There are a ton of posts on here by noobs looking at Gixxers, R6s, CBRs, etc that most agree have no business on one of them. Tonight I brought home a first bike for my wife. Its a little 250 Honda VTR. I have been riding for a little while and my wife is new so I rode it home. This bike makes about 25 hp and I am 225 lbs. Let me tell you I had a BLAST riding this thing. It handles great, acceleration is fast enough, its fairly comfortable, and it is a great bike to learn on. We paid $1100 for it and its in great shape. This is definately a good bike for a first timer. It rides very much like my VTR1000 just everything is easier to do on it. Yes I know everyone wants the cool sportbikes but do yourself and your family a favor and start out on something like this. You can always sell it to another Noob once you have some street time and move up to something b*****.