Sue Slate, the Women’s Motorcyclist Foundation National Programs Chair and a Kawasaki Motorcycle representative, does not let her 29 inch inseam prevent her from riding a motorcycle with a 35 inch seat height. Her main ride is a Kawasaki KLR 650 dual sport bike.
Slate did not want to compromise the bikes performance by lowering the suspension. After lowering her bike’s seat height by changing to a thinner gel seat, she added more thickness to the sole of her boots. Slate’s boots now have soles that are 3 inches thick. A notch cut in the sole of the left boot to enables her to shift.
This wasn’t the first time Slate had used this solution. “They’re like growth rings” that follow my motorcycle history, she said. She started on a Harley and moved onto BMW and Kawasaki dual-sports. Each bikes had a higher seat height, which required her to add thickness to the boots.
“The nice thing is you can do this with any pair of boots”, she said. To thicken the soles, a layer is glued onto the existing sole.
That Slate found an innovative solution to a common problem isn’t out of character. In 1993 she decided to focus her energy on fighting breast cancer and organized a dual-sport ride to the Arctic Circle to raise money. Since the success of the first tour, Slate founded the Women’s Motorcyclist Foundation, which has raised over 2.2 million dollars for breast cancer research.
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