Today was absolutely beautiful for riding. Sunny, clear, high 60's to low 70's. So perfect that I couldn't resist. I had a ton of stuff I needed to do today. TONS! As most of you know, and some of you have pointed out, da 'Train gets way too much Zaino and not near enough miles. Well, today I finally made myself say FUG the chores and responsibility, I'm hittin' the road. So off I went.
My mood today called for mellow cruising and a little mild twisty action. Nothing serious, just some fun corners to remind me that I ain't ridin' a Hardley or some other bike that won't turn.
I didn't even loft the front tire when I rode through my old street racing stomping grounds. How's that for restraint!?! Yeah, Bullet can hold back when he WANTS to. Hehehehehe...
Ya see, I've been trying to piece together a little riding "circuit" around where I live. You know, some roads that don't really push my skills. Roads that simply re-enforce good riding habits and provide valuable seat time, also known as therapy, for when I don't have the time or inclination to ride further away for some real riding. I want my li'l circuit to be at least 30-40 miles. Enough to feel like I've rode, but not so much that I can't ride it if I'm kinda limited on time.
Prior to today I had sort of come up with a decent little circuit but it just didn't give enough seat time. Maybe 20 miles. Since my mood was callin' for easy ridin' today I decided to cruise my normal route and then hit a few new roads that I thought would extend my circuit just the right amount. Off I go. The usual circuit rolls by too quickly as usual and was pretty uneventful except for one car that kinda wanted my lane in a corner. It wasn't going very fast and the driver saw me so he whipped it back into his lane. Hell, at least he was watchin' the road! That's better than 90% of the fools around my area.
After I run out of road on my normal route I hit the first of the new additions to my road course. Let me tell ya, it felt great to go on across that intersection instead of turning left to head for the house after such a short ride. New road #1 rolls by smoothly. So does #'s 2, 3, 4, and 5. Then I hang a left on new road #6. I've driven this road many times at moderate to high speeds in cages. It has a fair amount of curves but nothing really tight. So I'm rolling through at a cruising rate not pushing anything, just feeling the road out for the first time on a bike. We all know that a road takes on a whole different character when we're on two instead of four, right?
Corner after corner goes by without incident, but then it happens... I come up on a little off camber corner on a hill crest a little hot. Again, I'm not pushing the busa hard at all, I'm just cruising. I see it coming so I grab a little front brake to scrub off a little speed before I enter the turn. I slowed to probably 30-35 mph and make my corner entry, feeling good about my entry speed. The corner goes left and the banking is to the right.
As I start my lean the busa just ain't turnin'. She's going WAY wide. I maintain my composure at that point and just lean more thinking that she will pull the corner off but just barely. Well, she still ain't turnin'. She's still drifting toward the edge of the blacktop. I'm leaned further than I have EVER leaned 'er and she just isn't going to make the damned turn! The tires have already crossed the white fog line and slipped a little there. Don't know how in the fug she didn't lowside then. Pucker factor almost pegged out!
To make things worse, this road has been resurfaced several times. The drop off at the edge of the asphalt is probably between 6 and 8 inches (Pimpbike can attest to the fact that a LOT of the roads around where we live are this way.) Well, I figured if I went off that drop with her at full friggin' lean it was all over. There was no way the pegs and bodywork would clear the edge of the roadway at the angle of lean I was holding. I figured as soon as the tires left the edge the peg and bodywork would catch and I'd be flippin' 'er.
There was no way I was going to keep the tires on the road. Luckily at that point I was actually at the exit of the corner and entering a short straight. The only option I could think of that might keep me up was to stand 'er up and get 'er off the edge without draggin' or catchin' the road edge. A split second before the tires dropped off the edge I flicked 'er straight up and angled off of the edge into the grass. I went about 75 feet or so on the shoulder never getting more than maybe 1.5 feet from the road edge, hoping like Hell that the ground wasn't mushy from the recent rain. It was mushy though. She got loose and skated a little. Luckily I kept it up despite not having any real traction. As soon as I could I angled back onto the roadway and continued on. As I rolled away from that corner I wiggled back and forth on the seat trying to loosen from my rectum the patch of seat cover that it bit out when I left the road's edge.
Folks, that's as close as I have come to going down on the busa. There were two different times during the incident at which I mentally prepared myself to go down. The first was when she wiggled her ass crossing the fog line. The second was when she left the roadway and started skating on the wet ground. Both times I just knew it was past the point of no return. Even so, I refused to just panic and go down. I can't tell you how proud I was that I didn't just panic and freeze up. If I had given up this story would without a doubt have had a sad ending.
I've got mixed feeling about the incident. First and foremost, I'm happier than I can put into words that I didn't go down. I'm also just as relieved that I didn't panic and lose my head. Not only was this the closest I've been to dropping the busa, it's the closest I've been to crashing any street bike. I've always wanted to believe that I wouldn't panic and that I'd try everything I could to pull it out no matter what I got into. That may not be the case next time, but today it was. Makes me feel much better about my riding mindset.
On the other hand, I still am not sure why I went so friggin' wide layed down as far as I was. I didn't scrape the peg or anything but I did kinda scuff what little chicken strip I had on the left side of the tire. I was using all the tire I had so I know it was leaned over. I've taken off camber corners before. I've even taken them a little harder than I took this one. All I can figure is that my weight transfer was wrong because I wasn't getting back on the throttle and pulling some weight off that tiny front tire. Recalling what I've read in Twist of the Wrist I'm almost 99% certain that I just overtaxed the traction/turning abilities of the front tire. I guess the ol' roll off survival reaction got me.
I'm still running through this incident in my head, trying to understand it so that maybe I can prepare mentally in case it happens again. Maybe if I had gave 'er a little throttle and took some weight off the front she would have made the turn. Keith Code says that rollin' off in the corner when you're going wide only makes you go wider. That HAS to be what happened...
Oh well, me and da 'Train survived to try it again. Live and learn! Just thought I'd share my experience. Typing it here and going through it in my mind has actually sort of clarified it a little for me. I didn't realize that I had rolled off the throttle until I was typing the last couple of paragraphs above. Replaying it in my head to share it with you helped me realize what I had done. That alone was worth every key stroke.
Sorry this is so long but since I didn't have anyone to talk with about it, typing it here was the next best way to review and analyze it. I've got to get TOTW back out and re-read it. I've also got to RIDE more so I can keep improving my skills.
Take care and get out and ride if your weather allows!
<!--EDIT|BulletTrain
Reason for Edit: None given...|1069462456 -->
My mood today called for mellow cruising and a little mild twisty action. Nothing serious, just some fun corners to remind me that I ain't ridin' a Hardley or some other bike that won't turn.
I didn't even loft the front tire when I rode through my old street racing stomping grounds. How's that for restraint!?! Yeah, Bullet can hold back when he WANTS to. Hehehehehe... Ya see, I've been trying to piece together a little riding "circuit" around where I live. You know, some roads that don't really push my skills. Roads that simply re-enforce good riding habits and provide valuable seat time, also known as therapy, for when I don't have the time or inclination to ride further away for some real riding. I want my li'l circuit to be at least 30-40 miles. Enough to feel like I've rode, but not so much that I can't ride it if I'm kinda limited on time.
Prior to today I had sort of come up with a decent little circuit but it just didn't give enough seat time. Maybe 20 miles. Since my mood was callin' for easy ridin' today I decided to cruise my normal route and then hit a few new roads that I thought would extend my circuit just the right amount. Off I go. The usual circuit rolls by too quickly as usual and was pretty uneventful except for one car that kinda wanted my lane in a corner. It wasn't going very fast and the driver saw me so he whipped it back into his lane. Hell, at least he was watchin' the road! That's better than 90% of the fools around my area.
After I run out of road on my normal route I hit the first of the new additions to my road course. Let me tell ya, it felt great to go on across that intersection instead of turning left to head for the house after such a short ride.
New road #1 rolls by smoothly. So does #'s 2, 3, 4, and 5. Then I hang a left on new road #6. I've driven this road many times at moderate to high speeds in cages. It has a fair amount of curves but nothing really tight. So I'm rolling through at a cruising rate not pushing anything, just feeling the road out for the first time on a bike. We all know that a road takes on a whole different character when we're on two instead of four, right? Corner after corner goes by without incident, but then it happens... I come up on a little off camber corner on a hill crest a little hot. Again, I'm not pushing the busa hard at all, I'm just cruising. I see it coming so I grab a little front brake to scrub off a little speed before I enter the turn. I slowed to probably 30-35 mph and make my corner entry, feeling good about my entry speed. The corner goes left and the banking is to the right.
As I start my lean the busa just ain't turnin'. She's going WAY wide. I maintain my composure at that point and just lean more thinking that she will pull the corner off but just barely. Well, she still ain't turnin'. She's still drifting toward the edge of the blacktop. I'm leaned further than I have EVER leaned 'er and she just isn't going to make the damned turn! The tires have already crossed the white fog line and slipped a little there. Don't know how in the fug she didn't lowside then. Pucker factor almost pegged out!
To make things worse, this road has been resurfaced several times. The drop off at the edge of the asphalt is probably between 6 and 8 inches (Pimpbike can attest to the fact that a LOT of the roads around where we live are this way.) Well, I figured if I went off that drop with her at full friggin' lean it was all over. There was no way the pegs and bodywork would clear the edge of the roadway at the angle of lean I was holding. I figured as soon as the tires left the edge the peg and bodywork would catch and I'd be flippin' 'er.
There was no way I was going to keep the tires on the road. Luckily at that point I was actually at the exit of the corner and entering a short straight. The only option I could think of that might keep me up was to stand 'er up and get 'er off the edge without draggin' or catchin' the road edge. A split second before the tires dropped off the edge I flicked 'er straight up and angled off of the edge into the grass. I went about 75 feet or so on the shoulder never getting more than maybe 1.5 feet from the road edge, hoping like Hell that the ground wasn't mushy from the recent rain. It was mushy though. She got loose and skated a little. Luckily I kept it up despite not having any real traction. As soon as I could I angled back onto the roadway and continued on. As I rolled away from that corner I wiggled back and forth on the seat trying to loosen from my rectum the patch of seat cover that it bit out when I left the road's edge.
Folks, that's as close as I have come to going down on the busa. There were two different times during the incident at which I mentally prepared myself to go down. The first was when she wiggled her ass crossing the fog line. The second was when she left the roadway and started skating on the wet ground. Both times I just knew it was past the point of no return. Even so, I refused to just panic and go down. I can't tell you how proud I was that I didn't just panic and freeze up. If I had given up this story would without a doubt have had a sad ending.
I've got mixed feeling about the incident. First and foremost, I'm happier than I can put into words that I didn't go down. I'm also just as relieved that I didn't panic and lose my head. Not only was this the closest I've been to dropping the busa, it's the closest I've been to crashing any street bike. I've always wanted to believe that I wouldn't panic and that I'd try everything I could to pull it out no matter what I got into. That may not be the case next time, but today it was. Makes me feel much better about my riding mindset.
On the other hand, I still am not sure why I went so friggin' wide layed down as far as I was. I didn't scrape the peg or anything but I did kinda scuff what little chicken strip I had on the left side of the tire. I was using all the tire I had so I know it was leaned over. I've taken off camber corners before. I've even taken them a little harder than I took this one. All I can figure is that my weight transfer was wrong because I wasn't getting back on the throttle and pulling some weight off that tiny front tire. Recalling what I've read in Twist of the Wrist I'm almost 99% certain that I just overtaxed the traction/turning abilities of the front tire. I guess the ol' roll off survival reaction got me.
I'm still running through this incident in my head, trying to understand it so that maybe I can prepare mentally in case it happens again. Maybe if I had gave 'er a little throttle and took some weight off the front she would have made the turn. Keith Code says that rollin' off in the corner when you're going wide only makes you go wider. That HAS to be what happened...
Oh well, me and da 'Train survived to try it again. Live and learn! Just thought I'd share my experience. Typing it here and going through it in my mind has actually sort of clarified it a little for me. I didn't realize that I had rolled off the throttle until I was typing the last couple of paragraphs above. Replaying it in my head to share it with you helped me realize what I had done. That alone was worth every key stroke.
Sorry this is so long but since I didn't have anyone to talk with about it, typing it here was the next best way to review and analyze it. I've got to get TOTW back out and re-read it. I've also got to RIDE more so I can keep improving my skills.
Take care and get out and ride if your weather allows!
<!--EDIT|BulletTrain
Reason for Edit: None given...|1069462456 -->
Good Job keepin' her up. I wouldn't even want to see those pictures of the Train. 
G.I. Joe ain't got shiot on the grip my ass had on that friggin' seat cover, bro! 
