I'm going to toss my newbie $2 cents worth in, perhaps it might give you annother perspective, just what you need, right? I'm not sure of your background, here's mine- I was born and raised in South Florida, ie, a large city. I had a very shortlived bike experiance back when I was in my early 20's. I got ahold of a Triumph 650 Bonnie, and put a couple of thousand hair raising miles on it. Before I had a chance to do myself in, the engine on my racecar blew up, and the Bonnie got sacrificed to keep me going for a while (until I totaled that particular car, but thats annother story). We now fast foreward to 2004, when, due to various emotional and quite irrational impulses I got a brand new 2001 CA Special. I went to the bike school-MANDATORY, btw, and then had the bike shop deliver my Guzzi. I then spent the next several months riding around my neighborhood, on roads I knew, at 3 am. No cars to worry about, on roads I could drive in my sleep. I had one zero speed tip-over, thats all the wreaking that I have had on the CA. I then gradually, at my own pace, introduced cars into my riding enviroment. I started to venture onto the expressways. Before I left S Fla, I put over 2000 miles on the CA, and now have about 4,000 miles on the old boy. Into this process came a 2004 V11 Copa Italia. I had about 2, maybe 3 thousand miles total, and then got that, the deal fell down out of the sky via Ebay, I couldn't pass it up! Simply put, I love it. Its easier to ride than the CA, IMHO. It came with the titanium exhaust and the hot ECU. I've put about 2,000 miles on it. Now, in all this process I moved to the coast of Washington state. No freeways with kids driving around in suv's chattering on cell phones, just twisty roads, wet weather, logging trucks and deer that dont' seem to see anything. Demanding in its own way.
Bottom line- as a virtual biker newbie, I have survived my first 5,000 miles on two large displacement Guzzi's, and feel at home and comfortable on both machines. Will your experiance be like mine? Nothing is exactly the same, let me throw some things out at you. I had a lot of bike riding as a kid, and, off and on, kept riding. So my basic sense of balance stayed fairly active. In addition, I always have a stick shift somthing around. In bike school I noticed that the folks that had the most problems were those who lacked one of those two skills. In fact, a lady who had just learned to ride a bike at the age of 45 and had never driven stick, quit almost in tears on the first day. So I would say that you need to be completely natural with both of those skills. I don't know if this is a factor or not, but I have a far amount of car racing experiance. I've got some years of both oval and road racing. Stock cars, open wheel midgets, a couple of years in SCCA formula ford, I've hot lapped a hydroplane, raced at Sebring, etc. I suppose that factors in somewhere in the transision to bikes.
So...could you get a Ballabio and live thru the learning curve? I think you could. IF, and that is IF you have above average hand-eye coordination, good eyesite and have two wheel balance already in place. Assuming you have a certain amount of common sense, yes, you can get thru it. Honestly, i don't think getting a dirt bike and learning how to wreck will accomplish a lot, unless your a 20 somthing generation whatever. If your a boomer, you don't need to go there, but thats my opinion, and I could easilly be wrong. Go thru the school, get your bike from a local, reputable shop, do ALL, repeat ALL of your beginning riding around your neighborhood and roads, and introduce traffic at your own speed. Then, I think you should be ok. Hope this helps:)
