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19Nov 2011 10Mile turnaround

28/5/2014

 
The world was already flooded with light from a hot sun as I made my way to the Shell at Moore Park, it was 7AM. We rolled into a relatively empty Berowra and collected the motley bunch together. When the dust settled, we were (Hope i didnt miss anyone  ) – 

HarryD – BMW K1200R
ConRod - Yamaha Zeal250
Pizza - SV650
Dan – Blackbird
Tony (Dan’s mate) – VTR1000
Andy - Diavel
George – Daytona 675R
Mario – R1
Chief – CBR250R
Blaze – Street Triple
Gabriel – VFR800
Luke – Ninja 1000
Mick – GS650F
Seen006 – CBR250RR
Blackster – ZX-6R
Browny – Blackbird
Wayne – Blackbird
Pete – Z1000

And we set off down the OldPac. I lead the biker snake at a relaxed pace, enjoying the twisties and the lack of traffic. After Mooney Mooney, the ConRod hit the front and revelled in the honour of leading the pack. It was a steady, comfortable pace and before long, we piled into Jerry’s at Kulnura for much needed coffee and b’fast. Browny joined us here, which was worrying in itself but even more worrying was the presence of 2 HWP cars. After enjoying a leisurely bfast with plenty of  we took off to ensure we stayed ahead of the popo and not behind. I followed Luke & Andy out of Jerry’s and we quickly made time and caught up with the lead pack, buzzing unsuspecting Mick, Chief and Pete in the process  . I was really enjoying the brisk pace of Luke and Andy when suddenly something hit my left hand and I noticed my newly installed bar-end mirror hanging limply and about to fall off. I hit the anchors and pulled over to adjust it but it was only the start of my mirror woes for this trip . I only had 1 bar-end mirror on the bike and I knew it wasn’t the best placement but I wasn’t expecting it to come apart so early. Anyway, I carried on, we re-grouped at Wollombi and after crossing the dirt section, I’d just started revving it on the long sweepers when the fucking mirror came off again. This time I just took the fucker off and stuffed it under the seat and went mirror-less, racer style! Anyway, I didn’t let the lack of mirrors deter me from enjoying the fantastic sweepers coming into Broke. I love that section of road. The surface is smooth and grippy, the corners are wide and sweeping and visibility is endless so you can actually see round the corner which allows you to take much wider (and faster )) entries into corners. I caught up with the group just as the last folks pulled into Broke where there was already animated discussion in progess about how fukn cool the sweepers were!

We re-fuelled and set off for the 10mile. I had already declared to everyone that I was mirror-less so any punters looking to overtake me should be careful as I won’t be expecting them. That must’ve scared the cool kids as no-one overtook me on the whole 10mile, I should use that trick more often to stay in front . Andy was leading into the 10mile, followed by Wayne and then me. I don’t know who or how many were behind me as I cudn’t see! Andy was setting a cracking pace, moving around the bike to compensate for the limited lean angle (compared to a sportsbike). No matter how many times I’ve follow Andy on the Diavel, it’s always a bit weird to see him moving around so much on the bike coz it’s not the kind of bike you’d see people hanging off of. Talking of hanging, I was just about hanging onto the end of Wayne and was enjoying it immensely. The riding was fast and furious for me and involved lots of hard braking, peg scraping and gunning it out of corners. This is not usually the kind of riding I enjoy, preferring not to hang off too much and concentrate on being smooth through corners but this was bloody awesome fun right now and I decided I could leave smoothness for another time. Wayne, meanwhile, looked smooth as silk and was all over Andy’s back wheel when Andy wisely kicked him through and then Mr Confused left us dazed and confused in his wake as he made the big bird appear like a lightweight supersports, his knees sticking way out in the wind occasionally dragging along the tarmac, the trademark Ventura sail-bag bouncing along merrily. We were well and truly Houdinied by the soft-spoken and hard-riding Central coaster. We caught up with him again a few kays down the road when he’d backed off. Later he said to us “I went up ahead and then said to myself, I came to ride with the group so what the fuk am I doing out ahead on my own, I could do that any other weekend”. Glad you backed off mate, it’s always good to ride with you . We reached the turn-around point and slowly the rest of the pack roared into sight – Luke, Mario, Pizza…..Gabriel, Conrod…Dan, Browny, Tony…..they kept coming and coming…and I though Fuck, how many of us are there?! Finally Blackster & Sean brought up the rear with Sean’s loud 250 downshifting so many times while slowing down that Andy remarked “How many gears does that bloody bike have?!”. We were quite a sight with 18 awesome bikes parked neatly in a line on Putty Road .

We set off back up Putty Road, one of the best things about the 10mile turn around ride is that you get to do the 10mile twice . The return trip was different, a lot less hectic,I was riding alone and there wasn’t a single vehicle along the whole stretch to spoil my ride. Wayne buzzed me going round an open right hander, which I wasn’t expecting at all, having no mirrors and all but it wasn’t scary and I continued along my merry way. I eventually caught up to Gabriel and he was puttering along at a decent pace so I stayed put behind to observe his rear end . He certainly seemed very comfortable and sounds like the suspension work is paying off in enhanced confidence in his riding. Pizza and Mario swapped bikes as we truned off Putty Road towards Broke and Pizza buzzed Luke at an unmentionable speed  and Luke took off in hot pursuit, probably thinking that some thief was running away with Mario’s bike. I followed Luke into Broke and it was great watching him stretching (not parting thankfully) Ivy’s legs.

It was stinking hot by now and leathers came off in a hurry as we all huddled under the shade of the giant tree at Broke Service station. We spent an enjoyable and leisurely hour at lunch and while the softies took refuge in the comfort the air-conditioned bistro, the real hard men of the north spread out under the tree in various poses of leisure and exhaustion. The second lap of 10mile was quickly cancelled and we set off back to base with visions of home and ice cold beer. I set off in the middle of the pack but found myself leading by the time we entered the tight stuff before Wollombi and firkin hell I enjoyed that section . The road is narrow, hemmed in by lush green vegetation and twists and turns around corners that are blind as bats. It’s also bumpy and has leafs and vegetation strewn across it at times. Really challenging and heaps of fun when it comes together. Halfway through, as I came round a left hander, I saw a black R1 parked on the opposite side of the road, which looked like it had taken a serious tumble. My heart skipped a beat as I thought, Oh Fuck, Mario! But thankfully it was some other bloke’s turn today and I carried on. Browny was somewhere behind me and as I didn’t have mirrors I don’t know if I was holding him up or losing him in the distance but I think he enjoyed that section as much as I did. Wayne walked upto me as we pulled up at the lights for the dirt section and said his goodbye, he was taking off back to Newcastle.

I brought up the rear leaving Wollombi and followed Sean for a bit. He seemed to be going well, taking corners nicely and generally not doing anything stupid so I carried on and hung behind Blackster for a bit who looked pretty dashing on the sexy ZX-6R. They do look like a neat package, Blackster and the feisty Ninja and I hope we see them both on many more SR rides . Some of us peeled off the highway while the rest of us regrouped at Road Warriors on the oldpac. Stories of the day were thrown around and we cooled down with drinks while letting the sweat evaporate off our bodies. At one point, a loud bike-scream pierced the air and we saw a guy pass by pulling a massive mono on his sportsbike all the way. We also saw 3 cop cars and 2 cop bikes in the 20mins we were there so we took it pretty easy on our way out, not that the oldpac is a place for shenanigans anyway . It was a long, hot and tiring slog through traffic to get home but it was so fucken worth it!!

Goulburn - Oberon Loop March 2011

28/5/2014

 
Oh Fuck! What time is it?! That was the rather panicky start to the day for me. My alarm didn’t go off and I was woken up by an sms from Dejan asking “Are we still riding mate?”, it was 6:42AM. God bless Dejan. I was supposed to update the forum with Go/No-Go at 6:30AM. There was no time to do a Met check so I said a quick prayer to the rain gods and posted the GO on the forum!

It was sprinkling lightly as I pulled into Sylvania Maccas, Dejan was already there. The boys started trickling in with ConRod being the last arrival, well past the go-live time of 8AM. He’s lucky I like him otherwise he would’ve found an empty maccas parking lot because as y’all know, time and Harry wait for no-one. Anyway, we pulled out and it came bucketing down as we got on the old princes hwy at waterfall. I pulled over to allow everyone to put their wets on. Of course there were the macho types who didn’t bring any wets and laughed at our softness. Well they probably weren’t laughing when they got back home and saw fungus growing in their crotches! I did a head count and realized MrWoo wasn’t with us anymore. He did mention we shudnt wait for him so I didn’t give it any more thought, except poor bugger, woke up early, got drenched, sat around in maccas, got drenched again and went home after riding 5 minutes! Anyway 5mins down the road the weather opened up and we were treated to blue skies as we motored down the freeway past Wollongong. After the traditional SR river crossing on the back road to MacPass, it was every man for himself as Pizza took off to make hay while the sun shone on MacPass. MacPass was bone dry much to everyone’s delight and lust gleamed in many a biker’s eyes on beholding those luscious curves . I followed Jugz all the way up, he in turn was held up by a BMW rider who was enjoying the curves in a rather leisurely fashion, much to Jugz’s frustration. It was entertaining to see Jugz right on the guy’s back wheel, waiting for the littlest opportunity to blast past but the guy was a tough nut and would close the door on every opening. Finally Jugz forced his way past on the first overtaking lane and i was expecting him to flash an angled hotham salute at the guy as he went past but he checked himself.

We said goodbye to the “softies” Jugz, Adrian & Ken who were turning around at the pie shop. The real men continued their brave march in the face of a light shower. I had, of course, brought out my wets again, which Dejan and “Pistol” Pete took as a sign that the rain would stop soon enough. And hey, the bloody rain DID stop 5 mins into the ride! We enjoyed some nice sweepers on the backroad to Marulan via Bundanoon before hitting the slab for a few minutes into Goulburn. After fuelling up both man & machine were raring to take on the best kept secret around Sydney, the Goulburn – Oberon road. Despite desperate pleading by the boys, I refused to put on my wets for this section as I was confident we had the rain gods firmly on our side now. Chrome had mysteriously lost a few pounds in the maccas dunny and his Sprint GT was enjoying the leaner & meaner load! I had just lead for the first few corners out of Goulburn when a single gunshot echoed in my helmet and I saw Pistol Pete streak past me effortlessly . I checked my mirrors coz I know where there is Pistol Pete, there’s bound to be a shadow, and sure enough BadR1 Dejan blew past me in the blink of an eye! I followed them for a couple of corners and then Poof! there was a puff of smoke and the duo disappeared from view, pulling one of their magic tricks. The Houdini brothers were gone!

Me & Robbo kept each other company and swapped leads a couple of times on the endlessly long open sweepers towards Taralga, it was blissful riding. It’s one of those roads that’s absolute heaven for bigger bikes as you can set them in 6th gear and just cruise along without requiring much throttle modulation at all and just enjoy the sweeping curves. OR, if you’re a mad fucker like the Houdinis, you can fang the fuck out of the fastest bikes available!
Me & Robbo pulled up at the T junction 30Ks short of Oberon to wait for the stragglers, Chrome Pizza & ConRod. After about 2 minutes Robbo ran out of patience and mumbled something about trying to catch up to the Houdinis and roared off. I sat down in the grass, played with some sticks, played with some rocks, played with the local dog, played with myself..  ! waited waited waited..  then I started getting worried, surely it couldn’t take this long, especially with BigPete around…I saddled up and went back to look for them. Thankfully 5 mins into the ride they all passed me flashing Hotham salutes. Bastards! I breathed a sigh of relief and turned around. BigPete, Conrod & I kicked tyres for a few minutes more, admiring BigPete’s bike and listening to his love struck phrases “Oh I luuoooveee this bike, Oh it’s so torquey, Oh it’s so stable in the corners…Oh I just want to make love to it…   ”  

Got into Oberon and got an earful from the Houdinis as they’d been waiting for 45mins for us stragglers to catch up. Serves you right for overtaking the ride leader ! Got out of Oberon and this time the Houdinis were taking it easy and I was able to keep them in sight. It’s just an amazing spectacle to follow these two trailblazers. So smooth, so composed and so fast, they flow together like a well-oiled machine. Chrome was really reaping the benefits of the afore-mentioned spot weight loss as he gunned the GT into the sweepers and was obviously enjoying the balance and composure of the tourer. The twisties between Oberon and Hartley are among my favourites and I revved the WPN hard enough to see glimpses of the beast that lives in the engine and comes out to play when the tacho needle goes past 10 clicks. He’s an ugly bastard that beast, scary yet hypnotic and I had to will myself not to fall under his spell!
It was raining again up at Mt Vic and some of us had had enough. The Houdinis, Conrod and myself split down the Great Western hwy on to home while Pizza, Robbo & Chrome sat around deciding what to do. Conrod, the crafty commuter, showed extraordinary Zeal in filtering and splitting through bumper traffic back in the big bad city. The most tiring part of the ride was crawling along the traffic back to home and I was done by the time I got off the bike in my parking lot.

A fantastic ride then, with a great bunch of guys. Thanks for the good cheer despite the sometimes damp conditions. Hold On! Don’t walk out yet, read the End Credits:
Best Male actor in a leading role = Harry, Yamaha R1
Best Female actor in a leading role = Pistol Pete, Yamaha R1 (she loves a big bang!)
Best Male actor in a supporting role = Dejan, Yamaha R1
Best Male actor in a comedic role = Chrome Nathan, Triumph Sprint 1050 GT
Last Action Hero – Jugz Jerry, Honda CBR1000RR
Action Assistant – Adrian, Honda CBR1000RR
Torque Expert – Ken KT750, KTM Duke 690
Special Effects expert – Robbo, Honda VFR800 (Red/Pink)
Big Guy Award – Big Pete (medium bike), Suzuki SV650S
Small Guy Award – Paul (PMC Dermo), Yamaha Zeal 250
Unsolicited Cameo appearance = MrWoo, Yamaha FZ1

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