So I’m in the office on Tuesday (have been most of the week, the job is even worse than normal when I’m out of the laboratory, so the week is already pretty crap), when one of my colleagues asks me why my bike is lying on its side, I vault over to the window to see my eppitomy of graphite loveliness on it side in the car park.
My other colleague stood by me, sees his wifestandibng next to their car ad says ‘well at least the wife is not in the car so it probably wasn’t her’. We both head out to the bike to pick it up to discover that actually it was his wife who hit the bike and that she had “only brushed it”. As we try to pick it up it seems alot more difficult to pick up than I would expect, When we get it up I see why, the side stand is down. Basically this bike that was “only brushed” managed to pole vault over it side stand and land on its tail unit and front fairing whilst miraculously avoiding any damage to the middle part of the bike. The front fairing was lying on the paving stone so this is prabably why the middle survived damage. On inspecting the bike I make out that there is prabably at least £800 worth of damage to the bike and the evidence is that was slightly more than merely a brush. So I decide to check if the bike is ok by riding it a little around the site, first and only bit of good news the bike is still ridable and can get me home. Some of my coleagues on their way back from lunch peruse the damage to the bike and decide that it was some “brush” and not only is the bike damaged but so is the car that hit it and amazingly the curb stone that the bike fell upon
. So I ride it the 30 miles from Huntingdon to Ely, waiting for something to fall off and decide it is time I got the Sprint re-shod (the back tyre has resembled a car tyre for some time now and was the reason why I was riding the 675 into work, combined with the fact I have some rater nice roads on my way home).
So move to today and I have arranged for OnYerTriumph to assess the damage. After the assessment, the guy asks me how on earth I managed to damaged the bike in that way and that half the guys in the workshop have been trying to fathom out the same thing. Then I ask how much he thinks it will cost, I will get the actual esimate in the post next week. About £1500, that was some “brush”, I think my coleague may have a bit of a domestic when I present him with the bill.
