Another month come and gone, with mostly the mundane to report: a lot of waiting to recover from last month’s entry; dealing with a water heater flooding the basement, that kind of thing.
I went up to Lake George for Americade today, with plans to return again tomorrow. I’ve been going up when the weather mostly cooperates -- I’ve seen 50 degrees and cold rain one day, followed by 90 degrees and sunburn the next -- on and off, since it began in the late ‘80’s. This year there was a mission: ride street fighters. This is a category of motorcycle which began from rebuilding sportbikes after they’d been crashed, losing most of their bodywork. They have an aggressive rearset peg position, but higher, straighter bars for a more upright riding position, VS my stretch to clip-ons.
My desire to look into this class of motorcycle has been enhanced suddenly by injury last month and the realization that time marches on. I hate that. It may be a blast to ride my GSX-R750 for short bursts, but longer stints are not so much fun. There is a lot of weight bias on my wrists and strain on shoulders and lower back that are really reducing the fun of riding. Aside from temps in the high 40’s this morning as I started the 60ish mile sprint north, the pain in my right wrist resulting from the crash last month was very annoying. It may be time to pursue options.
Choices are limited, but today I rode a Triumph Speed Triple. This may be the bike credited with starting the genre. With it’s 1050 engine and short wheelbase, it was a blast to ride. It handles great and the power never seems overwhelming or scary. Some bikes are just user friendly and you don’t have to worry so much about them jumping up and biting you. This bike is also just plain cool with it’s trick single-sided swingarm to it’s bug-eyed lights. Downsides include: it’s a bit pricey, and not for sale within 150 miles of my house.
Last ride of the day was a Kawasaki Z1000. Purpose built, this bike uses some form of the engine found in the monster ZX-10 and has no lack of steam. Riding impressions included “This thing will leave the Speed Triple for dead.” While it may not have the Triumph’s classic, “just crashed an expensive European sportbike” organic form, it makes tons of power and has razor sharp handling. Some of the Transformer styling cues can be overcome in the aftermarket, and other plusses include it’s 3/4’s the price of the Triumph and available 6 miles from my house.
Both of these bikes were great fun to ride, and neither caused me physical distress. The circumstances presented allowed me to ride the big Kawi at about twice the speed of the Triumph, and while I’d like to ride them back-2-back, I’m pretty sure the Z1000 provides more grins per mile.
Wednesday, June 6, 2007
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
“One of these things, is not like the other...”
“One of these things doesn’t belong...”
This past weekend I was over at a friend’s house with a couple other guys, helping to create a new dirtbike trail on his land. We cut down some trees, cleared some brush, that sort of thing. In the afternoon it was declared time to ride a little on existing trails behind his property. Let me state up front that I’m not a big fan of trail riding. Dirt moves. Trails in the woods are seldom laid down by bulldozers and are therefore best traversed by more stable 4-wheelers, and goats. There tends to be mud and water pits and loose sand in every turn, trees just off to each side, and it’s generally something that takes a lot of effort and concentration to get around in tact.
Apparently, I was low on those things. We had made 5 or so laps of a circuit that felt like about a mile of riding, though I don’t know how long it is. Of the 4 of us, I brought up the rear and was always the last back to the rest stop, so as I arrived, everyone took off for the next lap. After about the 5th lap we ALL actually rested for a minute, then it was decided to try a different circuit, which proved to be too swampy, so the leader spun around and headed off in another direction and we ended up back on the main circuit, running some of it backwards. I finally recognized where we were when I made the sharp left, down the steep hill and through the mud-filled water crossing, up the other side, sharp left-right-left, up the long steep hill, sharp left and onto the long straight for a hundred yards or so.
At the end of the straight there’s a rusted out heap of some very old vehicle, so take a right and start down and back to the resting area. About 15 yards before the end of this straight is an uneven outcropping of slate several inches tall that acts as a ramp when you hit it. I’d already hit it 5 times, landed and made the right turn. This time around: not so good. Part of it was some fatigue and part of it was I hit it in 4th and not 3rd and I traveled too far, fixated on the pile-O-junk car, landed badly and crashed. Lemme tell ya, crashing sux. The bike sort of folded out to the right and I crashed to the left.
Now, as my years advance, I try to be an observer of All The Gear All The Time. I’m going to tell you that I’m very, very happy that I was wearing what I was. Chinbar of my helmet kept my face out of the ground. I have about 6” of scrapes on my left arm/elbow where my elbow/forearm protector was driven into my arm. I have some scratches on my left leg where my knee protector/shin guard was driven into my leg. I threw out the pants I was wearing as the knee was ripped out.
Honda runs an ad campaign that says “Stupid Hurts”. Unfortunately, I was wearing work-boots and did not have on my heavy riding boots. In retrospect, it seems that when I fell forward to the left, my foot did not come off the peg quickly enough and I hyper-extended it backwards as I rotated. A bit unpleasant, that. I stood up and hobbled around doing the time tested “If I can stand, things aren’t broken too badly” analysis. After a couple minutes the others came back to find out where I was, straighten my handle bars and clutch lever and we decided to call it a day and rode back out.
I loaded up, drove my manual tranny truck home 30 miles, which meant clutching about 500 times, unloaded and then swelled, not in a good way. I went to the emergency room Sunday morning just to be sure, and after a few relaxing hours of sitting around, I was told my X-rays looked okay, just a bad sprain and take this aircast with you. Later, the ER Dr. called and said bad news, the Radiologist looked over the xrays and sees that there’s a fracture of the Talus which could mean a hard cast, and why don’t you come on back in for a set of crutches and get follow-up on Monday. I said okay, I’ll think about coming back in to the hospital.... and then I went to a birthday party instead.
Monday I snapped these pics before going off to see the family Orthopedic surgeon, 'cause doesn't every family have one, just in case I ended up with a cast. It may not be a good sign when these guys know you by sight, and asks how the kids are doing (who he has treated....). I told him what had happened. He looked over the xrays then back to me and said "How old are you?".... and said the “fracture” was merely a chip off the edge of the Talus from when the two bones came together. Nothing for it, otherwise just a bad sprain. Get rid of the dirtbike and you should be fine. I said okay, I’d think about it.
This past weekend I was over at a friend’s house with a couple other guys, helping to create a new dirtbike trail on his land. We cut down some trees, cleared some brush, that sort of thing. In the afternoon it was declared time to ride a little on existing trails behind his property. Let me state up front that I’m not a big fan of trail riding. Dirt moves. Trails in the woods are seldom laid down by bulldozers and are therefore best traversed by more stable 4-wheelers, and goats. There tends to be mud and water pits and loose sand in every turn, trees just off to each side, and it’s generally something that takes a lot of effort and concentration to get around in tact.
Apparently, I was low on those things. We had made 5 or so laps of a circuit that felt like about a mile of riding, though I don’t know how long it is. Of the 4 of us, I brought up the rear and was always the last back to the rest stop, so as I arrived, everyone took off for the next lap. After about the 5th lap we ALL actually rested for a minute, then it was decided to try a different circuit, which proved to be too swampy, so the leader spun around and headed off in another direction and we ended up back on the main circuit, running some of it backwards. I finally recognized where we were when I made the sharp left, down the steep hill and through the mud-filled water crossing, up the other side, sharp left-right-left, up the long steep hill, sharp left and onto the long straight for a hundred yards or so.
At the end of the straight there’s a rusted out heap of some very old vehicle, so take a right and start down and back to the resting area. About 15 yards before the end of this straight is an uneven outcropping of slate several inches tall that acts as a ramp when you hit it. I’d already hit it 5 times, landed and made the right turn. This time around: not so good. Part of it was some fatigue and part of it was I hit it in 4th and not 3rd and I traveled too far, fixated on the pile-O-junk car, landed badly and crashed. Lemme tell ya, crashing sux. The bike sort of folded out to the right and I crashed to the left.
 |
| Wrong foot Right foot |
Now, as my years advance, I try to be an observer of All The Gear All The Time. I’m going to tell you that I’m very, very happy that I was wearing what I was. Chinbar of my helmet kept my face out of the ground. I have about 6” of scrapes on my left arm/elbow where my elbow/forearm protector was driven into my arm. I have some scratches on my left leg where my knee protector/shin guard was driven into my leg. I threw out the pants I was wearing as the knee was ripped out.
Honda runs an ad campaign that says “Stupid Hurts”. Unfortunately, I was wearing work-boots and did not have on my heavy riding boots. In retrospect, it seems that when I fell forward to the left, my foot did not come off the peg quickly enough and I hyper-extended it backwards as I rotated. A bit unpleasant, that. I stood up and hobbled around doing the time tested “If I can stand, things aren’t broken too badly” analysis. After a couple minutes the others came back to find out where I was, straighten my handle bars and clutch lever and we decided to call it a day and rode back out.
I loaded up, drove my manual tranny truck home 30 miles, which meant clutching about 500 times, unloaded and then swelled, not in a good way. I went to the emergency room Sunday morning just to be sure, and after a few relaxing hours of sitting around, I was told my X-rays looked okay, just a bad sprain and take this aircast with you. Later, the ER Dr. called and said bad news, the Radiologist looked over the xrays and sees that there’s a fracture of the Talus which could mean a hard cast, and why don’t you come on back in for a set of crutches and get follow-up on Monday. I said okay, I’ll think about coming back in to the hospital.... and then I went to a birthday party instead.
Monday I snapped these pics before going off to see the family Orthopedic surgeon, 'cause doesn't every family have one, just in case I ended up with a cast. It may not be a good sign when these guys know you by sight, and asks how the kids are doing (who he has treated....). I told him what had happened. He looked over the xrays then back to me and said "How old are you?".... and said the “fracture” was merely a chip off the edge of the Talus from when the two bones came together. Nothing for it, otherwise just a bad sprain. Get rid of the dirtbike and you should be fine. I said okay, I’d think about it.
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