Dunno if anyone's said it, but don't buy what's expensive or cheap, buy what fits.
I'm unfortunate as Shoei fits my spherical bonce, me Da gets away with cheaper lids as he as a more oval head. Try a few on starting with the cheapest and working up in price until you hit the right one for you.
Same goes for all the other kit as well.
My first proper set cost something like
Lid: Shoei £300
Jacket: Old Frank Thomas from a Charity shop £15
Jeans: BKS from the bike show £50
Gloves Alpinestars from the bike show £50
Boots: Alpinestars, you guessed it, from the bike show £50
Back Protector: Alpinestars. bike show £50
So half decent summer kit for less than £600 all in, one of the good things about the bike show is a lot of the big shops, like J&S which is where most of my kit came from, use it to punt on the unpopular colours of last years kit at pretty big discounts.
Gotta say, if I had the choice between a £200 lid and cash or a £600 lid, I'd be buying better gloves.
I have been pretty conservative on the above My Helmet, gloves and boots would be £700, £500 and £250 respectively.
Hang on - you bought gloves for £500?!
Interesting thread though, been thinking for a while myself of doing CBT then DAS, whether I end up buying a bike I'm not sure (I crash enough exploring the limits of adhesion when cornering on my road bike, don't think I'd want to do that at motorbike speeds). A eMotorbike would be tempting though but not looked into how far advanced they are at the minute
There's really no need to go bonkers on kit.
I bought the wife some Alpinestars GP Pro gloves for £60 worn twice.. I've bought TCX boots for £110 or Oxtar etc, in fact unless you go for Daytona it's hard to spend more than £200 on boots.
Jackets, seriously, Ebay. The number of leather/textile jackets that are on ebay after a few times is ridiclous, these are selling for 20% of the purchase price mostly.
Took my CBT via a firm in Devizes, straight onto Direct Access. Passed my test on a tuesday and picked up a Triumph 955i on the Saturday. Still alive
Moved onto trail riding a few years later, WR400cc which I used for trail riding / converted to a supermotard and took it round tracks (Pembrey mostly) where it was good fun and kept ahead of a good few bigger bikes.
Spend money on kit in line with what your end goals are - i knew i was going to get a sportsbike when I set out, so bought decent gear (Arai lid etc) - cheaper options are available now that are pretty good.
How big a bike you need really depends on where you are going to use it / top speed etc. You could use a 125 everywhere - but a bit more cc makes life a bit easier. I'd probably look at a 450cc motard for around town, more resistant to being dropped when you do so... Get good locks
