1969 - Ridin' Ridin' Ridin'

Of the hundreds of rides I've taken these are the only ones I remember as story-worthy. I admit they are probably not the only dangerious rides I've taken...the rest I've blocked from my memory. I caution anyone reading not to follow my example in this...but then I'm sure I could have mentioned this warning before. Well, Ok...as my friend Ron says when I leave his house: "Drive fast! Take chances!"

1969 - Ridin’ Ridin’ Ridin’

As I topped the ridge I glanced down at the motorcycle’s speedometer. It screamed 90 at me. I held the throttle full on as I started downhill. A short rise was in front of me after a trip downhill that, at this speed, threatened to leave me virtually weightless. I felt G-forces in my groin and in my stomach as I hit the low spot at the bottom of the hill and I headed up the next short hill with barely a drop in speed. The road ran between two sheer walls of hillside where a cut had been made in the hill. At the base of this last hill a heavy wind had been blowing from the northwest but blew at my back as the sheltered wall on my right and the canyon on my left conspired to change the winds aspect to blow at my back. This had helped get my speed up to the last plateau of speed. Many of the roads on the old US 395 cut through hills like this as they made the road less of a challenge to the types of vehicles that were traveling this road when it was first built. As I shot over the top of this little rise I glanced at the speedometer. It only went to 110 and was past that and against the peg. My legs fought to stay on the pedals as the big thumper engine on my 1965 BSA 441 Victor ran full bore and possibly faster than it had gone before. There was very little traffic on the US 395 as I headed back to San Diego from my weekend in San Bernardino. The light traffic and the hot weather started me running faster than traffic and a couple of high-speed passes had gotten me to a speed that was electrifying and challenging. Just how fast would this baby go? I kept the gas twisted full-on and charged on.

Looking up from the speedometer I saw a valley laid out before me with the highway running straight for about another half-mile. The road made a gentle curve to the right which then straightened back south after circling the little hill that sat at the bottom of the mountain from which I was now descending. There were no vehicles in front of me. The road was clear all the way to the beginning of the curve. I dove aggressively into the valley. The curve would necessitate a deep drop in the motorcycles aspect to the road as at this speed the curve would not be a gentle as it would at the posted 55 mph. I’d be laying on my side fairly deeply into the curve but I loved the feel of deep turns so looked forward to this as I shot out from between the walls of the cut hill.

I immediately dropped toward the ground as the wind buffeted my relatively small motorcycle from the side. The sudden change from having the wind at my back to having it blowing from the side was an eventuality for which I had not planned. I jumped on the binders trying to slow the vehicle as much as possible when I realized the speed coupled with the wind was going to make this curve a much more challenging event than I had originally thought. As the old BSA motorcycle only had 3-gears I was going way to fast to downshift. An exploding transmission would not help the situation. I had no time to look at the speedometer this time as the curve rushed toward me like a charging bear. I leaned further toward the road feeling my Levis flapping against the pavement. I picked my foot up a couple of inches and the foot-peg began to spark with sparks shooting immediately behind me. I noticed this in my rearview mirror as the sparks caught my eye. The bike shook for a full second as the exhaust pipe touched the road. I could feel this bleed just a tiny bit of speed off and it definitely helped but this was not how I wanted to slow my pace. I could feel the road at my shoulder as I fought the tendency of the motorcycle to throw me off and straighten its path into a straight line that would be disastrous for both me and the bike. The road began to straighten again before setting up for the next curve. My speed would be well under control by that time. The road began to fall away from its uncomfortably close association with my shoulder. I took my first breath in quite a few seconds.

Now, I don’t recommend that anyone follow my lead in motorcycle riding…in fact staying off of motorcycles the last few years and always having cars with cruise control is probably part of the reason I am still here to write about this.

The BSA 441 Victor was a fairly light motorcycle for its power and capabilities. Light bikes had been the bane of my existence since my first rental in 1966 and, here in 1969, I could feel that the lightness of the bike was one of the reasons it fought so hard against the direction I wanted it to go. A heaver bike would have stuck so much better to the road as I had witnessed just a couple of weeks before when I had borrowed a buddy’s Honda 450 and taken it for a spin on the 5. I’d been moving at typical freeway speeds as I came off the freeway on 17th street with a green light at the bottom of the exit. With no other traffic at the intersection I blew through hardly decreasing my speed certain I had 2 blocks to go until my turn onto B Street. I downshifted as I spied the B Street sign just as I arrived at the intersection…1-block shorter than expected. I threw the bike into the turn realizing at the last second I was still moving at a pace that would have put my little 441 into an immediate sideways skid that would probably turn quickly into a tumble. There was no way I would make the turn. Luckily the 450 was not my little 441 and it was quite a bit heaver. It dropped on its side, both tires straining to hold the pavement as they skipped twice in the direction it wanted so badly to continue. I glanced down toward my feet and in the direction the bike was trying to skid. The white panel of an automobile approached as I gripped the handlebars and jerked them to the right muscling the motorcycle back under my control. The heavy Honda shook itself once and stood straight up. A second shimmy and I was headed back down 17th, clearly missing the turn but back under control at high speed. The light on the roof of the white-paneled vehicle came on as I slipped right around the next corner and accelerated down the block making another immediate turn to my right circling back, now on B Street. As I passed calmly through the same intersection I noticed the police car sitting at the corner a block up from where I had originally seen it. The light was still on but the vehicle was not moving and the officers were clearly having an animated conversation.

Over the extent of my life I’ve owned several motorcycles. In the beginning they were fairly light vehicles but as my comfort level rose so did my abilities and longing for something bigger. My trip from San Bernardo to San Diego demonstrated this lesson clearly and I, soon thereafter, traded my BSA in on a “rice-burner.” The Suzuki 500 was heaver and was the only thing I could really afford with the trade-in. The day it reached break-in it managed to pass Bill in his TR-7 on his way to work. He told me he was going 130 mph at the time. I was not looking at the speedometer. This was not so smart, I admit, but I believe this is the fastest I have ever traveled this close to the ground. Despite the price being right on the new Suzuki and the bike being considerable heaver than the BSA its brand and the sound of its engine often reminded me of my very first ride on a rented Suzuki 120 in Waukegan.

Robin and I had our drivers licenses and had talked many times about owning or riding a motorcycle. Jack’s Harley 250 Sprint was famous in my crowd after we watched Jack struggle through the snow one winter day when he was, evidently, absolutely determined to ride his bike to school. From the school bus we observed his feet were on the ground like training wheels as he slipped and slid down the road. We laughed long and loud at the thought of training wheels on Jacks bike. No one wanted to admit it but we were all jealous of his independence and how cool it was that he owned a motorcycle.

The first bike I bought was a piece-of-crap Harley Sprint that I simply had to have because, after Jack’s bike, it had to be just about the coolest motorcycle ever. It broke down permanently after 3-days. On to the BSA. This was another fairly light vehicle with a shortened lightweight racing frame that caused the front wheel to skip off the ground at every stoplight despite my light touch on the accelerator. The 441 was just a bit too light for my tastes and, with its tendency to skip lightly down the road it felt way to much like the lightness of that first rental. As I mentioned, lightweight motorcycles had not served me well starting out with that first rented Suzuki.

Immediately after renting these “toys” in Waukegan we went over to our girlfriend’s houses to show off. We stopped first at Debbie’s house where she was in the back yard washing the AMC Pacer that would soon be hers. Her mom, looking at my tiny little motorcycle was adamant that her little girl wasn’t going to have anything to do with “that thing” so we headed to Rob’s girlfriend Marilyn’s house.

We pulled into the driveway. I was cool as a cucumber trying as much as possible to be Lee Marvin from the Wild Ones. “Yeah,” I said, “I’ve gotten pretty good at this in the hour or so I’ve had it.” Her dad admired the little bikes and even rode around the block on Robin’s. “Let’s go for a ride.” I said looking at Marilyn. She, like Debbie’s mom, had an uncertain opinion of my ability to adequately control the vehicle. “No problem.” I said as I dropped it into gear, intending to take a little spin around her yard to demonstrate my superior riding ability. I gently let go of the clutch and the bike jumped forward a foot or so…and stalled. I kicked. I kicked again and it wound up. A-ring-a-ding-ding-ding-rattle-rattle-rattle. The engine caused the loose chain of this ill-maintained rental to sound off against the chain guard as it idled in place hanging loose against the teeth as it came off of the sprocket. The two sounds of the ring-ding-ding motorcycle and the rattle of the chain sang together with a less-than-pleasing cacophony of sound. I depressed the brake as I prepared to put it back into gear. Wham! Wrong side! The brake was actually first gear! The motorcycle leapt forward with me barely hanging on as it shot across Marilyn’s yard. Luckily I accidentally found a barren spot as I went through the 6-foot high hedge bordering her parent’s house and the nearest neighbor’s yard. To avoid the toy-strewn lawn and the stroller on the front sidewalk I made a sharp turn onto the road and headed straight across and through the cross-neighbors little 2-½ foot hedge. I was a mere passenger as the bike began circling around in a tight circle to avoid the front porch. I ran once more through the neighbors hedge and headed back across the street barely turning enough to enter the property near the driveway. Unfortunately it was not near enough to the driveway as the front wheel met the curb and bounced skyward. A heaver vehicle would have stopped but not this little monster! It continued over the patch of lawn and down the driveway toward Robin and Marilyn, both of whom were frozen in-place watching my performance. I slid to a top immediately in front of Marilyn and put my foot down skipping once arresting my forward momentum. The handlebar slipped out of my grip and the bike crashed to the ground at her feet. Robin fell to the ground holding his stomach tightly. Marilyn gave me a barely disguised look of pity and turned toward Robin who continued to writhe on the ground caught in the ecstasy of uncontrollable laughter.

Of course that time the lightness of the bike probably saved me from more damage but the toy-like lightness of the bike also made me more casual about its capabilities. Like when I destroyed my brother’s Suzuki – another 120.

We were camping in upper Wisconsin as a family. I home on leave from the Navy when I borrowed his “toy” bike. I had owned my Suzuki 500 for some time and had become a lot more familiar with the workings of a heaver bike…to my misfortune. As I returned from the short run I’d made around the lake I stopped at the corner awaiting cross traffic. I dropped the little bike into gear and accelerated quickly winding the engine out to its red line before shifting. Coming into the first curve I prepared to drop a bit into the curve to keep my speed up when I noticed the sand spread across the road from some apparently recent roadwork. There was no time to slow the motorcycle. As I headed into the turn I felt the wheels slip on the sand patch which I was just entering. There was no way to make the curve while I was in a slide so I did the next best thing. This was a dirt bike. It was made for off-road abuse. I straightened the handlebars and prepared for the 10 foot jump into the shallow swamp on the inside of the curve. This was a better choice than the lake immediately on the other side of the road. This part of the lake had a steep drop-off that would be the last I would see of Steve’s bike if I went that way…no, the swamp was a better choice. These thoughts raced through my mind as time slowed and a goosed the engine to raise the front end high into the air. I was sailing smoothly toward a 2-wheel landing when the front fork caught on a passing tree. The bike started tipping forward and I decided it was time for the vehicle and me to part company – I pushed off to the side noticing at the same time the figure of a gentleman around 200’ away leaning against the corner of his house smoking his pipe and watching me. He had not, yet, had time to react I noticed impartially as my body hurled toward the ground. With my hands above my head to break my fall I thought “If I land like this it’ll break my arms.” I put them somewhere else – I’m not sure exactly where because almost immediately I landed on my head tipping immediately onto my stomach. I lay quietly thanking my lucky stars that I was still alive when I looked up to see the motorcycle arriving on the 12:47 and I was the arrival platform! The motorcycle landed flat pinning me to the ground. “Still alive!” I thought then almost as fast realized the transmission cover was on my helmet and my face was under the 6 inches or so of water that made up the liquid part of this little patch of cattails and stagnant water. My left arm was pinned under the rear wheel and I could feel the heat of the exhaust pipe through the water which told me how close it was. My right arm was pinned under the front wheel which would have been easier to lift if my sleeve had not been caught on the front hub. No amount of tugging was breaking it free. Realizing I would soon drown if I didn’t do something I gripped the rear spokes and the chain guard and lifted with my left hand. The motorcycle moved enough to free my left hand with which I dug at the mud surrounding my head and the engine enough to give me the required leverage to climb bodily under the front wheel and out to freedom. I thrust my head up for a breath as soon as it was free. I lay for a second then pulled the rest of me out from under the tortured piece of machinery. Both wheels were tangled in swamp-weeds and bent into unnatural positions that were like some disturbed persons’ idea of modern art. As I hauled myself to my feet I reached up to remove the helmet that had served me so well. It split into two halves as I exerted outward pressure to pull the helmet over my ears. Right down the middle. A little star decorated the side of the helmet where the transmission had tried to re-shape my head.

After righting the bike I kicked it couple of times and it surprisingly came to life. Handlebars wrenched out of shape and front wheel scraping the front forks I mounted the motorcycle for the 1-mile trip back to camp. It was a challenging mile. Handlebars twisted so one side was against my stomach and the other controlled by my hand that extended straight out in front of the bike where I could still twist the throttle. I drove into camp and dropped the kickstand down and fell in a heap next to the mass of mutilated metal and rubber.

“What happened!” Shouted Steve as he saw me lying prostrate beginning to curl into a ball of sympathy…or so I hoped. “My bike! My bike!” Steve shouted as he leapt over my still form and began to hug his gas tank while caressing the twisted front fender. I rose in disgust both for my uncaring brother and this lightweight toy of a motorized vehicle. In retrospect of course I can completely sympathize with his concerns, after all I had always survived any traumatic things I insisted on doing to myself but motorcycles cost MONEY to fix. And this one would take more of that than a high-school senior usually had. I’m sure my brother saved like crazy to fix that bike but…ya know…when I think about it…

…I’m not sure that one was ever ridden again.