were back in Wanaka.\u00a0 Now with a BMW R80G\/S to explore the stunning Central Otago back roads.\u00a0 Life is good \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

This is where I started my own company, building it into a successful aircraft maintenance business, where I could share my experiences and knowledge with young engineers and encourage them to gain their qualifications.<\/p>\n

So, how did I become an instructor?\u00a0 Well, I started taking the Ride Forever courses from Bronze, Silver through to a Gold course every year for the last 6 years and my riding improved quite dramatically every year because of this.\u00a0 On my last course, my instructor Simon suggested I might like to become an instructor.<\/p>\n

What me??\u00a0 I\u2019m just an average guy on a bike!\u00a0 \u00a0I have now completed my Instructor endorsement and am loving teaching.\u00a0 It\u2019s just so cool to help new riders learn to ride and gain their BHST certificates and prepare for riding on the road.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve just completed my certification so am now also able to assess riders through their CBTA Restricted and Full assessments and present Ride Forever courses.<\/p>\n

Having worked tirelessly over my career as an Aircraft Engineer, to keep everyone who flies safe.\u00a0 It\u2019s time to bring that passion and commitment to the the motorcycling community.\u00a0 I\u2019m honored to be able to be part of the Ornsby Motorcycle Training team and to do my part in keeping everyone safe and smooth.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Motorcycle Training Wanaka, Central Otago – Beginner to advanced Welcome to Ornsby Motorcycle Training Wanaka. Meet Simon Richards & Matt Bailey, two of our highly professional and fully qualified instructors who provide beginner-to-advanced level training and all licensing services. Regardless of whether you are an absolute beginner and don\u2019t know a throttle from a piston… […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"home-page.php","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2056","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/motorcycletraining.co.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2056","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/motorcycletraining.co.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/motorcycletraining.co.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/motorcycletraining.co.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/motorcycletraining.co.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2056"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/motorcycletraining.co.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2056\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3983,"href":"https:\/\/motorcycletraining.co.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2056\/revisions\/3983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/motorcycletraining.co.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2056"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}