Post by haitch on Feb 18, 2022 22:48:53 GMT 10
Yesterday was our second date. Seductive as she might be, she still has a mean streak. All started out in a fairly orderly fashion with the intention of making a run to Birregurra for a morning coffee. The task was twofold or is that threefold. Try to give Ruby some more quality run in time, test my new Sena 10c, and get some quality familiarisation time with Ruby.
We headed across the back blocks from my place toward Modewarre and the Cape Otway road. A nice quiet run from my experience. Round-about's and long sweeping bends were a new experience. They gave me a chance to think about a few things spoken of by the learned ones in this forum. Stuff like dropping an elbow and pushing rather than pulling in the bends.
As we progressed I noticed the many corrections required due to changing road camber due to the road crown and the many patchwork tar repairs.
The continuing changes mid bend, on lefts and rights having challenging small pucker moments. Remembering to try and use the outfits natural tendency to pull left under acceleration, and right rolling the throttle off and braking. I recall watching videos from "creaky rider" Keith, who explained that very well. I read so many publications and visualised what I thought I needed to do. Here we are now, and its happening.
In fact , I got so engrossed in visualising the next right hand 90 degree bend and how I would make the approach, I completely ignored the fact that it was the wrong turn. Before I knew it I was in Winchelsea and no longer heading for Birregurra, but Colac and on a main dual lane highway. That meant high speed dodgems and bloody big "B-Doubles"
Self preservation kicked in, so a not so quick "U Turn" and head back to Winch for a coffee and Google maps to find the intended destination. The UDF factor kicked in as a middle aged lady told how she wished her Bike crazy husband would have loved to have seen it.
Having regrouped with my misplaced sense of direction and contemplated some head temperature readings, which I was quite surprised about we set off for Birragurra again. Damn, Google maps was taking me back down the dreaded highway. All the while, the other mission I had was to determine if a better position for the gear lever could be found. I had already re positioned it from the first ride because it was impossible to find the heel lever and I couldn't get my toe under the forward part. This caused many missed shifts, cursing and much deviation from the chosen direction as I looked down to see where the bloody heel lever was.
The new position still wasn't satisfactory as the heel lever was too low and would not allow an up shift as my boot hit frame or sidecar brake rod or rear strut. This forced the use of the front part of the lever to be used conventionally, with minimal missed shifts. I did adopt this operation for the rest of the ride.
Arrived finally in Birregurra and stopped briefly to look around, and wave to some other bikers having lunch. Speaking of which, having lost complete track of time, decided to make tracks to home for my lunch, back down the Cape Otway Road. A nice cruise at 75-85 KPH still trying to work out some bends.
Then the orange light started to flash, bugger, Fuel low. Figured I had enough to give it a shot without resorting to my 10l jerry. (no funnel) The gods and Ruby must have been pleased as we rolled into the servo with about 2 litres left, taking on nearly 15lts.
Nearly home as we left the servo and cut across to the third lane intended for right turn and "U turners. This was my large pucker moment. approaching the stopped traffic and being lulled into a false sense of security, I realised too late that we were on the downside of a massive road crown and were being pushed into the median strip shrubbery. Picking up my remaining dignity as we levelled out, I gave the bars a massive twist toward the chair (praying the chair wheel stayed down) as we coasted to a halt behind the turning traffic. We managed to execute the U turn with dignity intact (just) and headed for home. The off camber left at the top where I turn seemed like a pimple, but was duly noted. Ruby still deems me unworthy, sob. Warning-Crappy video coming.
We headed across the back blocks from my place toward Modewarre and the Cape Otway road. A nice quiet run from my experience. Round-about's and long sweeping bends were a new experience. They gave me a chance to think about a few things spoken of by the learned ones in this forum. Stuff like dropping an elbow and pushing rather than pulling in the bends.
As we progressed I noticed the many corrections required due to changing road camber due to the road crown and the many patchwork tar repairs.
The continuing changes mid bend, on lefts and rights having challenging small pucker moments. Remembering to try and use the outfits natural tendency to pull left under acceleration, and right rolling the throttle off and braking. I recall watching videos from "creaky rider" Keith, who explained that very well. I read so many publications and visualised what I thought I needed to do. Here we are now, and its happening.
In fact , I got so engrossed in visualising the next right hand 90 degree bend and how I would make the approach, I completely ignored the fact that it was the wrong turn. Before I knew it I was in Winchelsea and no longer heading for Birregurra, but Colac and on a main dual lane highway. That meant high speed dodgems and bloody big "B-Doubles"
Self preservation kicked in, so a not so quick "U Turn" and head back to Winch for a coffee and Google maps to find the intended destination. The UDF factor kicked in as a middle aged lady told how she wished her Bike crazy husband would have loved to have seen it.
Having regrouped with my misplaced sense of direction and contemplated some head temperature readings, which I was quite surprised about we set off for Birragurra again. Damn, Google maps was taking me back down the dreaded highway. All the while, the other mission I had was to determine if a better position for the gear lever could be found. I had already re positioned it from the first ride because it was impossible to find the heel lever and I couldn't get my toe under the forward part. This caused many missed shifts, cursing and much deviation from the chosen direction as I looked down to see where the bloody heel lever was.
The new position still wasn't satisfactory as the heel lever was too low and would not allow an up shift as my boot hit frame or sidecar brake rod or rear strut. This forced the use of the front part of the lever to be used conventionally, with minimal missed shifts. I did adopt this operation for the rest of the ride.
Arrived finally in Birregurra and stopped briefly to look around, and wave to some other bikers having lunch. Speaking of which, having lost complete track of time, decided to make tracks to home for my lunch, back down the Cape Otway Road. A nice cruise at 75-85 KPH still trying to work out some bends.
Then the orange light started to flash, bugger, Fuel low. Figured I had enough to give it a shot without resorting to my 10l jerry. (no funnel) The gods and Ruby must have been pleased as we rolled into the servo with about 2 litres left, taking on nearly 15lts.
Nearly home as we left the servo and cut across to the third lane intended for right turn and "U turners. This was my large pucker moment. approaching the stopped traffic and being lulled into a false sense of security, I realised too late that we were on the downside of a massive road crown and were being pushed into the median strip shrubbery. Picking up my remaining dignity as we levelled out, I gave the bars a massive twist toward the chair (praying the chair wheel stayed down) as we coasted to a halt behind the turning traffic. We managed to execute the U turn with dignity intact (just) and headed for home. The off camber left at the top where I turn seemed like a pimple, but was duly noted. Ruby still deems me unworthy, sob. Warning-Crappy video coming.
