Things are moving along with the bike. Here’s a pic from last Wednesday evening. I picked it up on Saturday. Of course, I need to make sure everything worked… 200 miles later, I returned home.
I am still waiting on a couple parts: another bolt for the ignition and a strap for the exhaust. Handguards were added before I picked it. I’ve already reworked the handguard placement and attachments. I need to get the Pazzo levers back on it. That isn’t going to happen until I mail them off for repair. Duh. Framesliders are coming from KTMTwins.com Cali. (upper, lower). Hopefully these will arrive before some bubblehead tags me again.
I’ve noticed this (One of ‘those’ days…) is a very popular page. Today I re-read it. I saw a couple more typo’s and places where I wasn’t very clear. But more than anything else it was frustrating and disappointing to revisit that moment.
I know the guy had a life before all of this. He made a bad choice, but his choices had consequences far beyond his limited world. I had multiple conversations with the insurance companies. I learned his name, Mason Andrews. I learned that the driver he hit was terrified to get back in a car and was vowing to never ride again. I know that it took me almost a year to stop thinking about what I saw when I got back on a bike. Maybe that is why I still feel that tightness in my chest when I think about it. It was a brutal moment. Exceptionally fast and infinitely slow.
Spilt blood, bent steel, torn carbon, shattered glass, falling tears, and bare feet.
I still ride, obviously. The SuperDuke is in the same class as the S4R. And I have been seduced by carbon, ti, and steering dampers. But I try not to make those kinds of mistakes. I know what I don’t know. I don’t know the KTM well enough yet to really push it. I do know that you don’t push in rush hour traffic, at least not like that. Sure I break the laws and occassionally lane split when it suits my purposes. I use the power of that v-twin to scoot past the cages that would block my progress. But I also know what happens if I make a mistake…
Live. Ride. Breathe. Feel every moment. And understand that one choice will cause those ripples to move away from you and impact other’s in ways that you never imagined.
Tags: Commuting, Crash, Ducati, FJR, KTM, Motorcycle, S2R 1000, S4R 1000, SuperDuke, The Human Condition, Yamaha
I reread this post tonight and realized it needs another edit, so here is a new version with fewer grammatical errors and maybe a bit more clarity. It wasn’t exactly a good day when I wrote all of this down. 28-Aug-2008
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Let’s skip the wind up and boring crap. Shall we? On my way to work I had front row tickets to the event of a lifetime and I really don’t mean that in a good way. I witness the spectacle of a Ducati Monster S4R 1000 slamming into the back of a Toyota Celica on I-5. This wasn’t a glance or a simple traffic incident. It was full-on high speed impact with a trip to the trauma ward. Read more…
Details:
FJR1300, ~20mph, uphill, w/ my Mom on the back, in snow. Not good.
Context:
My mom has been itching to go for a ride. The forecast for Sunday was for 60s. My mom asked me to come down and take her for a spin. I showed up around 3:30. We ate and then saddled up. Over dinner we discussed where she wanted to go. She wanted to go up by the McMinnville reservoir. It is up in the foothills of the Coastal Range. Read more…
