Friday night of Melbourne Cup Weekend Pete
and I left home with our friend Terry for
The course was great. We had 5 classroom
sessions, each one followed by a track session (yeah!). In each track session
you were given a specific drill to practice and you had an instructor who would
at some stage during each session follow you to see how you were doing and
offer advice. While we had been in the first classroom session they had gone
around dropping tyre pressures and taping up everyone's mirrors and speedos. This meant that you didn't know when your
instructor was following you - so you had to behave - or appear to behave
anyway. For the majority of the sessions you weren't supposed to use your
brakes, and were only allowed to use 1 or 2 gears (either 4th, or 3rd and 4th)
- interesting. It was a really good day, and we came away from it with
more confidence, feeling that we were riding faster - but more relaxed and
hopefully safer!
We finished at the track around
The ride to Orbost was fairly uneventful.
The only wildlife we saw came after dark when we were attacked by millions of
bugs throwing themselves at us, and the 2-legged variety when a cop coming the
other way flashed his blue and reds at us. A quick look in the mirror to check
he wasn't turning around to follow us and we carried on. Stopped in Bairnsdale
for dinner and got to Orbost at
Day 2 and we were about to be
introduced to touring - the MSTCV way. This was
my first decent trip on the Fireblade and, having
always ridden touring bikes before, I was interested to see how I would
go. We were already down one person to seven as Bruce had a problem with
his bike the day before and had gone home. The first stop was
After we passed through Thredbo
the road starting tightening up and winding down the hill. The traffic heading up seemed to
be all over the road. This didn't seem to slow the guys down so I just took it
at my own pace. A couple of kilometres from Khancoban I came around a corner
and saw Pete parking his bike on the side of the road. It looked ominous.
Trevor was sitting on a rock holding his arm and looking a bit sad. His bike
was lying on the side of the road looking even sadder. The skid marks on
the road told the story. Some nice Swiss tourists took Trevor off to the
hospital where x-rays showed no broken bones, and the bike was taken to the
nearest petrol station. Then there were 6 of us...
On to Walwa Pub where we parked the bikes
and settled in for an evening of telling lies. Ray and Pete were both riding GSXR's and started bonding immediately. When they found out
that they both supported the same footy team too it was all on. Derek suggested
that I swap rooms with Ray so they could have more time together. They weren't
that keen though. Then the guys all started working on Pete and talking him
into a new bike. I was starting to realise that this could be a more expensive
weekend than I had originally thought. Ben and Rhys got the maps out and
started planning the route for the next day. I was blown away by their
knowledge of the area. They seemed to know all of the roads - good or bad and
had a tale to tell about most of them. Apparently a couple of the tales were
actually true too.
Day 3 and Derek decided that he was
going to do his own thing, so we were down to 5… This was starting to look like
a Survivor series - and I had a
feeling that I might be the next one voted out. I volunteered to go rear-rider,
but at the same time decided that I was going to keep up with the boys today.
Easier said than done. However, I did manage to keep
them in sight for most of the day – I was starting to feel that the course was
paying off already.
As we left in the morning I noticed that
Pete and Ray had swapped bikes - the guys were working pretty hard on Pete by
this stage and I could see the signs he was crumbling.
At the first stop we met up with Rhys who
had left early that morning to get a new rear tyre fitted.
After filling up with petrol we headed down
to the hospital to see how Trevor was doing. He seemed to have everything under
control and was waiting for his wife to turn up. Not wanting to witness that,
we carried on.
Next stop was Trevor’s corner so we could
look for his watch that had been knocked off in the accident. Rhys found it and
we spent a bit of time deciding whether to tell Trevor we had found it, or to
sell it off and split the proceeds. It was a bit damaged so I think Trevor got
it back. The rest of the day was fantastic. Great roads, lots of high speed
stuff. At the end of the day I had to admit that it was probably one of the
most enjoyable rides I had ever been on – not to mention the best roads.
Funniest scene of the day/weekend had to be
watching Ben scrape the gravel off his ice-cream after it dropped on the ground
(now that is tight!). Somehow ice-cream ended up all over my rear tyre –
(someone was trying to slow me down I think). Then he looked pretty close to
tears when Pete accidentally stepped on the chocolate that had been melting
into the ground while he dealt with the ice-cream. Quite a tragic sight really
– had me close to tears (of
laughter) too.
Back to Walwa Pub for our last night. The ride home on Tuesday was a bit more laid back probably due to the
fact that we were travelling mainly on major roads, and the weather was not the
best. The main excitement for the day for me was a fairly large tree falling
across the road directly in front of me about 20 kms
before the start of the Black Spur. I braked pretty hard and managed to stop
about a metre away from it. Some other cars stopped and, as no one could get
past, they all jumped out to help us clear it off the road. A large club ride
(looked like Hondas) came through and they all sat on their bikes and watched
us clearing it. Nice work guys! (But if anyone knows the guy who was getting
photos I wouldn’t mind a copy.)
All in all it was a fantastic weekend with
2,500kms travelled for Pete and myself. Impressive roads, great company (thanks
guys), good weather and the Fireblade turned out to
excellent over a long distance. A special thanks to “Mother Ben” who led the
ride, kept us away from cops, ploughed the roads of wildlife and checked that
we all had clean visors and lubed chains. Looking
forward to the next ride…
More Who’s News
Dave Moore, marshalling at the blue Light Rally, blew up his ’92 WR250 (two stroke) Yamaha dirt bike. It started making “bad” rattles, but he was stuck out in the middle of nowhere. Deciding to risk it he rode for a further half an hour. None damage at this stage: piston damaged, bore scored, head scratched and pitted, big end bearings seized, crank damaged or bent – yet to be determined. Bugger.