A Wannabe is somebody who admires the adventures of others, would love too enjoy that lfestyle, but has other commitnents (family, house, career, etc) that at this time in their lives, are of higher priority than longtime adventure. Their own adventure maybe only limited too a couple of weeks at a time living a dream in short bite size chunks rather than taking the whole cake.

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engjacques
09 R1200GS. 06 Royal Star Tour Deluxe

This is my point why do people describe the famous one and his mate as wannabe's and why if you have clean aluminium panniers are you a wannabe i have even seen it said that if you ride a big German motorcycle to work you may be in the category of wannabe I just find the definition or at least how people view others as odd.

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Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do.

For me the term wannabe simply refers to someone who want to be something else then he/she is.

IMHO they come inn all flavors and colors and can't be identified by the brand of their bike. I'm not sure if C+E are wannabes, they managed to do their daily lives more interesting and I can't see they are claiming they are something they are not.


I have been looking for a word for "pretend to be", maybe pretobe. :confused1:

C&E started the wannabe thing, but they actually did it, so whatever you might think they are not IMHO wannabes.

I'm married, mortgage, **** job to pay for everything etc. Forgetting I used to be single with an F650 with tin boxes and used to think nothing of heading to the top of Norway or Morocco or into Russia. That aside, I'm prime material to be an "Image" rider. The latest "image" is what E&C started. Blokes in my age group with my comittments who havn't a cat in hells chance of getting further than Italy until little Jonny gets a job when he's about 45 and finally gets chucked out of education can buy the image. You go send off for the Touratech catalogue and while you wait for it to turn up you order something for £12K from BMW and get yourself down to Horrible Gherkin for the Arai and a helmet cam. Once equipped with your hard things and laser cut titanium spork you can then dress up and go say "extreme" and "Totally extreme" down the local cafe. They could manage with a set of throwovers on an R1200R, but that wouldn't be "extreme". It's playing dress up just like all those accountants on their Bad Boy Harleys who'd have heart attacks (or tut alot) if anyone did anything actually bad.

I find these blokes odd as I'd buy the throwovers and a lot of petrol (most of it for the *****y lawn mower these days), but each to their own.

Andy

I think you have it Andy they are described as wannabe's but they are in fact image bikers. Have to agree petrol to me is more important than metal mules but hey if you have it why not.

The good news so far then is im not an image biker 3001 km around Thailand on a 250 with throw overs wont get me in that club I guess.

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Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do.

You all are wannabes in someone else's eyes (and me!)

either that or you have no dreams, ambition or just damned stupid ideas drifting round your mind ......

I think it's just silly trying to classify/look down upon anyon-get on with your own dream!

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Ollie

www.jollyfollies.com

Land's End to Sydney 2009

What about a metric.

Feel free to add/refine propose alternative measures....

Wannebee hard core travel metric:
If the ratio of the cost of your trip(s) (excluding bike and equipement) divided by what you paid for your bike and equipment is:

• <0.1 you're a hardcore wannabee
• between 0.1 and 0.5 you're definetly a wannabee
• between 0.5 and 2 you're the average traveler
• between 2 and 5 you're a kandidate adventure traveler
• between 5 and 10 you're an adventure traveler
• >10 you're an hardcore adventure travel.

Maybe we should ad a parameter adjusting for the average cost per day of a trip and a multiplication factor for the number of passports you had to replace because they are full.
Negative points for sponshorship, and blogs explaining all the mods and meals
Positive points for nights slept outside, ...

If we do this properly, everyone can easily find out what exactly his status is. With knowledge of your status, you can confidently adopt an apropriate behavior in about any social context.

Reading the contributions from other parts of the world, I'm guessing the "image biker" thing is still pretty limited to Harley and it's associates outside these islands?

For those who are confused we have biker tribes here. The cruiser-pirate-bad boy I'm guessing is pretty familiar to you all, while the sportsbike-power ranger will be known as a squid or squib in North America? In the UK we now have groups of R1200GS's, F800GS and New Tenere's with square, aluminium coloured boxes you could live in for a week roaming at least twenty miles from home to queue up and actually ride through a ford that might be a whole 6-inches deep.

The whole tribal thing, as you will imagine is highly disruptive and counter productive when trying to get sense out organisations outside our little bikey world. I'm reasonably used to European bike clubs where ten riders might turn up on ten different makes and everything from a Harley to a classic Ducati to an XT350. This has a much more positive effect as when the Harley guy fancies a long trip he's more likely to end up with a XT600 and ex-military bags having talked to XT350 guy than a brand new R1200GS and a trillion pounds worth of laser cut ally having googled that actors name.

The trend that will wind me up is some of the rat bike fakers. When my insurance goes up and people start stealing 15 year old MZ's and XBR's because they sell to clowns with pots of matt black paint who want to follow that particular trend I will not be happy.

Andy