Doc Wong Ride South of San Francisco

[Paul Master <master@xxxxxxx>]

Had a pretty good time at the Doc's ride yesterday. Round trip, 229 miles.
I'd guess around 90 of that was twisties, yeehaa!!

I was in the third group, right behind the group leader for the first half,
then did some cleanup duty at the back of our group for the last half. One
younger guy managed to lowside a tight downhill turn going down Jamieson
Creek. We got him upright and his leathers did their job, though he banged
his shoulder rather hard. He ended up with a pin hole in his left case,
leaking oil, which we noticed it at the next stop, and got it patched with
some duct tape. Doc checked out his shoulder, nothing broken. He supposed it
was some pulled ligaments, and had him ice it down. A few scratches on his
Bandit (1200 I think), plus a dented headlight rim, cracked and scraped
bikini fairing, miscellaneous scrapes and scratches down the left side of
the bike. Those nek'd bikes seem to fair far better in minor dumps like
this. All the more reason to be careful.

The day's riding topic was "Smooth Riding - Awareness and Vision". The idea
is to be aware that when you get into a situation where you are over your
head, to try and push your awareness out, not get tunnel vision and "target
fixate". There seems to be a direct correlation between your anal sphincter
and your vision awareness. You still see everything, but you are tightly
focused on an obstacle, impediment, or other road hazard. When this happens,
you vision essentially becomes laser guidance, and you will likely go
exactly where you are looking, definitely not the thing to be doing. So
force your vision/concentration to where you need to go, ie, away from the
pothole, rock, around the corner, not off the side of the road etc.
It was definitely a fun day, and I even remembered to practice last months
topic, light on the bars, grip with the legs, thighs, support your upper
body position with your back. And even the other things, like weighting the
outside peg, smooth everything (particularly throttle and brakes),
accelerate through the turn after approaching at a sensible speed (sensible
being NOT requiring additional braking, BAAAD thing to do in a corner).

In fact, this may have been what happened to our poor Banditeer. He may have
either touched his front brake which caused his front wheel to wash out, or
overcooked the corner slightly, went wide to the gravel and leaves
repository, and when trying to turn back in, probably with throttle chopped
of by now, so overburdened the front tire as to cause it to loose traction
and wash out. Our ride leader, who races (on the track, a very sensible road
rider) indicated to the Banditeer that he has a relatively small front tire
for his weight bike, compounded by a sharp downhill turn,.... you can
imagine the rest.

Good fun, learning, great roads, even crappy roads which can also help teach
you a thing or two (ie bumpy, potholes, patches, sand/dirt/gravel in
corners).

Paul Master - Red 99 Sprint ST "The Flash"
East Bay (San Francisco Bay Area)
email  master@xxxxxxx

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