twowheelnut
R.I.P. Our Motorcycling Friend
I’m lucky to be writing this. ****, I’m lucky to be alive or not to be in some emergency room. I wasn't going to post this, partly from embarrassment, partly from pride, but I think it might help one of you someday. So, I’ll share this with you so that you might add today’s experience to your memory bank in hopes that if you ever encounter what I did, you might be able to put it to use...
Needing to run some errands for Patti (a.k.a. Mrs. Nut) in Ventura and being a perfect SoCal kinda day, I just had to find the wiggliest way to and fro. I decided on beach roads down and Hwy 150 back, through picturesque Ojai. Errands complete, I headed out Hwy 126 to pick up 150 in Santa Paula. Blue skies, light traffic, good tunes playing and a happy tummy, satiated by a glorious Surf Dog, smothered in chili and kraut – yummy.
Pleased to see that several of the storm damaged areas are finally repaired, the rest nearing completion on 150 from the brutal rains of 2 years ago and the continued good fortune of little or no traffic, I decided to up my pace just a tick or two. Mistake 1. Now, I’ve run this road hundreds of times and I know the road like the back of my hand. Every tar snake, dip, hidden drive and turn is committed to memory. I’m very confident running this road at an elevated pace. Mistake 2.
I don’t fear much when riding the bike on public roads and I ride well within my limits and those of the bike, but not necessarily those of the road. Mistake 3. My one great fear while on the bike is that of a head-on collision and how easily one might occur in corners. Something was scratching my uh-ohmeter as I neared the end of Hwy 150, just a few miles from home. It was an acute, but brief, awareness of my head-on fear. Mistake 4. Always, always listen to your gut. It’s never wrong.
Approaching the last set of twisties is a blind left-hander, posted at 20 mph. Coming from the opposite direction, you’re going downhill and this corner is deceiving to approaching drivers. I knew this and adjusted my line a bit further to the right of the centerline. Clipping along at 60 or so, I downshifted and cut speed to 45, which is comfortable for that corner. Mistake 5.
As I start my turn, I heard the unmistakable scream of tortured tires trying to hold a line coming toward me and then, BAM! There’s an M-Class Mercedes pushing its way around the corner and using better than one third of my lane to accomplish it! Being leaned over, my head is in line with the 3 pointed star centered on the hood. The female driver’s eyes are as big as baseballs. I think, ‘I’m dead.’ What happens next is not in context with my rationale. I should be dead, if not, mightily busted up. Instead, I'm sitting on the ground of a dirt pull-out, just up the road.
I had no frickin’ idea of how I maneuvered outta death’s way. None. It seemed to completely engulf my being and then, poof! I’m sitting on the side of the road trying to calm my trembling body, wondering what just happened and how’d I cleared the truck. It’s taken the better part of 3 hours, but I think I now know what I did, completely and utterly from pure instinct, yanked from the sum total of all my riding experience and pitifully brief amount of ride schooling. I know for sure that I didn’t hit the brakes – been working hard on that lately. I remember shoving hard on the bar to stand the bike up while I aimed at the open portion of my side of the road. There wasn’t a runoff to use as a buffer, so heading off the road could have proved equally disastrous. Once I got clear of the truck, I had to regain my line before running outta road. That required another serious shove of the bars, but this time I had to grab a boatload of throttle to push the bike through. I missed the truck by a c-hairs width, ditto the edge of the road. And that’s about it – I think, cuz there was not time to think, just react. I got it right. I have no idea how I got it right, but I did.
Lessons learned? I shoulda backed my speed down and listened to my uh-ohmeter. I need to move my line further outboard from the centerline on lefthanders. This bike has way more forgiving capability than my skills - thankfully, you can shove the **** outta the bars to get leaned over and turned. Properly aired, good condition tires is a good thing (I had just aired and checked the tires earlier, both were down 5 lbs.) I firmly believe the the Wilbers shock and springs were a key factor in the successful completion of the maneuvers. Power is your friend, trust it.
My good juju side of the ledger has been dinged a hefty debit today. Hopefully, I won't have to right another check anytime soon. Now I only need to decide whether to tell Mrs. Nut or not.
Be safe out there guys. The Reaper is a mere blink away.
Needing to run some errands for Patti (a.k.a. Mrs. Nut) in Ventura and being a perfect SoCal kinda day, I just had to find the wiggliest way to and fro. I decided on beach roads down and Hwy 150 back, through picturesque Ojai. Errands complete, I headed out Hwy 126 to pick up 150 in Santa Paula. Blue skies, light traffic, good tunes playing and a happy tummy, satiated by a glorious Surf Dog, smothered in chili and kraut – yummy.
Pleased to see that several of the storm damaged areas are finally repaired, the rest nearing completion on 150 from the brutal rains of 2 years ago and the continued good fortune of little or no traffic, I decided to up my pace just a tick or two. Mistake 1. Now, I’ve run this road hundreds of times and I know the road like the back of my hand. Every tar snake, dip, hidden drive and turn is committed to memory. I’m very confident running this road at an elevated pace. Mistake 2.
I don’t fear much when riding the bike on public roads and I ride well within my limits and those of the bike, but not necessarily those of the road. Mistake 3. My one great fear while on the bike is that of a head-on collision and how easily one might occur in corners. Something was scratching my uh-ohmeter as I neared the end of Hwy 150, just a few miles from home. It was an acute, but brief, awareness of my head-on fear. Mistake 4. Always, always listen to your gut. It’s never wrong.
Approaching the last set of twisties is a blind left-hander, posted at 20 mph. Coming from the opposite direction, you’re going downhill and this corner is deceiving to approaching drivers. I knew this and adjusted my line a bit further to the right of the centerline. Clipping along at 60 or so, I downshifted and cut speed to 45, which is comfortable for that corner. Mistake 5.
As I start my turn, I heard the unmistakable scream of tortured tires trying to hold a line coming toward me and then, BAM! There’s an M-Class Mercedes pushing its way around the corner and using better than one third of my lane to accomplish it! Being leaned over, my head is in line with the 3 pointed star centered on the hood. The female driver’s eyes are as big as baseballs. I think, ‘I’m dead.’ What happens next is not in context with my rationale. I should be dead, if not, mightily busted up. Instead, I'm sitting on the ground of a dirt pull-out, just up the road.
I had no frickin’ idea of how I maneuvered outta death’s way. None. It seemed to completely engulf my being and then, poof! I’m sitting on the side of the road trying to calm my trembling body, wondering what just happened and how’d I cleared the truck. It’s taken the better part of 3 hours, but I think I now know what I did, completely and utterly from pure instinct, yanked from the sum total of all my riding experience and pitifully brief amount of ride schooling. I know for sure that I didn’t hit the brakes – been working hard on that lately. I remember shoving hard on the bar to stand the bike up while I aimed at the open portion of my side of the road. There wasn’t a runoff to use as a buffer, so heading off the road could have proved equally disastrous. Once I got clear of the truck, I had to regain my line before running outta road. That required another serious shove of the bars, but this time I had to grab a boatload of throttle to push the bike through. I missed the truck by a c-hairs width, ditto the edge of the road. And that’s about it – I think, cuz there was not time to think, just react. I got it right. I have no idea how I got it right, but I did.
Lessons learned? I shoulda backed my speed down and listened to my uh-ohmeter. I need to move my line further outboard from the centerline on lefthanders. This bike has way more forgiving capability than my skills - thankfully, you can shove the **** outta the bars to get leaned over and turned. Properly aired, good condition tires is a good thing (I had just aired and checked the tires earlier, both were down 5 lbs.) I firmly believe the the Wilbers shock and springs were a key factor in the successful completion of the maneuvers. Power is your friend, trust it.
My good juju side of the ledger has been dinged a hefty debit today. Hopefully, I won't have to right another check anytime soon. Now I only need to decide whether to tell Mrs. Nut or not.
Be safe out there guys. The Reaper is a mere blink away.
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Ride safe everybody.
