Buy A Bike You Boring Tramp!
Ahh, at last the temperature is up again, and the roads are dry.
What are you waiting for? Take that bike out of the shed and ride it, you Fair Weather Biker pansies!
If you don't own a bike - get the test booked and get one!
Buying a bike was the best thing I did in my life. Seriously. Every single journey is great.
You know how you wake up in the morning, and you think "Oh no - I have to drive to work"?
Doesn't happen to me! I wake up already looking forard to getting on the bike! I love going to work because I get to ride there, and then ride back!
I see people treating every car journey like it's some major chore - I'll jump on the bike at every opportunity! I've been know to ride 60 miles for an item that I don't really need, and could have got from the shop that's 2 mins away from me anyway!
These are the kind of reasons which make me view this road-tax-by-the-mile type toad with utmost horror. f*** that.
So on Sunday I did my first few real laps of The Cloverleaf on this VFR. Taking it at a medium pace, I lent it into the first uphill left-hander, and eased it over a bit more and then got that beautiful sound/feel of kneeslider on tarmac!
Ooh yeah - I've still got it!
And what better way to scrub in a brand new shiny tyre than a few laps? It's a pretty agile bike for a big old lump - but nowhere near the ZXR that I never got beat on around there...
I took the rear tyre right up to the edge, and there's no more of this Winter Chicken Strip* crap on my tyres anymore! *For you non-bikers, the Chicken Strips are the unscrubbed bits at the edges of the tyres. The more you lean a bike over, the smaller the chicken-strips. If you see some top-of-the range sportsbike, take a look at the rear tyre. Anyone on a sportsbike with chicken strips bigger than about 10cm from the edge is a bit of a pussy who's posing rather than using the bike. Tell them they're scared and say your cousins tricycle gets leant over more.
That wasn't my first knee-down of the year, either - I think that was around Valentines Day - also on The Cloverleaf!
The downside was that a pair of front fork seals and a new front tyre cost me £170! That was a bit painful, but had to be done. It just so happens I don't have front stands myself, and so couldn't do it - or it would have cost me around £10 for the seals and a part-worn front I could have got fitted for around £20.... Meh!
I used a new place for the first time - Dougs Bikes in Studley. He seems like a cool bloke who really cares for the bikes. That's rare. The main reason I do all the work myself is because my bikes always seem to come back with nuts and bolts missing etc.
Another first for me recently was following a Volvo Ambulance car on a high speed run using the blue flashy lights! Fast cars, but the main problem for me was that I couldn't see a fucking thing following it!
The blue strobelights were majorly trippy, especially when his brakelights came on, too (err... I should add this was all in darkness).
Also, when we went through residential areas, the lights reflecting off all the house windows was breathtaking! Partly because I couldn't see toad, and partly because it looked like I was entering some kind of timewarp or something!
I was half expecting Al to show up next to me and start blathering on about what I had to do to 'jump'!
Riding a bike is a whole new world, that you'll have no idea even exists until you enter it.
Every other biker is then your brother on the roads - and not the Bad Brother who used to piss on your Barbie's hair and then went down for armed robbery. You'll get 'the nod' from every biker you see, and the second you break down every other biker will stop to try and help you!
Plus you will probably NEVER get to experience the speed in any other vehicle. Most cars hit 60mph from a standstill in around 10 seconds. Most bikes are closer to 3 seconds!
I used to love taking off in a plane... I got a major buzz, and couldn't believe the acceleration... then after flying on my holidays a few years after riding bikes, found it wasn't all that fast, really!
So get out there on a bike, you sick little monkeys - you know you want to!!!
Buy A Bike You Boring Tramp!
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- Jamz
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Buy A Bike You Boring Tramp!
Last edited by Jamz on Mon Mar 26, 2007 7:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.
- RedexRobB
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- Jamz
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LOL good man Rob!
Renegade - It'll happen!
At first I was trying my heart out to get my knee down on my 125's then the ZXR - of course, I was also saying how getting your knee down was no big deal and it was unsafe and only made you go slower anyway...
The first bike I got my knee down properly on was an old '86 VFR750 FG while my ZXR was off the road. I still remember getting straight back on the ZXR and finding my knees were touching down on every corner after that!
Renegade - It'll happen!
At first I was trying my heart out to get my knee down on my 125's then the ZXR - of course, I was also saying how getting your knee down was no big deal and it was unsafe and only made you go slower anyway...
The first bike I got my knee down properly on was an old '86 VFR750 FG while my ZXR was off the road. I still remember getting straight back on the ZXR and finding my knees were touching down on every corner after that!
- Jamz
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- masterofinsanity
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hey jamz had douggie shaved that beard off yet??? used to drink wiv him in the griffin, thats the pub opposite dougs place.
Don't forget people there is more to the zxr400 than this forum... check out www.zxrworld.co.uk also.
- Jamz
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Cuz maximum lean angle occurs at the apex of your turn, when riding in a circle like a roundabout your radius is a constant apex and thus you can scrape your knee easily, you get more time to position your body correctly for it too and can gradually settle the bike into it's turning circle and then focus on your lean angle.Renegade wrote:what does my head in is that i can get it down on islands easily enough but i cant do it on the bloody corners!!! why!?!?
When your trying to knee down on a corner/bend in the road your line through it is the crucial part, you get less time to position yourself, set your entry speed and lean angle and thus it becomes a little harder to do, to scrape it on small corners means you have to drop the bike in a lot faster. your knee also wont touch the floor for more than a second or two anyway, it varies depending on the corner's radius but essentially this is why.
A bikes turning circle is just that, it turns on a circular radius. hanging off the bike decreases this radius which is why you'll understeer if you put too much weight off the bike trying for a knee down on a corner without a sufficient amount of speed to keep the bike on a constant matching that of the fastest line through your corner.
just take it easy and dont go slamming the bike down just carry on riding normally and dont strive for the knee down through corners concentrate on what hanging off the bike was designed to do, increase your ability to turn the bike faster at higher speeds. Eventually your knees will come into contact with tarmac.
I'm quite short and had a few problems with knee down on my 400, was always pegs first, then knee and exhaust shortly after. my 750 has better clearence on the pegs but knee downs still take me within 5mm of my tyre edge with both butt cheeks off the seat.