Every day, you swing a leg over your machine, but have you ever considered that you are quite literally sitting on the shoulders of giants?
That machine that somebody gave to you in exchange for a few pieces of paper that you earned with a few months of office drudgery or whatever it is I do would appear to any of the ton-up boys of days past as nothing short of miraculous. You might be able to ride it, but you probably wouldn’t be able to fully understand it. Much less, reproduce it!
Behold. The insane engine technology, creating unreal amounts of thrust from a few drops of black stuff pumped out of the Earth somewhere hot and dangerous. Computer controlled digital fuel injection. High tech rubber compounds and advanced suspension technology keeping you on the road. Brakes than stop you in an instant. A chain that somehow manages to feed all this power to the back wheel without snapping like a shoe-lace. Aerodynamics tried and tested in wind tunnels. All yours for a few thousand quid.
Think of the generations of engineers and tinkerers that have made this possible. Think about however buggered this society is, it somehow managed to give you – this. It’s enough to feel humble for a second, isn’t it?
You sit astride it and push the starter button, and fling yourself out onto the road, reaching 150 mph without much effort. It doesn’t get any better than this this side of military aviation and manned space flight. Sweeping through high speed bends, you realize flying couldn’t feel much different from this. And isn’t that what you dreamed of since you were a boy?
Later, you put her back on the kick stand and wonder why only a small percentage of the population experience this. The miracle of modern motorcycling.
I have updated it a bit to reflect my ride yesterday
You sit astride it and push the starter button, and fling yourself out onto the road, reaching less than 150 mph without much effort. It doesn’t get any better than this this side of military aviation and manned space flight. Sweeping through high speed bends, you realize flying couldn’t feel much different from this. And isn’t that what you dreamed of since you were a boy?
Later, you call the RAC to come and recover you from a pub car park because the insane engine technology has a faulty sensor hidden deep in the engine that stops the fuel injection from firing the bike up. You watch her being driven away on a RAC flatbed and wonder why only a small percentage of the population experience this. The miracle of modern motorcycling.
I often think about that. In this seemingly safety-obsessed society it seems crazy to think that you’re sitting on a volatile machine, with moving parts, explosions and crankshafts all thrashing away hundreds of times a second just a few inches away from your old chap.
Sure they would! I mean, they let people play with jet-packs, lasers, firearms, all manner of interesting chemicals and of course hydrogen-powered vehicles.
Oh, and they even give some folks electric guitars. That’s just reckless.
What I really wanted was a Supermarine Spitfire, but parking one in London is such a drag and the fuel economy is simply frightful. And where do you put the shopping?
The RAC were really good, a guy was there within 25 minutes and he spent about 40 mins trying to get it going but had no luck. Unfortunately they outsource the bike recovery to OnTime and I had to wait about 3 hours for them to arrive.
It wasnt the end of the world, the sun was shining and I broke down in a pub car park so I sat in the beer garden and drank beer until they arrived. I had the last laugh too as my mate who was laughing at me and taking photos of the bike in front of the RAC van had to drink coke while I had got stuck into the beers
