Pretty in pink. 11/25/2006
In a certain racetrack, somewhere in the world, there is a particular corner which is very difficult. This corner, in the words of the many club racers who race there, is “a bastard.” It has claimed many racers, who, upon entering the said corner, suddenly find themselves running very quickly out of road, and mouthing the words, “oh shit!”, just before being catapaulted into the sky.
I have, in the course of my time racing motorcycles, made my acquitance with this corner. Rather more than that actually. Suffice it to say that I entered the corner upright, and left with my machine being ferried out in the back of a pick-up. I managed to get driven home by the then girlfriend. It was a rather tense and tight lipped journey home. She came out to the track to fetch, after getting a call from me saying that I had crashed, and the track medic had recommended that I don’t drive back. Not that I could drive back, since I had ridden the bike to the track, taken off the lights and slapped some numbers on it, and the said bike was now looking much the worse for wear after eating the kitty litter.
The guys at the track had made arrangements for the wreckage to be shipped back to me, and the remains were now sitting in the garage. All that I really wanted to do was to start work on the bike, to get her back into race worthy condition. I had spent a lot of time on the engine, and felt that it would be a shame to let all those man-hours and begging for machine shop time go to waste. She, on the other hand, had different ideas.
When she got to the track, she didn’t see me immediately. I was off in the back of the pits somewhere having a smoke. What she did see was the very scuffed and scraped piece of fibreglass that was my racing helmet. And since she was a Princess of the highest order, she never really got into the whole motorcycle racing thing. Especially not the fact that she would see me and my friends banged up from crashing one weekend, and then dropping the crutches or taking off the arm sling to go racing the next.
After a few tense days in the house, I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to go work on the bike. My vision had cleared to the extent where I wasn’t really seeing double anymore. At least, not much, and the ringing in my ears had stopped. I walked into the garage, and started work. Much to my relief, I found that the damage was mainly cosmetic. Some of the fairing brackets needed straightening, which was quickly and efficiently done with judicious application of a B.F.H. I had spare levers, which I quickly bolted on.
Which left the bodywork. The left side fairing was scuffed all to hell, but still in one (reasonably big) piece. I set to work with pieces of aluminium plate, and a rivet gun, and soon had the fairing looking fit. I filled in the worst of the scrapes with body filler, and everything was ready to be painted up. It was now close to midnight. I needed to get the bike ready for race qualifying tomorrow morning. I stood there in garage, looking at the bike with a critical eye.
She was mechanically sound, and ready to race. The only thing was she looked a lot like a mangy dog, with large patches of body filler, and scraped decals and stickers. I thought that giving her a coat of paint might be the way to go. She wouldn’t look pretty, but she would at least look presentable. I looked around the garage, and found a boxful of spray paint cans. I picked them up one after the other, and most of them were empty. Except for one. I grabbed it, turned to the bike, and started spraying her up. And groaned.
The fairing was now a brilliant shade of shocking pink.
- Posted in : Road rash
- Author : thesnark
Comments»
sounds like the corkscrew in laguna seca….
oh our friend is still not done..
had somethings to say about u in my site..
hehe…
btw.
did u happened to be at elite track last sunday? saw a nice Ducati there and wondered to myself..
hope your making your way to A1 this weekend
Mmm, famous corners to crash at…so many!
Corkscrew - I always wanted to ride at Laguna Seca, unfulfilled ambition.
More obscurely, the Gooseneck at Cadwell Park had me in trouble and on, but not in, the dirt.
At Donington Park, the blind entry to Coppice, or is it Charlies (?) can be a swine, and the Melbourne Loop in the wet sucks trying to find a line.
I recall a graphic from Bloodrunners - Suzie in her crop top next to a Bimota “have you got anything faster in pink?”
So, did you ride the *cough* Pink bike *cough* at the track?
Pink? Worked for Britten.
RVL : I’m going to apply something I learned from my USENET and DoD days; Don’t feed the troll. As for the Ducati, I wasn’t there.
Intensecure and RVL : It wasn’t the Corkscrew, although I have done it several times without crashing. Donington rocks though. I’d love to get the chance to go back there one of these days and hoon it up again.
NSDS3 : Yeah, I rode a pink bike that weekend. Must have been a lucky colour, because I got a hard fought second place. Although the other riders may have been in shock more than anything.
Gaijin Biker : It most certainly did. If his heirs ever get around to making replicas, I’m putting my name down for one. Singularly the most innovative bike in recent history. Didn’t use anything particularly different or new, but brought together all these ideas into a bloody competitive package.