Thieves, Irony, and Lessons Learned

There's an expression that goes like this: "experience is what you get when you don't get what you want". So there I was getting ready for the last track day of the year at ThunderHill West. My friends had signed up and it was quitting time at work. Just like I had numerous times before I came home practically bounding through the steps to connect my trailer to my Sedan. I wanted to get an early start the next day (ThunderHill trips take a day of travel down and a day back) so I loaded my ZX6R onto the trailer Friday evening. Most of the time I don't sleep well before a trip and Friday was no exception. Saturday morning I got up and looked out the window to see my bike was gone.

In retrospect I can say I was calmer than I would have expected I would have been in this circumstance. I posted to social media that my bike was gone, I called the police, and I gave a report to the officer that responded. Odd that I kept my cool in a situation that I should have completely lost it.
Lesson: Just because you think your neighborhood is safe, lock your stuff up

Here's where the irony comes in. When I renewed my insurance in October I dropped full coverage on the Ninja and went to Liability only.

Talking with my dad on the phone he practically insisted that I should load up my VFR and go to the track with it instead of staying home and feeling helpless and angry. So that's what I did. I loaded up the big red bike and headed south. By the time I got to my motel it was well past dark and I got some unwanted practice in backing up with a trailer in a crowded parking lot.

The next day I finished my pilgrimage to ThunderHill and met up with my friends. The Sunday TrackDay was at ThunderHill West where I'd never been. The west track has its own pits, garages, overhangs, and Club house. Its a very nice facility. As the sun slowly crested the hills I tried my best to capture a golden hour photo of our lineup.

Overall I had a pretty good time on track. The west track is a lot of fun. We ran the counter clockwise configuration which is 1.6 miles. Its short, twisty, and fast  The pavement is pretty fresh and except for CCW T-1 is in great shape (there's some weird texture from grinding there). Unfortunately I started having pretty bad brake fade once they got hot. There's nothing like hitting your brakes at 130mph and they go to mush. Because of that I missed some track time and outright skipped the last session, better safe than sorry. A lesser problem is that the VFR has Pilot Road 4s on it that are a fantastic road tire but a little squirmy on track. Although I didn't get my mind off the theft of the ZX6R, it helped my state of mind.
Pictured: There's no way to look cool on a sports tourer with bar risers on an unfamiliar track

Lesson: Don't put off maintenance on your B bike, just in case your A bike goes missing

On Monday I returned home and got a call from LPD that they'd located my bike. I rushed over to where they found it and loaded up my rolling chassis of a ZX6R. The thief had dropped it on both sides, busted out the ignition (holy hell ignitions are hard to replace), gas tank lock, rear seat lock, spray painted the windshield, and removed a bunch of stuff. At the scene the police commented that they knew the guy, he's a repeat offender, drug user, transient, and general scum.

I spent the next week agonizing about what to do with it and shopping for parts. Finally my dad suggested that I just bite the bullet and take it to the Dealership and let the pros do their thing. Amazing how much anxiety is off my shoulders since dropping it off there and them saying no problem.
Lesson: Its OK to call in the Pros
Lesson: Dad has some good advice now and then

Before dropping it off I re-assembled it the best I could with what I had on hand and a spare windscreen I had. Doesn't look bad from 20 feet when you can't see the scratches.

Final Irony: My precious super-sport gets stolen right before a track day in the cold autumn and not stolen during the nice sunny summer when I had it out on the trailer and parked at motels while on trips.

Fantastic Bikes and Where to Ride Them

Waiting for trackday photos to come out makes me feel like an irrational eight year old who gets told he has to wait a week for a toy. Every day and sometimes several times a day I go to the website and refresh it to see if they're uploaded, like a kid checking the mailbox at all times of the day.

I've been doing trackdays since 2011 and I still get the feeling. For that matter I still get the jitters the night before a trackday right up until I finish my first sighting lap.

When you were a teenager remember having a crush on someone? The pure distilled feeling of desire you have towards that person as if your life depends on obtaining love from them. Any moment your crush goes unrequited is heart wrenching to the point that you can't concentrate on anything academic.

Have you noticed that past your twenties those extreme feelings towards another person fade and go away? Do you miss that emotional high, even if you never got the person you crushed on?

Here's how to recreate that emotional high as an adult. Think of your dream bike and your dream trip (be it to the track, or tour, or whatever). Bingo, now you can't think about work and you feel like your life won't be complete until you obtain that goal.

I'm going to share one of my fantasies with you. This is literally one of the things that distracts me from work and gives me that emotional high of desiring something I can't have.

My fantasy starts with buying a new hot overpowered sport touring bike. For the purpose of this blog I'm going to go with the KTM SuperDuke 1290 GT. But don't worry, my VFR doesn't get jealous. The details vary but sometimes my fantasy includes flying somewhere to score an amazing deal on a new-old-stock bike from some nowhere KTM dealer.

Anyways my fantasy continues as I ride it to all the different national parks in the western US. Sounds pretty... vanilla, doesn't it? OK here's where it gets more interesting. In my brain I take the SuperDuke to all the tracks in the western US along the way and am the King of C group on my sport touring bike with my yellow touring suit.

When I put it on paper (electronic paper) it actually doesn't sound that fantastic or unrealistic. Funny how that works.

There's a joke that circulates motorcycle social media regularly that goes like this: All my friends are getting married and having kids and I'm like "Look at my motorcycle". That's my life now. I've seen no less than five pregnancy announcements among my friends and acquaintances in the last month. Meanwhile I've been on a short super-tour and gone to the track.

My life is a joke. An awesome joke.

Hey, look at my motorcycle!

Tool Abuse, Bike Maintenance, and Making Things Just a Little Better

Its no secret that I consider myself a disciple of Dave Moss. If you haven't heard of him, search youtube and facebook. He's a suspension tuner and racer, although his outreach goes beyond setting sag and twiddling knobs to trying to get all riders to take care of the basic ergonomic tuning and maintenance tasks that all too often get ignored.

The other day I was watching one of his videos and he was harping on brake fluid. So I paused the video and went to change the brake fluid in my special lady friend's 2012 CBR250r, which had probably never been changed.

Yucky.
Funny that after I changed that suddenly the brakes worked like they should. All this time I just assumed the brakes on it sucked (they felt sticky), but in fact the fluid was just awful!

I've bled the brakes on the VFR about four times this year trying to get the feel that I want. They were mushy as hell after I did a complete flush, I was thinking I was going to have to replace the lines. First though I removed the calipers and cleaned them thoroughly, then very carefully bled the brakes again, watching for tiny bubbles coming out. Voila, good firm brakes. Also my reservoir was weeping and as it turned out that happens when its over full, my fault.

I finally changed the coolant, which was a phenomenal pain in the ass due to the way Honda built the VFR fairings and where they placed the cooling system pieces. Two radiators and bits and pieces all over.

The fork oil on the VFR needs to be changed but that's a bigger job than I can do, and I don't have tools for it. So I'll let my guy do that for me before my big trip in August.

The baby CBR has much simpler forks where you can access the oil from the top, so I changed that tonight. I sucked out the 0W Honda fish oil and replaced it with 10W Repsol oil. Big difference, it no longer pogos.

Ironically Honda didn't see fit to put a place for spools on the swingarms. If you want spools you have to put on aftermarket pieces that go onto the chain adjusters, which ironically you need to lift the back end to do which you can't because you don't have spools. Using a paddle lift is a no go because it grabs onto the part of the swingarm that blocks the axle.

Tim the Tool Abuser Jensen to the rescue. Ladder plus rachet straps = motorcycle lift.

I also used this method to reassemble the forks.

While Dave would be happy that I'm taking care of my suspension and brakes, he'd probably be horrified at the way I improvise on things!

SpringTime

Spring in Oregon is like a bipolar Ex. One minute its 80 degrees and sunny, then next its a thunderstorm. People start poking their heads out in the sun and after a few cycles of getting rained on wearing shorts they just say "screw it" and start doing their spring/summer activities rain or shine.

Motorcycles riders are no different. Although some stay indoors until a forecast of 100% clear some of us are out there getting in some great tourist free road miles in the foul weather.

As it turns out the Q3s on my Ninja are worse in the rain than the Pilot Road 4s on my VFR. I didn't go down but I felt the rear twitch a lot on this ride.

Yesterday I lucked out and had a traffic free run to the coast (in the rain) on board my VFR. At the coast it was sunny. The ocean was incredibly blue, a rare sight in Oregon where its normally green or brown looking. Of course getting to and from this beautiful sight was torrential rain, but proper gear and tires handle that pretty well. Easy does it on the control inputs and remember the fundamentals, the engineers at Michelin and Honda will take care of the rest.

I've said before that the motorcycle Gods look kindly on acts of charity. This week I had the opportunity to lend my garage and (limited) technical skills to a friend so she could remove her forks to be re-sprung, change her oil, and change her coolant. It was an interesting learning experience. Six year old original Suzuki coolant looks like some kind of blue syrupy sports drink.

The weather only gets better from here. Until the end of May and then it gets worse briefly, but then it gets better.

Track Day Stereotypes

A wise man once said: "Stereotypes are in place for a reason". Granted he might have been talking about getting drunk on St Patrick's day when "everyone is Irish", but we'll just go with it. Without further ado here is TrackDay Stereotypes volume 1!

-The streetfighter rider that shows up to talk to his track friends and brag to anyone that will listen about how awesome his bike (old GSXR missing all its fairings with a dirtbike front end) is. Bonus points if he's wearing a "cut" advertising some RC/MC.

-The 16 year old girl on the 20 year old 125CC GP bike that spends the first half of the day lapping faster than adults on 1000cc bikes, then leaves after her engine explodes because its a 20 year old 2-stroke. Her family is one of those mainstays of the local racing community (in one niche class) and always operates on a shoestring budget.

-Guy with a BMW that starts super aggressive then spends more time trying to sort out why his bike won't run (electrical gremlins in a sensor somewhere) than riding, then leaves early.

-The clueless first timer on a Monster/FZ1/other upright standard/sportbike that shows up with a backpack. Usually someone takes him in and shows him the ropes/lets him rest under their canopy so he doesn't dehydrate and die.

-The guy who shows up with a motorhome/trailer and a full MotoAmerica/MotoGP sized pit worth of stuff. Usually has all his club racing buddies pit with him and they hang up some kind of sign advertising their edgy "race team" name. Included is optional pit wife with a gaggle of small children or dogs. OK I'm a bit jealous maybe, but I'm not jealous of the logistics. Bonus points if the grill (that costs more than my bike) comes out at lunch and they make the pit smell like Burger King. Even more bonus points if their "pit bikes" cost more than my bike and their pit wife drives around the pit in a brand new $20k SxS ATV (also Pit Wife costs more than my bike).

-The C group guy on an ex-race bike. For whatever reason someone totally new the the track that plunked down the cash on a turn key race package and *looks* like a racer but isn't, but thinks he is. He doesn't know how to maintain the Graves R1 he just bought and surely doesn't know how to ride it. But his Instagram has like 1.2m followers so who am I to talk, right?

-The super aggressive club racer in C-group. This guy normally races in the open-sportsman and can't seem to ever make top 10. He goes to trackdays and signs up for C-group so he can "practice his passing" which translates to "ignore C-group passing rules" and dive bomb all the newer/slower riders. He's pretty much just padding his ego in C-group.

-The tiny Asian guy on a 250/300. No idea where he's pitting, don't know who he is, wears Dainese, doesn't speak English well, passes me about twice per session. Dangit there he goes again, three times.

-The GoPro Hero. He has a camera on his helmet, one on the tail of his bike, a forward facing one, and reverse facing one. His youtube channel has more subscribers than mine. Often seen walking around the pits with a GoPro on a selfi stick talking to his subscribers or getting close up shots of his melty tires

Warm Up 2018

Its almost officially spring in the Central Valley. The temperature is coming up, the sheep are getting shorn, and motorcyclists are coming out of hibernation.

Not me of course, I rode all winter thanks for Pilot Road 4 tires on my VFR, and a Joe Rocket Survivor suit.

But I digress. *Other* riders are coming out of hibernation. Just like every other year there's the safety Nazis making posts that nobody will heed about taking it easy because the roads aren't clear and you haven't kept your skills sharp all winter. Just a thought, they might get more attention paid to them if they reached out to the squids and crotch rocketeers instead of vilifying them. I'm no safety Nazi, but I do appreciate the consequences for my actions (tickets, crashing, etc) and take steps to mitigate the damage (see yellow dork suit above).

The first real group ride of the season last week was pretty cool, if short. Six riders showed up for it. It was invite only so we had a small but skilled group, all ATGATTing, and all riding fast well-kept machines. Our intent was to go check out the hills and see how the roads are; to take it easy because we don't know the conditions out there. Well if you read my "Lies Motorcyclists Tell" story you probably know what happened next when six crotch rocketeers on top end machinery get out on the open road.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztXXB5r85QQ - SalemCBR's video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iO-tM6NiHcs - My video

Funny thing is that I was riding the smallest displacement bike out there. As Cutback would say though: "modern 600s are so god damned fast there's no difference on the road". Funny thing about group rides; plenty of people are willing to haul ass when they're following, few are willing to lead. I find myself in the lead occasionally and always start feeling super self conscious (am I going through this corner fast enough to satisfy the followers?).

This year I was due for new leathers. My four year old Sedici leathers are really showing their age (and price point). I decided to follow the crowd and plunk down some coin on a 1-piece from Comet Racing Leathers. Unlike the other guys (looking at you Native-D and SalemCBR) I wasn't willing to be a shill and become a brand ambassador, although I'm perfectly willing to use their discount code.

In case you can't tell I like to mock other YouTubers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SmgPo0Uz-k

Its been years since I wore a 1-piece (seriously, like 2011 my first onesie was a Frank Thomas) and I'd forgotten what its like. New leathers are stiff and hard to get into at first, then if they fit right they crunch your balls when you're standing, but fit like a second skin once you're in position on a supersport motorcycle.

The motorcycle gods approve of acts of charity so I'll probably hand down my Sedicis to a less fortunate squid. One could say that's part of my outreach work to turn squids into proper canyon-carving/trackday riding/ ATGATTing Crotch Rocketeers. For every one that I fail to bring the Gospel of Keith Code to, I will succeed with two others.

The Last Scooter Toss of the Year

When the weather in December gives you something as favorable as a forecast of 50 degrees and not raining, on a Saturday, it would be an insult to the motorcycle gods not to ride. Given that the favorable weather was coming in and melting the snow in the mountains that was a better prospect than snowboarding on slush.

I suited up in my new winter gear, Joe Rocket Survivor and Joe Rocket waterproof boots, and headed out on the Interceptor. The first stop was to pick up one of my riding buddies, Dani, and take her to get her bike out of storage, then on to meet with my other riding buddy Paula. The plan was laid out, rally points set, and we started off.

Winter traffic on highway 34 is pretty light. Besides the wet, moss, and tree debris its a much more fun road during the "off" season. No RVs, no tourists, and clear passing. My Michelin's stuck to the pavement and I made more than a few minutes of lead on my buddies (Ninja 250 and Vulcan 800). Not that I was riding especially hard, I was going quite a bit slower than a summer/with the guys pace. Eventually I reached the last rally point on the highway and pulled over to wait for my friends.

At the way point I spotted a couple duck hunters and watched them do their thing. It seems years of playing wargames has given me the ability to spot camouflaged people in the weeds. See if you can find them in the panorama.

After waiting for what seemed like longer than I could have reasonably built a lead, Paula on her Vulcan pulled over and told me that Dani had run off the road and was being transported to a fire station. Here we go again I thought, pulled on my helmet and got back on my bike.

At the fire station in Waldport we found our friend, covered in mud, soaked, embarrassed, and surrounded by EMTs who were doing a thorough and by the book post-crash evaluation. When I say by the book I mean by the book. Being that its winter they probably didn't have much else to do but call in every single EMT/Firefighter in the area to evaluate the poor girl.

But anyways she was pretty shaken up and as soon as EMTs get involved that means that she was going to be transported to the Hospital. Paula agreed to head back to the valley to get her car and I followed the ambulance to the Hospital. Unfortunately they went up 101 without their lights on and it was a SLOW transport.

Eventually we got to the Hospital and I waited around until they'd finished their evaluation to see Dani and let her know Paula was getting her car. They had her in a neck brace for a while until the CAT scan came back that her neck was OK. A state trooper was there to take her statement and was probably the nicest OSP officer I've ever met, most of them will write you a ticket as you lay on your deathbed after a crash. Maybe he was just wanted to make sure he could get a date later.

Paula showed up and I left to make the run home. An hour and a half at 40 degrees in the thick fog, through the coastal range. Pretty much crap for visibility but I made it. At least the other cars could see me, the Survivor suit has some pretty amazing visibility and does OK in the cold.

So that's it, the last scooter toss of the year award goes to Dani. Come the new year we'll have to drive out to the coast to recover a river soaked/muddy little Ninja from a wrecking yard.

Takeaways: crashes can happen any time any where, even to the most cautious and not reckless rider. Nobody gets left behind. ATGATT.

Fortunately Dani didn't break anything or lose any skin. I've seen similar crashes where people had broken collarbones and road rash because they skimped on the gear. Of course those were also testosterone driven guys that would have insisted on not going to the hospital. Guys are dumb like that, arguing with paramedics about cutting off their leathers, and trying to ride home on busted bikes.
Edit: pics from the junkyard