RoadRunner Magazine / Other Options?

[sprint_st]

Chris ,speaking for myself,I like to read my print rags in dribs and drabs,not all at once,and the picture,map thing counts when its a decent ride.listening can be good,listening can be boring.My 2 cents
Would I be willing to try it,sure why not,it may be better than I am thinking.
This could be because I am in that generation ,but, I like to have a coffee in one hand and whatever I am reading in the other while I listen to music as I read

I really like talking books in the car on long trips.  Motorcycle magazines are totally different for me.  I like to be able compare the VFR and C14 while sitting on the can.  There seems to be some kind of connection between what I read and the process being performed    I must be behind the times though, I just don't believe I need an internet connection at that location.  

[Sport-Touring]

[Snowbird]

The thing with RR is that it is not on topic like:

Scooter.... leave scooters to a scooter mag, not a road runner mag!  I put on 15,000 miles this year and saw one scooter that was running the roads.  Yea I get it they are all over town, but hey only one out running the roads.

Don't review the same bike year after year.  RR puts out 6 mag a year.  It was the same motorcycle last year.  You know like three mags ago.  The manufacturer didn't change anything why write the same article again????????

They need new writers.  We get it you got on the bike rode to point A got off bike ate, rode to point B walked around town and then went to a chain motel/hotel.  We got.  Same article repeated over and over again sometimes in the same issue.

Tell the old guy to lose the JC Penny pose.  We get it, you have on a riding jacket, and your posed up next to the guard rail with the bike off to the left.  

Yeah, now that you mention it, their photos are sort of funny.

"JC Penny pose."  

The group photos remind me of class reunions or perhaps meeting cousins you never met at a family reunion.

Have you ever checked out their forums?  Woo hoo!!  All the fun of a dentists' convention.

[bomber]

I agree with moist of the criticisms here --

Any suggestions for improvements?

Just curious.

[sprint_st]

Garry made his own set of comments in the OP.  Not sure if there was any intent to make actual suggestions to RR for changes.  If folks are so inclined send a letter to the editor or something similar.  IMO, buy or not, let the market decide their fate.

[Snowbird]

I agree with moist of the criticisms here --

Any suggestions for improvements?

Just curious.

What hasn't been suggested?

Just curious.

[bogfro]

The type of "article" I enjoy the most are ride reports people post on these forums.  Very picture intensive, that tells a story of your trip with pictures.  Pictures of the scenery, the road, the bikes, the people, and the food.  But "articles" like this are too long and have too many pictures to publish in a magazine.  So I don't really expect ANY magazine to be able to do this.  That's why I like to read these forums.

Here's one I did earlier this year:

http://www.easttnriders.com/forum/showthread.php?t=32368

[bomber]

What hasn't been suggested?

Just curious.

Tough to identify something that hasn't occured -- some have posted suggestions -- just looking for more, is all, as many of the posts consisted of "loose the (fill in the black)."

(btw, the "JCPenny Pose" remark is priceless)

[Gypsyangel]

Looks like some peeps on ADVrider were trying to start up their own magazine:

http://www.advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=320693&page=3

An online magazine:

http://www.adventuremagazine.co.za/

Here's an Adventure Rider Magazine, not sure if it's more Dual-Sport oriented or not :

http://magcloud.com/browse/Issue/33276

[Snowbird]

Tough to identify something that hasn't occured -- some have posted suggestions -- just looking for more, is all, as many of the posts consisted of "loose the (fill in the black)."

(btw, the "JCPenny Pose" remark is priceless)

Well, I think an occasional reference to taking a touring day off due to a hangover would help.

[GoGreen]

Bogfro-checked out the site where you posted your trip. Absolutely beautiful scenery, you must have had an awesome ride. Thank you for sharing the pictures!

[wibornz]

How about focus.  Loose the scooter and the cruisers, and the dual sports.  While there are a few scooter, cruiser and dual sport riders that do run the roads; they are a small minority of your readers.  Most scooter, cruiser and dual sport riders do not run the roads.  They ride around town or go bar to bar.

Scooters:  You see them all over town.  If one wants to read about scooters, they buy scooter mags and go to scooter forums.

Cruisers:  Just how many high mileage cruisers can you find.  There are thousands and thousands of low mileage cruisers.  AKA cruiser bike is for cruising, not road running.  Cruiser running is twenty miles here twenty miles there.  I am sure I can go on to EBay right now and find 10,000 used cruiser bikes for sale with less that 10,000 miles on them.  One could say the average owner of a cruiser bike is not a road runner.

Dual Sports:  What is a dual sport?  It is a poor dirt bike and a poor road bike.  Stop writing articles about lame dirt roads. Stop writing about dual sports.  I doubt that any one trust your opinion about a dirt bike.  Let dirt bike mags write about dirt bikes.  If your riding your dual sport, chances are you know all the decent fire roads, dirt roads in your area that are close enough that you will not wear out your tires on the blacktop getting to it.  If your going to trailer your dual sport some where, your not riding dirt roads.  If you must write about dual sports write about some of the great trail systems that are worth taking your dual sport to like: Hatfield and McCoy Trail system, The Coal Creek (Windrock) trail system, The Land between the Lakes or the 3000 plus miles of trails in Michigan.  O wait the people that are intersted in that read dirt bike and ATV mags.  They are not buying RR to find this info.

Focus on your target market.  The riders that run the roads.  The people that put on thousands and thousands of miles.  You know the ones that think a ride is from gas tank to gas tank, not bar to bar.  The riders that go through two or three sets of tires each year.  The ones wear motorcycles out.  Not saying that you need to be an ironbutt, but if your bike is four years old and you have less than 10,000 miles on it, your not a road runner.  

Next test and ride and write about bikes that people who run the roads ride.
For instance:

Honda
VN700T, VFR, Gold Wing, ST1300 good bikes to write about and they are used for running the roads.  If your going to write about Honda and it is a VTX, a fury, a CBR, you're missing your target audience.

Kawasaki
Concours 14, maybe the Versys, or the KLR.  Do not write about the Vulcans or the Ninjas.

Yamaha
FJR, FZ1, FZ6, not YZF- R1 or any of the Royal Star line

Truimph
Sprint ST, the Tiger,  not Bonniville, or Daytona

KTM
990 Adventure no the RC8

Suzuki
Bandits, the Vstrom, and maybe the Busa...maybe  but not the GXSR, or the C50..C90, m109 whatever just stop it.

BMW
Well there are just plenty of BMWs that would be worthy of review as a road runner. Even though I am not a fan of BMW motorcycles.

Ducita
Multistrada 1200 not the 1198 or the Monster

All the not motorcycles are great bikes and I would ride any of them well all most any of them.  But none the less they are not road running motorcycles.  I would not pick up a roadrunner mag and expect to read about a C90.  Nice bike but if I want to read about a cruiser I would buy a cruiser mag.

There is just no excuse for the type of motorcycle reviews that RoadRunner has been doing.  There are so many fine road running motorcycles out there that a cruiser, scooter or dual sport should ever be in their mag.

If they were going to have KLR, or Vstrom in the mag is should be on a tour that is worthy of the bike like Alaska, South America, or Africa.  Not the back roads of VA.

The mag is hard to read right now, because the are trying to be everything to everybody and they should be focused roadrunning.

[sprint_st]

Ted,
I agree with just about every point you have made.  I also believe the people who set the direction of RR aren't going to change.  It's who they are.  When I purchase RR it is because of one or two articles only, usually ones that have one of those route map cards.  The frequency of me doing that has dropped off tremendously because I found their map cards to be less than "just OK."  I have ridden many of the areas in the Eastern US where they have produced articles.  They had some pretty picks but they sure missed a lot of great roads in favor of "just roads."

[DBrent]

I'm going to stick up for RoadRunner magazine, here. Publishing a magazine takes a lot of work, and I think RR does a pretty good job.  The magazine is celebrating its 10th anniversary, and the last numbers I saw had about 250,000 readers.

In today's publishing world, a magazine has to publish to a broad enough audience to make it successful. Christian and Christa's dream was to publish a high-end, slick-glossy motorcycle travel magazine that was not available in the USA. Basically, the magazine is about motorcycle travel, and today, a lot of scooter owners are doing just that, so RR is bringing those readers into the fold with two-wheel travel stories. Their reviews of bikes and scooters usually lean towards how they will "travel."

When Christian died, Christa took a pretty good shot at it, and I think it is better magazine because it has evolved with an experienced staff and pool of writers. A few comments here picked on the quality of stories, and I would agree with some of that. I had issues with the copy editor, and how he would rewrite stories. The magazine seemed to have one voice--his voice. Late last summer, that copy editor left the magazine, so the last issue or two have been under different copy editor pencils, and I have noticed a difference in the stories. Maybe you have too.

I no longer write for RR, but I think it is still the best motorcycle travel magazine out there, and yes, I still subscribe. Print has space restrictions. Magazines cannot give valuable space to endless photos of motorcycles on the highway. If it does not meet your needs, there are other outlets for your reading pleasure, like this forum. Christa reads all the e-mails sent to her, so fire her an e-mail if you have a concern.

If you want RR to be a magazine different than what it is, and you're not satisfied with Christa's response ... well ... go start your own magazine or web site. The power of the press belongs to those who own one.  

Brent
Writer & Photographer
Former professor of journalism and photojournalism

[Formerly Known as Bigfoot]

Good response Dbrent.  My issue as I stated before is not with the magazine as I still enjoy it.  It's all the syrupy sweet letters they publish in every issue from its readers.  I sent in a letter a couple years ago that basically stated I didn't buy the magazine to see them do articles on scooters.  Instead of publishing that they sent a personal response.  My letter would have been a break from all the good letters they publish and it wasn't nasty.

[RDY2GO!]

I enjoy RR for the most part.  Some of the content loses me, especially the over seas and dual sport stuff, but for the most part it's OK.

Now to truly show my age...  The last great, and I mean really great magazine was DIRT BIKE in the 70's while Rick Sieman, AKA "Super Hunky" was at the helm.  Now THAT was what an enthusiasts magazine should be!  Rick's writing style was just as an earlier poster described, like he was talking to a fellow rider.  He influenced many of his staffers and others, including myself, and because of that the magazine was a pure joy to read.

That being said... Because of finding myself with some available time here recently I signed up to be a free lance writer with an on-line outfit that I won't name.  To be honest I really wanted to see if I could write in a 'structured' environment.  I'm really struggling so far...  Still trying to get the very first piece done.  It seems like the very things that I think make something fun and easy to read is considered 'unprofessional' and not what their readers want.  Ehhhh, whatever...

A couple of years ago now I started a blog where I could post ride reports and photos to share with my family and friends.  I have a lot of fun with it and since starting it I have found that a lot of riders do this and that I really enjoy reading what they are up to and have to say.  It's a lot easier to write what you want and how you want when you aren't concerned with advertising dollars that provide you with a paycheck!

Bruce  

[soonerstan56]

How about focus.  Loose the scooter and the cruisers, and the dual sports.  While there are a few scooter, cruiser and dual sport riders that do run the roads; they are a small minority of your readers.  Most scooter, cruiser and dual sport riders do not run the roads.  They ride around town or go bar to bar.

Scooters:  You see them all over town.  If one wants to read about scooters, they buy scooter mags and go to scooter forums.

Cruisers:  Just how many high mileage cruisers can you find.  There are thousands and thousands of low mileage cruisers.  AKA cruiser bike is for cruising, not road running.  Cruiser running is twenty miles here twenty miles there.  I am sure I can go on to EBay right now and find 10,000 used cruiser bikes for sale with less that 10,000 miles on them.  One could say the average owner of a cruiser bike is not a road runner.

Dual Sports:  What is a dual sport?  It is a poor dirt bike and a poor road bike.  Stop writing articles about lame dirt roads. Stop writing about dual sports.  I doubt that any one trust your opinion about a dirt bike.  Let dirt bike mags write about dirt bikes.  If your riding your dual sport, chances are you know all the decent fire roads, dirt roads in your area that are close enough that you will not wear out your tires on the blacktop getting to it.  If your going to trailer your dual sport some where, your not riding dirt roads.  If you must write about dual sports write about some of the great trail systems that are worth taking your dual sport to like: Hatfield and McCoy Trail system, The Coal Creek (Windrock) trail system, The Land between the Lakes or the 3000 plus miles of trails in Michigan.  O wait the people that are intersted in that read dirt bike and ATV mags.  They are not buying RR to find this info.

Focus on your target market.  The riders that run the roads.  The people that put on thousands and thousands of miles.  You know the ones that think a ride is from gas tank to gas tank, not bar to bar.  The riders that go through two or three sets of tires each year.  The ones wear motorcycles out.  Not saying that you need to be an ironbutt, but if your bike is four years old and you have less than 10,000 miles on it, your not a road runner.  

Next test and ride and write about bikes that people who run the roads ride.
For instance:

Honda
VN700T, VFR, Gold Wing, ST1300 good bikes to write about and they are used for running the roads.  If your going to write about Honda and it is a VTX, a fury, a CBR, you're missing your target audience.

Kawasaki
Concours 14, maybe the Versys, or the KLR.  Do not write about the Vulcans or the Ninjas.

Yamaha
FJR, FZ1, FZ6, not YZF- R1 or any of the Royal Star line

Truimph
Sprint ST, the Tiger,  not Bonniville, or Daytona

KTM
990 Adventure no the RC8

Suzuki
Bandits, the Vstrom, and maybe the Busa...maybe  but not the GXSR, or the C50..C90, m109 whatever just stop it.

BMW
Well there are just plenty of BMWs that would be worthy of review as a road runner. Even though I am not a fan of BMW motorcycles.

Ducita
Multistrada 1200 not the 1198 or the Monster

All the not motorcycles are great bikes and I would ride any of them well all most any of them.  But none the less they are not road running motorcycles.  I would not pick up a roadrunner mag and expect to read about a C90.  Nice bike but if I want to read about a cruiser I would buy a cruiser mag.

There is just no excuse for the type of motorcycle reviews that RoadRunner has been doing.  There are so many fine road running motorcycles out there that a cruiser, scooter or dual sport should ever be in their mag.

If they were going to have KLR, or Vstrom in the mag is should be on a tour that is worthy of the bike like Alaska, South America, or Africa.  Not the back roads of VA.

The mag is hard to read right now, because the are trying to be everything to everybody and they should be focused roadrunning.

Good point Wilbornz,the last issue I purchased had a story of a guy flying into Dallas and renting a cruiser and riding for two days in West Texas.Not what I would call a road runner.

Stan

[advridermag]

We would lovde to have you try out Adventure Rider Magazine.  It is a small publication I recently started.  We have published a regional magazine for a couple of years and decided to start one with a bigger reach.  Our magazine focuses on people who ride their bikes for long distance adventure.  While we are not a sport touring magazine per se, we do cover long distance travel that might be of some interest to readers here.

My goal is to have a funny, irreverent magazine with lots of humor.  We plan to offer reviews on camping gear, how to pack and prepare your bike for long distance travel, and some interesting and unusual places to ride.  Each issue we try to have at least of a couple of really exotic locations (adventure riding in Afghanistan in our current issue) and 2-3 more normal destinations (the old forgotten parts of Route 66, adventure riding in Monument Valley & Big Bend TX area).

Adventure Rider Magazine is not some big corporation, just a bunch of adventure riding enthusiasts who decided to get together and publish a magazine.  We have had fantastic reviews and we are close to publishing our third issue.  Right now we don't have subscriptions available, you just have to order each issue as needed.  Soon we should have subscriptions availalbe.  Thanks and drop me line if you have questions.

[DBrent]

Adventure Rider Magazine is not some big corporation, just a bunch of adventure riding enthusiasts who decided to get together and publish a magazine.  We have had fantastic reviews and we are close to publishing our third issue.  Right now we don't have subscriptions available, you just have to order each issue as needed.  Soon we should have subscriptions availalbe.  Thanks and drop me line if you have questions.

It looks like you have an interesting magazine. I've sent you a PM.

Brent

[garry]

Now to truly show my age...  The last great, and I mean really great magazine was DIRT BIKE in the 70's while Rick Sieman, AKA "Super Hunky" was at the helm.  Now THAT was what an enthusiasts magazine should be!  Rick's writing style was just as an earlier poster described, like he was talking to a fellow rider.  He influenced many of his staffers and others, including myself, and because of that the magazine was a pure joy to read.

+1 on Super Hunky. Those early/mid 70s issues of Dirt Bike fueled my fire. They were as close as I was going to get to a bike for a couple years, then I finally convinced my parents to let me get a little KE100 enduro circa 1974.

Back on topic... I'm just asking for a motorcycle travel magazine to remember the motorcycle. I figure the roads, the bike (even the gear and gadgets) and the joy of getting a lean on are at least as important as the destination and where you ate/stayed. Have some fun with it. Take chances.  Don't be afraid to speak your mind, even if some readers might get pissed off or offended.

[JonS]

We would love to have you try out Adventure Rider Magazine.  It is a small publication I recently started.  We have published a regional magazine for a couple of years and decided to start one with a bigger reach.  Our magazine focuses on people who ride their bikes for long distance adventure.  While we are not a sport touring magazine per se, we do cover long distance travel that might be of some interest to readers here.

 Looks good! I bought an issue to check it out. Of course, I couldn't pass up an article dealing with my area.