Ride With #TheMotoSocial

Toronto can be perceived as an “every man for himself” type of city – a place where you can easily fall into the cement cracks devoid of community. But with monthly, summer events like #TheMotoSocial, it’s pretty hard to lone-wolf it, especially if you often find yourself perched in rush hour traffic on two wheels.

Since 2013, founders Viktor and Samantha Radics have leveraged motorcycles to remedy and serve a simple vision: to build community. Viktor explains, “We created #TheMotoSocial to see people connecting and building camaraderie. A night that was more about the people than the bikes themselves. An event that made our big cities feel a bit smaller.”

It was three summers back that they coupled up with a local cafe and spent a night with a few friends with one unifying purpose – to just hang. They had no agenda and no plan other than to talk shop and swap stories while inviting and meeting new friends without pretension, qualifications or prerequisites, either. Anyone is welcome and all are included. That’s it.

What started as half a dozen friends has now ballooned into hundreds who rumble the pavement as they herd in from all over the GTA. They line up like teeth in a long, winding, street grin and everyone melts over the sidewalks, ogling bikes, giving hugs and sipping coffee.

Right now, we want to continue positively influencing the world, bringing people together, building community and proving how important a welcoming community really is to humanity.

“We’ve watched #TheMotoSocial grow organically in Toronto from a small social gathering to an epic monthly hang of all kinds of people and motorbikes. Community is building while more and more new people continue to show up, chat, hang and connect. Long-term friendships are being made and the conversations are no longer only icebreakers or small talk,” Sam is proud to share. 

This spring, the Moto cup poured right over into the neighboring cities of Montreal and Ottawa – a debut welcomed and already quickly gaining ground. Sam describes the response and growth of #TheMotoSocial in these cities as super positive and encouraging. She beams, “We’re immediately seeing roughly 100-150 motorcycles show up each time along with a handful of friends who just cycle or walk down to hang. Everyone we’ve met so far has expressed how stoked they are about what the event is accomplishing in their city.”

So what’s next? Viktor sums up the future of #TheMotoSocial perfectly:

“Right now, we want to continue positively influencing the world, bringing people together, building community and proving how important a welcoming community really is to humanity. But we see the 196 countries in the world today and realize we’ve got a lot of ground to cover. Many of those countries have major cities, even larger than Toronto, with people needing a solid community.  So we’d like to see #TheMotoSocial being hosted every month in every major city around the world.”

-Interview and Photos by Danielle Kreeft