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Motorcycle Cannonball 2012

The Cannonball was a Great Adventure

It was difficult, beautiful, hot, stressful, fun, scenic, cold, had great camaraderie, was wet, had great roads, freezing, had long, straight roads, made new friends, cursed a blue streak more than once, learned shortcuts for working on the bike, was blue skies, foggy, tiring, dark, shared parts and tools, was grey, had moments of beautiful nature, shared beers with others, worked late, got up early, drank a lot of hotel coffee.

I don't regret a minute of it (but maybe 10 seconds...) and... and... well, I'm not ready to say if I'd do it again. Wait until I'm out of this stupid cast.
 
It was difficult, beautiful, hot, stressful, fun, scenic, cold, had great camaraderie, was wet, had great roads, freezing, had long, straight roads, made new friends, cursed a blue streak more than once, learned shortcuts for working on the bike, was blue skies, foggy, tiring, dark, shared parts and tools, was grey, had moments of beautiful nature, shared beers with others, worked late, got up early, drank a lot of hotel coffee.

I don't regret a minute of it (but maybe 10 seconds...) and... and... well, I'm not ready to say if I'd do it again. Wait until I'm out of this stupid cast.

Proud of you and your effort, wish I could ride a great vintage bike across the country !


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Darryl, I have a few qustions about the 10 seconds if you're up to it. How much faster were you going than you think you should have been going? Do you think that you might have made that turn with that bike at that speed if your line and body position were different? I am not asking these questions to beat you up try to make you feel bad. I ask because I wonder how modern body positioning late apexing might be applied to an antique motorcycle overcooking a corner. I'll use my buddies SoftTail to illustrate a point, he started trying to keep up me and some of the more 'spirited' riders in our group, he ground the footpegs down and nearly wore a hole in the primary cover. Then he took a course and now hangs off and late apexes. He keeps right up with spirits and doesn't scrape anything anymore. It would be interesting to explore the limits of lean angle and speed with and without advanced techniques applied. This could be done a disposeable relic of a vintage bike,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,A brand new Sportster!

I hope your stay in the hurt locker is short and the bike comes though none too worse for her adventure. I was at the start and watched you leave.
 
It would be interesting to explore the limits of lean angle and speed with and without advanced techniques applied. This could be done a disposeable relic of a vintage bike,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,A brand new Sportster!

.

Lost my sip of coffee on that one:laugh
 
Darryl, I have a few qustions about the 10 seconds if you're up to it. How much faster were you going than you think you should have been going?

No problem. I would suppose I was doing between 25-30mph, pretty much the sweet spot for 2nd gear. The turn was a slightly downhill, fairly flat, left hander.

The day before we had come over US-199 from Grants Pass, OR to Fortuna, CA, which is also a really nice, twisty road, and had negotiated it without touching down anything. So, I felt like I knew how far over I could safely go.

I think that if I had been 5mph slower, things would have been fine.

The flat turn required more effective lean angle than I had available. I picked my turn in, and countersteered into it... and hit the floorboard before I got to my angle.

Do you think that you might have made that turn with that bike at that speed if your line and body position were different?

It's possible. I wasn't hanging off, because I hadn't needed to do that before, and I didn't feel like I was that close to the limit. I once traded with a friend who rode a Harley FLH, and I was scraping the (folding) floorboards at slow speeds going around normal residential block corners. I later noticed that my friend hung off a bit to prevent that.

I hope your stay in the hurt locker is short and the bike comes though none too worse for her adventure. I was at the start and watched you leave.

Thanks!
 
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