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Posts Tagged ‘triumph’

I just returned from one of Eurosport Cycle owner Tony Lewis’ rides.

Approximately 30 of us left his shop at 0900 this morning and took a series of twisty back roads to Glen Rose. Along the way we stopped for some great BBQ at Hammonds. I shot a ton of video, and decided to post a couple of favorites here. First is one showing my boondoggle for the day. I took the second curve in a pair a little too hard. That wasn’t the problem. I could have continued to lean and I would have negotiated it just fine.

The problem happened when my right foot board started scraping the pavement and I freaked because I’m not familiar enough with my lean limits and wasn’t expecting to hear that sound. Instead of continuing to lean and turn as I should have, I backed off the throttle and of course that made the bike stand up and run across the center line. Fortunately there was no oncoming traffic and all I suffered was the embarrassment of about twenty people behind me witnessing my rookie mistake.

You can clearly hear my foot board scrape 01:49 minutes into the video below and immediately after you’ll see the camera view swerve out over the center line.

Of course, misery loves company, so I’m also posting this video of a the guy ahead of me a bit earlier in the afternoon as he ran off the pavement at the end of a curve. He did manage to keep control and get her back onto the asphalt. The fun for this one starts at 04:27.

And one last video, mainly because it captures a large number of the folks in our group. Nothing real exciting other than me and a few others getting stuck waiting on cross traffic at an intersection and having a little fun catching up to the group. We reached the parking lot at Hammonds and I got a good pan of most of the group. Then I managed to zip a couple blocks down the street to a Shell station, top off, and get back to the BBQ joint before the stragglers had finished dismounting.

I’ve never owned more than one motorcycle at a time. In fact, the total number of bikes I’ve owned in the nearly half-century I’ve walked this planet is two. And the gap between those years of ownership is greater than both put together.

Motorcycle ownership has always been a luxury for me…therefore relatively unachievable beyond my original Yamaha XS1100 (which I got used for a very good price and no-interest financing) and my current Triumph Rocket III which Robin made possible via her extraordinary financial management skills and desire to help me conquer my smoking habit.

As much joy as I get out of riding, I’ve never been able to come up with a pragmatic reason for spending loads of money on one. Owning a motorcycle is sort of like owning your own roller coaster. It’s fast, fun, and sometimes terrifying, but it isn’t a necessity for survival and it doesn’t really pay for itself…especially when you aren’t satisfied with anything less than a power cruiser that will pass everything but a gas station. I can’t even claim I’m making up for the price of mine with fuel savings.

Yet, I wonder…is one enough?

It would be so nice if Robin could ride along on a trip to the Talimena Drive or Big Bend. Maybe even a three-wheeled wicked contraption like the Can Am Spyder for her so she could carry all the things classy gals like to bring along when they travel.

The ultimate vacation. Me and my girl riding the countryside and connected to nature in a way you just can’t achieve with four wheels.

I have buddies who have three or more bikes. Some have a cruiser, a sport bike, and an off-road type. One has an undetermined number of between three and seven Ducati road burners…depending on whether you require all of them to be assembled and in running condition.

I keep blasting through the curves on mine and every time the foot boards scrape I think, “How much fun would it be to take this curve on a Speed Triple leaning another 20 degrees?”. After bartering my cigarettes for BB, I don’t have a bad drinking habit or any other vice left worth trading for a sport bike (don’t get me wrong, I have vices, just none left worth trading). So I just thank my lucky stars that I have the Rocket III and can power through the curves with significantly more agility than any V-Twin cruiser and less than any Ducati.

But the dream that replaced the one of owning a motorcycle…almost any motorcycle, is now one of owning another motorcycle, first for Robin so she can share the awesome feeling of freedom with me that comes from twisting the throttle on an open road; second so I can lean a little more when nothing less than knee-dragging will provide the contact high I crave. I guess that equates to two additional bikes, ultimately.

In a way I’m truly thankful and satisfied just to have one bike again.

In another way I just crave more satisfaction. One is plenty, and totally unacceptable.

Shortly after I procured my first used motorcycle back in 1988, I managed to pull a wonderful tank-slapper that left it with numerous cosmetic deficiencies I never fixed. Just getting the bike back in safe running condition required I drop off several prized possessions at the local pawn shop.

Among the “unnecessary” functions that I chose not to repair was the electric start. I never found out whether a wire had simply come loose during my lost battle with gravity and velocity, or if there was some other more complex damage. I simply pulled the kick-start lever, a large chrome-plated peice of steel, out of it’s storage space clamped to the frame, installed it on the cog sticking out the side of the engine, and used it as a permanent start for my Yamaha XS1100 from then on.

The kickstarter on the 1979 XS1100 was never intended for permanent use. The primary evidence for this conclusion was the fact that there was no hinge to fold the peg out of the way once the bike was running.

Instead, you either got off the bike and removed the solid steel protrusion, stowing it back in it’s clamp alongside the frame, or you rode with it sticking out from the side of the engine if you were insane and had no care for the risk of shattering your shin in numerous places below the knee in the event of a crash.

I was insane and didn’t care if I risked shattering my leg in several places below the knee.

There was just something about standing up on that kick starter, pushing off the left hand peg, launching my full 185 lbs into the air and pushing down with my right foot on that kick-starter to spin that massive air-cooled four-cylinder up that was incredibly satisfying.

Even if I’d had the spare money to get the electric start working again, I probably would have left the kick-starter arm on the machine and used it.

There were multiple justifications for this beyond the feeling of power it imbued upon actually starting the bike.

For one thing, only those who had owned older electric start deprived Harley-Davidsons had the skill and knowledge to get the XS1100 running via kick-starting. Even folks who had sufficient body weight to get the kick-starter through it’s 180 degree arc still couldn’t do it with enough velocity to fire up the engine. You had to know that little trick of lifting your entire weight off the bike and smoothly bringing it all to bear on that hard steel peg sticking out. Managing that, if you then failed to follow through to the end of the arc, the kick-starter would return with enough force to leave a wonderful bruise on the bottom of your foot and throw you over the left side of the bike.

This equated to a great theft deterrent.

Secondly, it was a money-maker. Making bets with friends that they couldn’t get the monster cranked, or even deliver enough force to get the kick-start lever through it’s entire 180 degree arc, was an easy way to make ten bucks a pop at parties, especially with the big drunk guys who thought their 200+ lb frames could simply force the thing round despite the incredible compression the engine produced.

There was a conflicting romantic and macho sensation that went along with kicking that monster into life…especially if there were any gals watching. There just is no way you can successfully kick start a large motorcycle without looking as cool as Steve McQueen jumping a Nazi border fence on a Triumph.

Of course, an unsuccessful kick-start attempt would leave you feeling like someone had just smacked the sole of your foot with a ball-peen hammer and might even result in you tumbling elbows over noggin several feet from the left side of the bike.

The resulting feeling is likely akin to Steve McQeen lying tangled in razor wire looking sheepishly at his captors after his secondary attempt at jumping a Nazi border fence.

Nowadays, you can’t even find an emergency kick-starter on even small bikes. I guess the combination of cheaper production and one less seal to worry about is enough to make this old method extinct.

I’m sure there’s no way a kick-starter could be made to work on something as large as my current Triumph 2300cc behemoth, but I still miss the glorious feeling of giving a large bike a good swift kick at the beginning of a ride to let it know who is boss.

I really can’t say it any better than this video. Just hoping I can get my hands on a set of those pipes and that they’ll bolt on my R3 Classic…

The stunt rider is pretty darn good, too, but you don’t have to ride like that to attract attention on a Rocket III. The bike does that all by itself.