Another Reminder to Ride Safe

I spent this past weekend at the second annual Eureka Springs ZZR1200 Rally. Sadly, a ZZR rider from Missouri crashed on Talimena Scenic Byway Friday afternoon. He and his motorcycle left the roadway and struck a tree. Despite him wearing all the right safety gear and aggressive and immediate CPR administered by those riding with him, he died on the scene. (Obituary is here.)

I'd just been through there that morning with my friend Greg Ruffin, both of us mounted on our CBR1000RR's en route to Eureka Springs. (In fact, we passed that southbound group somewhere south of Ozark, recognizing the bikes and our mutual friend Crazytrain in the lead. We turned around, figuring they'd stop to say hello, but they continued on. Because we hadn't had lunch and were heading in the opposite direction, we didn't chase them down.) I'd also been through there two weeks ago with my friends Danny and Kim (ref the video in my last post, filmed on that very road). I'd felt extremely confident on my Triumph Tiger two weeks ago, never out of control at speeds averaging 70 mph. On the CBRs this past weekend at significantly higher speeds, both Greg and I admitted to being a bit sloppy. It'd been some time since we'd "ridden the CBRs in anger" and it took most of that first day to shake out the cobwebs. There'd also been a fair amount of pine debris on the road surface from the storms the night before. For these reasons, Greg and I had both backed off the throttle a bit, but I can't help being reminded that an accident is just a thin margin of error removed. I often contemplate an accident scenario -- an overcooked corner, an imperfect and/or poorly evaluated road surface, an approaching vehicle with no respect for the centerline ... any of the dozens of potential pitfalls -- but I never punctuate my ruminations with death. Road rash. Bumps and bruises. Maybe a broken bone or two. These things I expect. Never death.

It's a sobering reminder that there's great risk in what we do. Group rides often bring out some rather unsavory dynamics. Never ride over your head. There's nothing to prove, nothing to gain, and everything to lose. "Ride your own ride." It's an oft-repeated and simple mantra. Sadly, I think it's very often an empty platitude with group rides. Blame peer pressure. Blame testosterone. Blame the simple courtesy of not wanting to hold up everyone else. It doesn't really matter why it happens. The simple truth is that it happens more often than not. At last year's rally, there were five crashes. Amazingly, there were no serious injuries. This year, there was only the one crash, but it was certainly one too many.

Personally, I think I'll be reevaluating my own participation in such group rides in the future. I honestly can't recall a single one where I haven't seen some seriously dangerous and stupid riding take place. And, yes, I'm honest enough to admit that some of that dangerous and stupid riding was done by yours truly.

My heart goes out to the wife and two daughters who thought Daddy was just going away for a fun weekend of riding the motorcycle he loved so much. I can't even imagine what it must have been like for his wife, having a Missouri State Trooper come to her door with no other information than "Ma'am, you need to contact the Oklahoma State Police." How long did it take to make that call, heart in her throat? How many times was she agonizingly put on hold and transferred from one person to another until she reached someone who gave her the worst of all possible news? And how do you deliver such dreadful news to your children?

Let's all be careful out there. Life is a very fragile thing.

"E is for Eureka Springs..."

No matter how many times I go to northwestern Arkansas to ride, whether on one of my sportbikes or on my dualsport, I always have a great time. The pavement around Eureka Springs is generally well-maintained and twisty as you like, weaving through the verdant Ozarks like a boa constrictor in need of a good chiropractor; there's the infamous Pig Trail (State Highway 23), of course, as well as old favorites like Highways 21, 16, 123, and others. The offroad stuff ranges from sightseer heaven overlooking the Buffalo River to as challenging as you've got the stones to make it single-track. The huge plus, of course, is that all this great riding is just a broken brake lever's throw from Oklahoma City. Not to mention the fact that Eureka Springs is, in and of itself, a really cool little town.

This past weekend, Eureka Springs played host to a ZZR rally, with something like 35 riders in attendance, most mounted on the mighty ZZR1200, but a few on the new ZX-14 (dubbed the ZZR1400 in Europe) and an assortment of other bikes. This rally was organized by my riding buddy Crazytrain and plugged on the ZZR Bikes website for many months. Since I rarely miss an opportunity to ride (a) with Crazytrain and (b) in the Ozarks, I'd really been looking forward to this one.

I chose to leave my ZZR at home in the garage (it needs tires) and take my new CBR1000RR instead (it came with new tires -- ha!). The plan was to meet my buddy Greg in Talihina Thursday night; he would also be riding his brand new CBR. Greg and I would do Talimena Drive and play around in Arkansas, meeting up with the ZZR boys in Eureka Springs Friday evening. There was scattered rain in Oklahoma on Thursday, and wouldn't you know it, a bunch of it scattered in my direction just as I was getting ready to leave the house about 4 o'clock in the afternoon. Thanks again, Mother Nature! I sat on the bike in the garage for about 30 minutes watching it come down, hoping it would pass through pretty quick. I hadn't ridden the CBR in the rain yet, and with nearly 160 ponies at the rear wheel, I was worried it might be a bit squirrelly on wet pavement. Finally, though, I just said screw it and rode. I didn't want to arrive in Talihina after dark -- too many deer in the area! Turns out I only had to ride in the rain for about 30 minutes and the CBR handled it well. Despite the massive amounts of "Get Outta Dodge Fast!" packed under its purty blue 'n yeller plastic, it really has a very manageable throttle.

I blazed out my usual route: Highway 9 to Highways 71, 2, and 1. Somewhere on a desolate stretch of 9, with me running about 90-95 mph and nothing but cows as witnesses to the crime, I crested a hill and found blue and red lights flashing from quite a ways down the road. It was a local sheriff type with someone already pulled over. I backed off the throttle, but didn't worry about it too much. Probably cruised past him doing 70-75 in a 65. Well, he musta been done, because he pulled out behind me, never bothering to switch off his happy lights from one customer to the next. At first I couldn't even believe he was after me. I let him follow me for a bit while I gradually slowed down, looking back over my shoulder with my most incredulous "Who, me?" posture going strong. When I pulled over, he proceeded to tell me that he'd clocked me at 85 (and even showed me the radar gun), but he was going to do me a favor ... yada yada yada, the usual drill. Damn, my second ticket in 5 months!

Now, maybe he did clock me at 85 ... but personally I think that was the reading from his last ticket ... or the ticket he wrote two weeks ago Tuesday ... or whatever. He wrote me up for 75, then told me the ticket would only cost $25. What?!?! $25? Why even bother? Hell, for $25, I'll speed through there every friggin' day of the week, Bubba! $25 isn't even worth the time I'm wasting sitting here jawing with you, Occifer. When I cautiously mentioned that I couldn't believe the ticket was so cheap, he let me in on the honest truth that it's all about revenue. At $125, most people go to court and fight the ticket, lots of people never pay them and cost the police time and money issuing bench warrants, and blah blah blah, it's all a great big money-making scam and the money rolls in just as fast as you please at a measly $25 a pop. The guy's about 350-400 pounds and his patrol car probably needs a new set of shocks and he's from someplace called Hanna, Oklahoma -- that I've never even heard of, nor have the faintest clue if I even passed through the stupid burg* -- where the donuts are probably coming up hot and fresh right now, thank you very much. Sign the dotted line and be on your merry way, Mr Sportbiker (and don't forget to mail in your $25!).

So I did. And pressed on. I'm calling bullshit on the whole incident, though, and would be willing to bet anything that the next person coming over that hill at anything above the speed limit got clocked at ... you guessed it ... 85 mph.

I rolled into Talihina in plenty of time to beat the nightly parade of deer venturing out on the roadways to check out the pretty lights. Greg's bike was already parked at the hotel (Kiamichi Inn, same place we always stay: cheap but clean). As usual, he didn't come to the damn door when he heard me pull up -- probably already gone to bed. I revved the engine a couple times. Honked the CBR's funny little toy horn. Nothing. I finally kicked the door nearest his bike. Some strange guy yanked it open and glared at me. "Sorry, buddy. Wrong room. Where's the guy that owns the red and black bike?" "Beats the hell outta me," he said and slammed his door. I moved on to the next door in line which, fortunately, turned out to be Greg's room. He was watching television, flipping from channel to channel at high speed and grumbling like a gorilla with Attention Deficit Disorder. What, did he think there would actually be something on worth watching?

We had dinner at the little cafe on Talihina's main drag -- parked next to a VTX cruiser and one of those new sportbikes imported from China or Korea or Taiwan or some place. Hyosung? Not a bad looking bike, but I don't think you'll be seeing one in my garage in this lifetime. We didn't even have time to get our helmets off before a 15-year-old kid came running out of the cafe to drool over the CBRs. Turned out that the cheapo sportbike was his -- a little 250. Certainly more stylish than a Ninja 250 (but I'm betting not nearly as reliable) and I'd have killed to own one when I was 15, even if it fell apart in a year or two. (I'm not saying it will, mind you, but I wouldn't bet money against it.) The Honda VTX belongs to his dad, they're having dinner inside, and why don't we come join them. So we did. Nice folks. The kid was wearing race leathers (ebay booty) and a good helmet, so he was starting out right, but he did mention that the red sportbike was Number 2, as he'd already thrown down a black one. Dad was an OB/GYN from Muskogee who was now working at the VA Center in Talihina -- talk about a change in perspective! Anyway, Greg and I enjoyed their company while we waited an inordinately long time for our food.

The CBR1000RR and I above the fog on Talimena Drive.
In the morning, Greg and I woke early to heavy fog. We dried the bikes with hotel towels, then had breakfast at the same cafe (Sorry, I don't recall the name of the place, but you can't miss it), hoping the fog would burn off while we ate. It didn't. We headed up into the mountains anyway, climbing above the fog line in short order, which was nice because I've been through there before when the fog went all the way to the top and I had to tiptoe through at 20 mph because I couldn't see a damn thing. We snapped a few cool pics at one of the overlooks, but generally just blazed up to the lodge at Queen Wilhelmina State Park (I watched for Danny's old tent as I went past, but it was gone), where we stopped for a pee break. Then it was on into Mena. From Mena, we worked our way north on 71 and 23. Once north of I-40, the really good roads began. We had plenty of time and were in no hurry to get to the hotel in Eureka Springs, figuring that most of the ZZR boys would be out riding anyway, so we decided to make a nice big loop incorporating some good twisty roads.

At a gas station somewhere, a pack of sportbikes came howling down the road and I immediately recognized the unique Micky Mouse headlight configuration. A second later, I recognized the lead rider, another riding compadre of mine named Charlie. Charlie rides a ZZR dressed in the pretty blue plastic that the Canadians got one year, but we Americans didn't ... something to do with trashing his original bodywork in a getoff. He was leading about a dozen yahoos, some of whom I knew by screen name from the ZZR website. Howdy-do's were exchanged, the CBRs were drooled on a bit more (to be fair, I was drooling on the ZX-14s), and Greg and I decided to join the pack for the remainder of their ride.

Eventually, late in the afternoon, we turned for Eureka Springs, but not before it decided to rain on us. I think we rode about 30 miles in a downpour. My Gericke jacket proved itself minimally waterproof for the second or third time now. Boots and pants held up fine. I wasn't wearing waterproof gloves, so those got soaked. Fortunately, it was plenty warm. Dinner for me and the Gregmeister was Pizza Hut. We tried to swipe free salads from the salad bar, but the waitress added them to our bill. If I'd known I was gonna get charged for it, I'd have really tanked up on the salad goodies instead of the piddly little helping I actually took! Greg went to bed at his usual 8 pm or so, while I waited up for Crazytrain's scheduled late arrival ... but I finally got tired and went to bed, too. Supposedly Crazytrain arrived about 15 minutes after I went to bed. He had a couple guys on ZX-14s with him, one of whom promptly dropped his bike in the parking lot after making the long haul all the way from Houston. D'oh!


CBRs in the rain, Friday afternoon.

Saturday, Greg and I were up at dawn and spent hours waiting for everyone else to get their act together. We broke into groups and spent the day riding in glorious sunshine. You couldn't have asked for a prettier day! We rode with Crazytrain's fast group, which really should have been labeled the "Stupidly Effing Fast Group." Riding around like that is so much fun it ought to be illegal ... oh, wait, it is illegal. There were a couple guys in the group who were so unbelievably fast that I know I'll never match them, but the CBR and I did fine, keeping up with 90% of the pack when we felt like it and drifting along in the rear and enjoying the scenery when we didn't. The bike itself is a huge part of the equation. It handles about ten times better than my ZZR ever did. Turns via some new-fangled mental telepathy interface or something. Brakes are from some alien technology unheard of in any other bike I've ever owned. Suspension has you so connected to the road, you can actually feel insect turds as you run over them. Certainly more power than I know what to do with. Damn comfy seat for a "crotch rocket." And so on. I only ever had one out-of-control moment when the bike was launched from a bump in the road. The CBR and I were literally airborne for a few seconds in the apex of a 35 mph sweeper that I was taking at about 80 mph. Not a good thing on a sportbike! We came through it unscathed, however, thanks to the incredible handling of the CBR.


Anybody got a towel?

Our group's ride was not without incident, though. A ZZR rider went down in what I know as ZRod's Corner (because this is where ZRod once rode his KLR straight through the curve and off the side of the mountain, just barely missing a huge boulder and several large trees). This is a 10 mph downhill switchback on the Pig Trail. If you've ever ridden there, you probably know the corner. It turns downhill (if you're riding north to south) through more than 180 degrees, doubling back under itself. Might be a 240 degree turn or something ungodly like that ... all downhill so that you're hard on the brakes and stuck to the seat by the proverbial pucker. Anyway, one of the ZZR riders in our fast group lowsided there and went down over the edge, narrowly missing the same trees and Volkswagon-sized boulder that ZRod had missed a couple years ago. Probably not the only two motorcycles that corner has claimed over the years. The bike was rideable -- after it took 4 or 5 of us 10 minutes to muscle it back up the bank and onto the road -- but it's looking at a new set of plastic now. I took a photo of it back at the hotel later ... along with shots of two other ZZRs that went down in the "slow group" that same day.

After getting home on Sunday and checking the ZZR website, I learned that two other bikes went down Sunday (Greg and I left for home early Sunday morning), one of them being my buddy Charlie, the other being a young guy on a ZX-6R, for a total of 5 bikes down out of the 35 or so in attendance. This is a horribly high percentage, and it's a miracle no one was injured. The problem with group rides like this is sometimes testosterone takes over or people get in over their heads following more experienced riders or ... I dunno. To everyone who attends these things, though, please be careful.

Sunday morning, Greg and I were up at dawn again and bugged out while most folks were still sawing logs. We set a nice, leisurely pace down Highway 23 to I-40. Somewhere along the way, a hillbilly in a pickup pulled out into the road and just stopped there, daring us to t-bone him. Less attentive riders might have done just that. Greg and I braked to make sure the dumbass wasn't going to back up, then shot by his rear bumper with about a foot of roadway to spare. He looked right at me, made eye contact and everything, completely unapologetic. What was he thinking?

At I-40, we got off the bikes, cleaned the bugs from our visors and parted with a hug. Greg continued on south for Dallas and I grabbed some interslab for a rocket-propelled ass-hauling to OKC, the speedo on the CBR hovering in the 95-100 range most of the way. I was home in about 4 hours and 15 minutes, the fastest I've ever made it home from Eureka Springs. Tried to listen to my iPod while slabbing, but the damn thing locked up on me three times before I gave up and put it away. I think the little hard drive inside gets shaken around too much when I wear it on my sleeve or maybe it gets too hot out in the sun. It works better stuffed inside my jacket, but then I can't work the controls, and if I get pulled over it's one more thing I'm fumbling for so that I can hear the friendly officer (who might think I'm digging in my jacket for a gun or something).

Ouch!
Again, Ouch! What is about these ZZRs and left hand turns?

My ZZR is glad it's never been loaded into the back of a truck looking like this!

That's my weekend. The Ozark Swiss Hotel in Eureka Springs was excellent, even feeding all of us on BBQ'ed ribs and brats and whatnot Saturday evening ... for FREE. At $45 a room, you can't beat that. The rooms were way above average -- nice fluffy towels (sorry for using them to clean bugs off my helmet and CBR), pillow shams, fancy throw pillows, soft beds, cable TV (so Greg can channel flip), etc. I've never stayed there before, but will be certain to make it my hotel of choice from now on in Eureka Springs (except for the dualsport rally there every March, which is already set up at a different hotel).

What else? Greg and I saw a bear on Friday. We dodged about a dozen squirrels -- what is it with those suicidal little bastards? And the chicken strips are gone from my CBR's tire. What more can you ask for?

If you own a ZZR and missed the rally, cross your fingers that they do it again next year and make plans to attend. Watch the ZZR website for info. Practice riding your bike between now and then, though. The pavement in that part of Arkansas takes no prisoners. You either spank the curves ... or they'll damn sure spank you.

---

*So I just checked the map and Hanna is four or five miles south of Highway 9 and at least that many miles back to the west of where this donut jockey stopped me. I was nowhere near the stupid place!

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Addendum: Those who read my motorcycle adventure blatherings on a regular basis know that I often include snippets from my riding buddies. This is from an email from the Gregmeister, talking about the ride home on Sunday:

I slowed down Sunday ... I really don't know how many give silent respects for those killed and fallen along that road [he's referring to Arkansas State Highway 23], but that peaceful Sunday morning I rode for them, the ones there with flowers and crosses and tears and monuments left behind to remind the living to slow down and think ... we all are but moments and a thin thread away from them. I noticed them all, the ones I could see and the ones the sunlight framed and etched into my memory. Each and every one of them told me the same thing as I passed ... THEY ALL WHISPERED SOFLTY FROM THE SIDE OF THE ROAD, "Ride safe today, ride one for us" ... I will never forget slowing down enough to listen to them.

Thanks for riding with me once again, Greg. Hope to share the road with you again real soon, my friend.

"C is for CBR1000RR..."

Had you been in the truck with me on the way back from Dallas today, you would have caught sight of something drop-dead-gorgeous lurking in my rear view mirror.


Just an hour or so before, you would have seen my buddy Greg and I loading her ever so carefully into the back of my pickemup.


And yesterday, had you been lurking on the backroads west of Fort Worth, you might have seen the two of us when we left the Honda dealership to put the first 375 miles on the odometers of our brand spanking new speed-demon siblings. I promise we broke the new mounts in real gentle like, though ... We only did 140 mph on that first day of riding. Heh heh.


Now she's safely tucked away -- where else? -- in my living room, of course!



Where she makes an excellent seat from which to watch motoGP races!


You don't think Rossi won that on his own, do you? He had me right there leaning with him!


Of course, Summer thinks the CBR is just the right size for her.


Stay tuned ... 2007 is shaping up to be a very exciting year!

"B is for Beginners..."

We all have to start somewhere...

Rumors that I am about to add a liter-class sportbike to my riding stable have spurred a desire to do the same amongst nieces and nephews in the Hopkins clan. Since we're talking about brand new or at best inexperienced riders, my mother has understandably become a bit alarmed. I'm sure her memories of me, 26 years ago, in a hospital for 7 weeks and in a cast for nearly a year, are still very vivid. And even now, she probably harbors a little fear every time she sees me leave her driveway on one of my bikes.

Since I have this public forum (a handy soapbox, if you will), I thought I would share a paragraph or two from my emails with her, by way of advice for those who are considering taking up the two-wheeled way of life.

Tell them children to start with DIRTBIKES. There's no one on the trails in 2-ton, 4-wheeled vehicles trying to run you over, and the dirt is generally forgiving. Heck, I wrapped myself around a tree yesterday and only have a few scrapes and bruises to show for it. (Of course, Danny kept on going, while I lay there pinned under my bike up against the tree. "Come back, Danny, come back..." He eventually realized I wasn't there anymore and stopped ... about 500 yards down the trail. Then he teased me about it when I caught up to him, said he was sorry he hadn't gotten a picture of me under the bike. That's okay, 5 seconds later, he wiped out in a big mud puddle. I pulled up beside him, splashing him some more, looked down at him and his bike laying there in the ooey-gooey mud, and asked him if I could borrow his camera. His response shall be edited 'cause I don't use those words around my mama. LOL.)

Nobody really needs CBR1000RR kinda power on the street. It's a race bike. It's not comfortable to ride for more than an hour or two. You can't really carry a passenger. You can't carry anything you can't fit in your pockets or a small bag on the tank. If you drop it in the garage, you're looking at $1000 in damage just in plastic and paint. It will eat tires faster than my ZZR does (less than 4,000 miles for a rear tire!). Maintenance costs a fortune if you're not doing it yourself. The low, narrow profile and small head/tail lights don't make it a safe bike. If drivers don't see my monstrous bright orange tiger coming down the road at sane speeds, they sure ain't gonna see this tiny little rocket coming down the road at hyper speeds. Experienced riders only need apply here. Someone who wants to race perhaps and doesn't even plan to use it on the street. Nuts like me that have plenty of other bikes for other purposes...

To which the general response was: "Then why is Uncle BAH getting one?" (which I actually thought I answered rather well in that email. To wit: experience, a wide selection of other bikes to ride on more sane missions, and the fact that I'm nuts). A soon-to-be nephew-in-law actually replied with the fact that he had two years riding experience, which ain't bad at all, but I've known plenty of people for whom "two years experience" equates to maybe 4,000 miles of saddle time, if they're lucky. Just scratching the surface, in other words.

My reply to my mother:

I thought everyone knew my motto: "Do as bah says and not as bah does." LOL.

Two years experience, eh? In motorcycle years (kinda like dog years only in reverse), that's a couple days. I've been riding motorcycles since I was 19 or 20 ... what is that, 26 years or so? ... and am still not the rider I want to be. I've been taken down by cars, deer, uneven railroad tracks, oil, curbs, sidewalks*, and I forget what all else -- and that's not counting all my offroad spills. You have to remain 100% focused 100% of the time, leaving behind all the work and family crap that might be bugging you at the time; there's room for nothing in your brain but riding when you're riding, otherwise someone will kill you. Around each corner there's always someone about to pull out in front of you, turn left in front of you, take your lane from you ... or there's a dog who wants to cross the street ... or a bit of sand in a turn that will take your front tire out from under you and send you sliding into a guardrail that would like to slice your leg off at the knee. You have to have an extreme amount of self control (especially with a sportbike) and know when and where you can ride fast; the difference between fast and too fast on a motorcycle is just a couple millimeters of additional rotation on that throttle. Yes, you can drive too fast in a car, but a car doesn't transition from fast to too fast in a second.

The smart way to start is to get a small standard bike (what they call a "naked bike" these days) or one of the beginner's sportbikes like a Ninja 250 or Ninja 500 -- or the new 650R that Kawasaki just came out with (not a 600 or 1000cc sportbike). Or start with a small dualsport like the XT225, DR200SE, KLX250S, or the DR-Z400, which adds the benefit of being able to ride offroad. (I wish I had STARTED offroad because while riding in the dirt you are always on the edge of control or past it, which develops all the skills you need to instinctively handle a streetbike when it's out of control. People used to tell me that riding offroad would make me a better streetbike rider, and they were absolutely correct!) All of these are inexpensive bikes, so when you drop it in the garage then drop it on the other side trying to pick it up, you won't feel so bad. They're reliable and fairly easy to maintain. They don't eat tires. Hold their value really well and are easy to resell. Get incredible gas mileage ... and so on. They're all great fun to ride without being "scary fast." Someone should ride one of these bikes for a year or two ... develop some basic skills ... learn to read traffic and drivers ... then move up.

Anyway, for whatever it's worth, there's my advice to new riders. It's certainly not original to me. Ask anyone who's logged a significant number of miles on streetbikes and their advice will be similar.

Sure, we all have to start riding somewhere ... but this is just too embarrassing!

*None of my buddies will let me forget that one.