And in the 90s, the third one....... Falling off while straw bale racing at Snetterton. Actually the rear tyre on the outfit had a massive blow out and I just got spat off the platform....we were going so quickly, the outfit and driver are just to the right out of the picture slammed up against the barrier. ......and it was the only time we had such a good start we were in third place on the second lap, so far ahead of the rest of the field.
I fell asleep while riding up the A3 from Portsmouth to London. I was a despatch rider burning the candle at both ends. So what do I remember. Not a lot really until I woke up careering up the large grass embankment at Ripley in surrey ay about 70mph. Initial instinct (about 1 second) was to get back on the road, so managed to point the thing back down towards the road. Great idea but shit move as the hard shoulder had a very defined 90degree edge to the concrete slab that was about 5 inches tall. I was flung across into lane three on my arse and the bike was about 50m further up the road in lane two. Sustained three holes in my body. But still managed to hobble down the road to fetch the bike and wheel it onto the hard shoulder. Just aswell it wasn’t my bike...LOL
Another guy I worked with fell asleep on the a12 and crashed into one of them big road signs that stand about 10 meters high with directions for the upcoming exit.
Ouch. I've nearly fallen asleep a couple of times on the bike back when I had a (cough) hxxxxy. Not so much on the Ducati.
early 80s. For some reason girlfriend's parents didn't approve so when I noticed her father looking out of his office window in Frinton-on-Sea High St when I was turning across the main road i took my eye off the ball and pulled out straight into a bus. Next thing he is standing there looking down at me sprawled in the road telling me that if I thought he was going to let his daughter.............
Summer 1979. Very pretty girlfriend and I went camping to Bude on my z250 (no dodgy body kit @Mary Hinge). Was going across Bodmin moor on way to visit one of her relatives and I stacked it on a wet roundabout. Bit of gravel rash and bent crash bar and back on we get, me making suitable I will go slow promises. 400 yards up road bike dies. Took me 30 mins to work out a kindly sole who had picked the bike up had turned the fuel tap off. On to relatives. Time to go home and got into a real dice with an rd250 and X7. My ribs were black and blue from her punches but it was brilliant. No fear when young. Final insult when we got back to Bude was her handbag had been strapped to the tailpiece. Now, where did that fall off? We finished shortly afterwards.
I have just remembered another one in the 60s but nobody saw it as it was about 1.30am, pitch black night. I had been at a piss up and barbeque at Bures. I was daft enough to have gone on a bike which had a failing regulator, so it relied on the battery being fully charged for relatively short trips. Because it was dark, I had the lights on, so I was 'merrily' trolling along the B1508 back towards Colchester, intending to reach the junction at the White Hart PH in West Bergholt and turn down the Lexden Road to go through Bergholt towards my home. The lights had got very dim amounting to about one candlepower.....as I got to the junction, they had failed altogether and I couldn't see a damn thing, but I turned right anyway........not far enough, though. The junction is in fact a series of acute angles, and I went straight through the hedge on the corner, ending up in someones vegetable garden (or allotment).......I still remember the sprouts going down at the same time as me. Dragged the bike out as quickly as I could and got it started again, buggering off quickly......glad to reach an area with street lights and got home. In the light that morning I had a good look at the bike, lumps of mud everywhere, cabbage and sprout leaves caught in between panels. I sold the bike not long after that.
know the area well and grew up nearby so you must be close to me....if wasn't for you know what, I'd be trying to get you to come and take a look at my superlight drip problem
Me and a mate pulling in to a camp site on Anglesey many moons ago Him on a KH 250 and me on my trusty RD 200, so noisy and smokey making our entrance very noticeable. We had camped out at few sites of dubious quality so thought we would treat ourselves to a fancy site complete with tennis courts and club room and a bar. Pulling in I mistook what I thought was an uncut band of grass running around the perimeter of the tent field. It was in fact a two foot ditch, front wheel went down and I went over the bars! All in clear view of the happy campers!
I worked for a motor factors in the late 80’s and had to go out in the snow into the country. Got to my destination ok but going back included an uphill. Gulp. Down in the dip I went with a left hand bend then up the hill, farm on the left hand side. Made a run up for it got half way and could not get up any further so I thought I would go and ask the farmer for a tow. Handbrake on I left the van running to keep inside warm, started walking up the hill, heard a crackling noise to find my van on it’s way down the hill, ran as fast as I could to get in to stop it, luckily it slipped into the small ditch on the bend. No I didn’t go and ask the farmer I turned around and went the other way
Riding back from Silverstone GP in the 80s on my bevel with a mate on the back. Rain was of biblical proportions after a glorious summer's day so we were both soaked through. Anyhow mate on the back kept falling asleep and leaning on me, and I somehow found that if I touched the chrome surrounds on the idiot lights then I got a shock was was transmitted to said mate through wet clothes and gave him a belt. Kept me amused for miles and he could not figure out what was going on.
France a couple of years ago. They had a fuel strike and so it took ages of queuing at the petrol station to get my fuel. My turn, filled it with delicious unleaded. Breathing in the lovely smelling petrol vapors. So happy to be full again - still in neutral gave the throttle a big handful of revs to celebrate - put it in first gear - CRUNCH - sounded like the gearbox was going to split in half. They looked at me like they were cringing with the sound it had made. Felt such a prat !
Another bevel tale. A friend had a CD175 which snapped its cam chain while slip streaming said bevel at probably 80-90 mph. So we hatched a plan to tow it back the few miles to his house using the bevel and a washing line. Thus involved crossing g a dual carriageway and then a long steep climb up to his village. I told him to keep the brakes on a touch to keep the line tight and off we went. Anyone who has towed a bike with a bike knows how horrible it is, every time he went one side or the the other it dragged my bike over, most interesting when crossing the dual carriageway, and a bevel isnt the quickest steering bike . Anyway up the hill we went and I thought bugger me the old girl is struggling so down a gear and full throttle. Got to his house only to find that as we went faster he had been putting the front brake on more and more to try and get me to slow down. A CD175 had some sort of drum brake on it which was incandescent when we stopped, and the hotter it got the worse it was. How we laughed. And I have never towed a bike since.
About 1998 I think, I had a Gsxr750wt, not long had it and going down a country lane and a range rover stopped in the middle of the road. I Slowed right up and gave a scowling glance at the driver as if to say wtf you doing, then slammed on the gas in first gear. Front wheel flew up, tank slammed me in the chest, feet came off the pegs, completely out of control. Must of looked a right twat
Very near Woodbridge......but used to live in Stanway, then Ardleigh.....after that, Copdock, Claydon and Woolverstone.
I was about 15 when I bought a Vespa Sportique 125 for £10 from a neighbour. I had no licence, insurance, or anything like that, of course, but had the presence of mind, at least, to push it to a large carpark on private land nearby to try it out. It started straight away, so I jumped on it and tootled round the car park, pulling in the clutch to head between two parked cars, as I let the clutch out, I hadn't realised that I'd moved the gears on the handlebar into first gear, so as I fed in a handful of throttle, it leapt up onto its back wheel and it was only then that I caught sight of a terrified nun sitting in the passenger seat of a parked car that the underside of my Vespa was careering towards!! To this day, I can't explain how I managed to turn the thing on its back wheel, so instead of burying its underbelly into the front passenger window of the pale blue Ford Anglia, it came down alongside and took a sliver of paint with the end of the long screw holding one of those squeeze-bulb bicycle hooters to the leg shield! I still remember, as if in slow motion, the paint spiralling off the end of the screw like a pale blue pube! Sister Beata and I, both in a state of shock, exchanged details. The convent had been gifted the car by a local Ford dealer, called Gillespie's and so she was going to have to go there to get it put right. The dealer was a very merciful bloke and the bill only came to about £14. Lucky!
I'd just picked up my brand new KTM SA1290 and was riding it, in a 30 zone, towards Tewkesbury. Lots of pedestrians on each side, returning from the local morning school run. It had been raining on my way to collect it and I rode there on my Mutley, which I p/x traded in. My leather gloves were still very damp. I wondered if the cruise control worked at 30 'cos there is a speed camera. The cruise control is on the right, for reasons I still can't fathom. So I reached for it with my right hand still on the throttle. Next thing I know, I'm doing a massive wheelie and looking like a right twat to all the passing people. The damp glove had gripped the throttle as I pulled my finger back to set the cruise at a slightly-lower-than-30 speed. Fortunately, the factory defaults were still set to full traction control and that's the only thing that saved me falling off the back. Managed to land it okay, but was very embarrassed as I then pootled past the speed camera.
Was on a trackday with a couple of mates. While doing the sighting laps, exiting Paddock Hill Bend at a very sedate pace, I thought I saw something “fluttering” down by my right boot. Took a look down briefly and then looked ahead again ...to see I was headed to smash into the back of my mate’s bike. Panic handful of brake and the bike goes into a vertical stoppie (Supercorsa without warmers..who needs them?)... Time then slowed right down and I was looking down at the track surface thinking “I got this...let off the brake and it will continue rolling and the back end will settle back down to the ground”..well, it did but when the rear tyre landed it was about 2 ft out of line with the front so the bike just slammed me hard into the ground. Most embarrassing return to the pits as the dick ‘ead who lost it on the warm up and red flagged the session. Had to miss the rest of the day as I had smacked my helmet on the track and had a massive headache. The horror..
