Issue link: http://trailridermagazine.uberflip.com/i/1545994
July 2026 came back, it was a vitamin D deficiency (write your own joke). In a way it really did feel comical. I went in afraid I was going to find out I had cancer or something. Turns out I needed to sit out in the sun like a damn houseplant. But the doctor told me it was no joke, and in cases like mine where there is a major deficiency, it causes severe fa gue and your immune system begins to fail. A er six months of taking a daily vitamin D supplement, I almost feel like myself again. Almost. It didn't help that I was quite depressed during this meframe. Nothing like a serious, nine-month-long commi ed rela onship ending by ge ng ghosted unexpectedly. No returning my calls, no returning my texts, nothing resembling closure for weeks. The kind of thing that makes you really ques on your worth and your judgment. Now let's talk about the other part of the equa- on, the bike. Rieju switched over to fuel injec on for the new model year and completely redid the engine and transmission as well. I'd ridden the new bike overseas at the last few rounds of EnduroGP, but we didn't get them in the States un l the begin- ning of this year. I never quite got comfortable on it in Europe, but assumed it was because I didn't have one to prac ce on here, so it just felt unfamiliar. Unfortunately, as I realized a er a week with one in the US… I flat out did not like the bike. There's nothing wrong with it. Plenty of other people seem to like it fine, and more than one person was convinced the problems were all in my head. But the way the engine made power was in complete opposi on to how I personally ride a motorcycle. It would be easy to fix if we had the correct so - ware and any knowledge of how to make fuel injec- on maps. Unfortunately, we did not, and Factory Rieju seemed equally lost. We tried all sorts of band-aid fixes. The closest we could get was gear- ing it very low, what we tried in Sicily that ini ally helped. This did make the bike feel be er, but then resulted in shi ing mid-corner, breaking the back end loose constantly, and all sorts of other "side-ef- fect" problems. Especially in American Enduro, every me I rode this motorcycle, I was frustrated and disappointed with how I felt on the bike. The one thing that's always been a release from all my other problems had become a 220-lb shiny red albatross around my neck. What are you supposed to do when you and your motorcycle have irreconcilable differences? You can't go to a marriage counselor, but you can go to John Ross.