Date: Tue, 16 Sep 1997 12:36:27 -0400 (EDT) From: gayathri To: Multiple recipients of list Subject: Vt 17 I was on VT 17 coming back from the Canadian Assault, being followed too closely by a squid on a zx-7 (?) with his girlfriend on the back - Max Buxton, MacFarland with the GSXR1100(bob! I know his name is Bob!) and Steve Moonitz were up ahead of me when we started 17 and as soon as I saw it was a tight technical road, I fell back - roads like this get me distracted easily and I prefer not having any riders in front to distract from looking thru the corners. (well, not that I could have kept up with any of them, so I didnt try.) Steve and I had been practicing late apexing on the way up to the canadian assault, and now I got a GREAT chance to practice it. Except for the guy behind me. I dont use my brakes much at all, even in places like this, prefering to try and pace ride and keep things smooth, so I must have been throwing this guy off a LOT 'cause when I'd hit the corners, I'd catch his rear wheel in my peripheral vision - a lot too close to me. Given a known road and a rider I've been with before, riding too close doesnt throw me, especially when I know they arent going to do anything stupid, but I didnt know this guy, I wasnt happy with how close he was and stopped paying attention to the road and started worrying about his girl on the back... There was a 25 mph corner marked that I hit at too high a speed. I stood the bike up and stopped it hard in the apex of the turn, a stupid move on my part, because I was distracted by the fact that as I was entering the turn, I again caught sight of not just his wheel, but the front end of the bike way too close to my rear wheel. Bleah. I stopped the bike just before I hit the dirt, and let him blast by. I sat there for a good few minutes shaking in annoyance at myself. Damn it, I want to be a better rider, but I still lose focus too easily. (and one would think a single person on a lightly loaded cbr600f3 could keep ahead of a zx with a passenger - these kinds of thoughts torture me sometimes until I remind myself to ride the road.) Continuing on, I fell into the rythmn on that road - its seductive - vt 17 is one of those great roads that require a lot of concentration and thought for me - I was being careful, or so I thought. Another one of those tight corners, I target fixate on the gravel at the apex and start heading towards the edge of the road (which fell away into a really DEEP ditch). and hit my rear brakes (stupid.) which started the bike wiggling on the road towards the gravel. "F**K, I'm not turning! @#$&!@^, I'm going to crash this bike! Steve is going to KILL me. *&%$*&^, FINE, goddammit, if I'm going off the cliff, I'm going to at least LOW side the bike." and I pushed it over to the left, taking my foot off the rear brake, and unconsciously rolling on the throttle. The turn itself was a decreasing radius turn to the left, and GOSH DARN! what happens when you push on the left handlebar and pull up on the right one, and gas it? Yup. the bike turned. Flicked, actually, right thru the turn and as soon as my pea brain figured out what had happened, I near kicked myself again. I had been riding from NY to past Montreal and back to NY over the span of a week, and in less then 15 minutes, I made two of my worst mistakes on the whole trip. VT 17 and I have a date to meet again, because I feel like I did that road a disservice riding on it that badly. Gayathri ------------------------------------------------------------------------ gayathri@world.std.com Calamari Club #002, SquidWannaBe Triumph Sprint 900, Jezebel Wolf in Sheep's Clothing