At a recent family party one of the guests was a local county judge.
The judge's son is about 12-14 years old and has some type of disease (I think cerebal palsey)
He is a very nice kid and I enjoyed playing basketball with him and my nephews.

I had my wheeler in the back of my truck, and when he saw it his eyes just lit up. We talked about it for awhile and I learned that he had never been on any type of motorcycle/atv/go-cart, etc..
Well, as someone who grew up riding anything with an engine I really felt sorry for him, so I asked his parents if it would be O.K. if I took him for a ride. His mom was very skeptical and I explained that I would take it very easy and that of course I had a helmet for him to wear. She eventually said O.K..

Well, you would have thought I just gave this kid a million dollars when I asked him if he would like to go for a ride.

He had an absolute blast on the ride and his face was beaming when we would pass by his parents. He was hooting and hollaring and just having a good old time. (I don't think I ever got out of 2nd gear)

After the ride his parents couldn't thank me enough.

I like to think that doing small things like this will help perpetuate our sport, although to be honest I wasn't thinking of that at the time, I just thought that it would be a neat experience for the kid.

I know how you feel....

I live in the city...which means a trailer trip anytime I want to ride....Or risk the 3-4 block ride to the fields.
Anyways...whenever I start up a wheeler for tune up..whatever, I get a whole driveway full of the neighborhood kids. It was totally annoying at first...question after question.

When can I have a ride? can I drive it? How much? How fast? My dads car is faster!!

One day one of the kids brings his dad over to show him my wheelers....I could not get rid of either of them...So offered to have them follow me over to my riding area and I would give him a ride. Of course they jumped at that...They loaded up their mini van with , I think, every 10 year old for miles.

The look on that 9 year olds face was priceless...and I think his dad did a double take too.... They grinned and screamed etc. etc.

They actually left the riding area after I ran out of fuel. And went right over to the atv dealer and bought their own... Now their driveway is full of kids. :)

Makes you feel good to introduce then to such a great past time .

I think thats awesome. Like you said not only does it support our sport you can at least make someone's day and give them a memory they will never forget. Something us ATV'ers never really think about when we just hope on our bike and go ridin! Its great to hear that people hold such a great interest in our sport. It's really not fair when people hear ATV and they think "dagerous" "wreckless" "ruining our environment" I myself have been in a similar scenario. The kids had an absolute ball. I let the kids ride a little bit ofcourse with me holding the handlebars.......Man and my parents call me wreckless! =-) The only word in those kids vocabulary is FASTER! I think what you did was great.

Cool post, makes ya feel all warm and fuzzy inside....

RoostKing...

These are great stories. These are the kind of things our sport needs to improve its image.

Those first ATV rides are something the kids will take with forever.

That's excellent guys, just excellent !!!

When I was about 14, I was the annoying liitle kid trying to get a ride! A local guy decided to give out rides one day and it really marked me for life...in a good way! I had my trusty cam-corder on those rides. It is a good memory to relive every so often.

Now it is me who gives my little cousins' rides...they just love it too!

sqooze,
And all this time I thought I was the only one who had discovered the way to make MY day!
During the cooler months of the year in Az I usually ride at our local cycle park which has a large parking area with remadas, grills, johns, etc. Weekends are generally pretty crowded with families many of whom aren't riders. With a long career involving kids I recognize "the Look" on a kid's face when he's wishing for a ride. Usually the parents are agreeable after some assurances he won't be back in a basket;), and as you said thelook on their faces is one of pure ecstasy. The real beneficiary, of course, is me, in being able to re-live the simple pleasures of a boy or girl. I think one of the main reasons I go there so often is to get another "fix" on that high. A side benefit is that some of these kids have their own rides now, even racing MX, and some of them call me from time to time to go riding with them. Since my two boys have gone to be with the Lord, I am so blessed to have that relationship.
I just had to respond to your excellent post.

The attitudes reflected in this post show that there are those in this sport that really do care about other people. Many times ATVers are portayed as stuck up tuff guys that are only there to molest the environment and injure themselves. It is good to know that most ATVers are like those in this post. However...there are still those that would complain and say that ATVing wackos are still endangering these children by demonstrating to them the IMproper way to ride a quad, namely 2 at a time. I and certainly all who have posted to this message would not agree, but we still must be careful since there are those that only look for the bad in the sport and not the good.

That may be the best post ever to show up on this site. Amazing how something that seems so insignificant and taken for granted by so many can mean so much to one person. That will come back to you many times over.