Triumphrat

DrBeast · 07-24-2005

Evening all,
Dr Beast here , on holiday in New England , usually resident in London , where it's clearly dangerous to be Brazilian.

I have just done a fly drive to niagara , and am now on the back half of the trip , about to move to Newport , and then Rhode island, and I've got to say , I really am missing my T100 terribly.
The kids are having a wonderful time , and such a buzz , that it's almost taken my mind of the impact that family rooms have on Beasts in love.

What I can't do anything about is the awful motorcycle envy I'm experiencing when ever I see a biker tooling along the interstates.

A tiny fraction of jap bikes, the rest , enormous harleys and goldwings, and as yet , not a single Bonnie. What is interesting , is the almost total lack of protective gear I see worn , usually , the holy trinity of jeans, trainers , and a T shirt , with no gloves , and a half hat.

It's been said before on this site , that Triumph riders seem a ***** sight more sensible and professional in their attitude to self preservation. Come on , harley brothers - give yourself a chance at least , should the doody hit the fan.

Otherwise - having a great time.
thanks America!

Beast

AllanCook · 07-24-2005

Don't be too disappointed, Beast. The people you saw on the interstates were the usual lot of New England idiots, the same as your British idiots. The real motorcyclists -- appropriately clad for riding -- were threading the winding, verdant secondary roads which rise and fall throughout the western part of New England, far from the madding crowd on the interstate highway system.

Enjoy the rest of your holiday,

Allan

fuzzdevil · 07-24-2005

DrBeast you are in one of my favorite parts of this country. I am a native California, but have a deep love for New England - Providence Rhode Island being #1. I hope you enjoy th trip, get some chowder slurp down some oyesters, and if you can make it up to Portland for some lobster. Oh yea and HP Lovecraft is buried in Providence

Dinqua · 07-25-2005

Dr,
Sounds like you drove by my house if you went down Route 90 to Niagara Falls. There is a nice Triumph dealer here that would have been glad to let you test ride some bikes for a quick fix.
As for the idiots in the T-shirts. Well, I must admit that even I have resorted in the last week to wearing a T-shirt while going for a quick ride. It has been one of the hottest/most humid summers on record and has been hovering around 90ºF for the better part of two months now. You can only take so much. It has gotten so stifling that i have even resorted to driving the airconditioned car to work and the store. It's been like riding in a blast furnace. With the leathers and full face I sweat so much I smell like a frenchman by the time I ride the 8 miles to work. Can't have that.
Anyway, hope you enjoy this part of the country, it is beautiful and has much to offer. All in all, a nice place to raise a family.

SpeedyPete · 07-25-2005

Hi Dr,

I ride in the NYC area and I might see another bonnie once a month if that. Its either Harleys or sport bikes over here.

I have to confess I also ride by bonnie (03 T100) in shorts and a t-shirt if I'm just tooling around town though I have been spotted on I-287 occasionally on my way to/from the hardware store. When it gets to 90F and 80% humidity, I just can't bear to get the whole kit on for a 10 minute ride. These days, I'm lucky if I can get a 10 minute ride in so its either shorts or no ride. We all make our choices.

I feel for you rolling through New England with no bike. The whole northeast is a rider's paradise right from Maine down to Jersey and out to Pennsylvania. I'm still holding a Father's Day IOU for a day of riding and will probably head up to the Rhode Island coast. For that I'll wear the full boots, jeans and jacket. With any luck I'll get 300 miles in that day. Its all good.

You know what they say about family vacations - its a classic oxymoron.

P

DrEnglish · 07-25-2005

There are blockheads everywhere. Yesterday while running errands I saw a coupla Hogs with female (more or less) passengers. Both were dressed in:

Beanie helmet
Tube top
Short denim cutoffs
Foam rubber flip-flops from the drugstore

Sure, it's hot lately, but that's a recipe for disaster even at 5 MPH. I was both angry and concerned by such stupid behavior. Sure, live and let live, but that is just brute ignorance in action. Can you imagine dropping a dresser on your ankle while essentially barefoot? Ack. I dropped the Bonnie on my foot at a walking pace while in full gear and am still not fully recovered 8 months later. Of course riding has risks, but I think I'd do better in a 60 MPH get-off than those folks would at a stoplight brainfart.

Roadglide · 07-25-2005

Quote:

On 2005-07-25 11:38, DrEnglish wrote:
There are blockheads everywhere. Yesterday while running errands I saw a coupla Hogs with female (more or less) passengers. Both were dressed in:

Beanie helmet
Tube top
Short denim cutoffs
Foam rubber flip-flops from the drugstore

Sure, it's hot lately, but that's a recipe for disaster even at 5 MPH. I was both angry and concerned by such stupid behavior. Sure, live and let live, but that is just brute ignorance in action. Can you imagine dropping a dresser on your ankle while essentially barefoot? Ack. I dropped the Bonnie on my foot at a walking pace while in full gear and am still not fully recovered 8 months later. Of course riding has risks, but I think I'd do better in a 60 MPH get-off than those folks would at a stoplight brainfart.

I don't disagree with you, but you can't drop a dresser on your ankle.

DrEnglish · 07-25-2005

I guess the crash bars and bags would stop it? Not sure I'd wanna try that experiment...

markbvt · 07-25-2005

Beast, Allan's right. Those of us with Triumphs are too busy enjoying the twisty back roads to bother plodding along the highway.

Nothing quite like the feeling of riding my Bonnie at 70mph down a two-lane country road. Or at 30 around one of the App Gap's hairpin turns.

And yes, I wear full leathers when I go for a ride, if it's less than 80 degrees out, and a full-face helmet. If it's over 80, I'll wear an armored mesh jacket and a regular pair of pants -- just too ***** hot in leathers -- although I'll still use the full-face helmet. Some of us actually value our skins, unlike all too many of those Harley riders. (But that said, it was actually a kid on a sportbike who claimed the idiocy record in my experience -- he was riding in nothing but a pair of shorts, a helmet, and a pair of flipflops.)

--mark

GaryD · 07-25-2005

In my part of the USA 99% of the riders are on cruisers (mostly japanese clones) and 95% of the riders wear no helmets. Engineer's boots, jeans, T shirt, leather vest and do rag is the standard uniform with leather chaps and gloves being optional. Sport bikes and full face helmets are very rare. Of course, 98% of the riders haven't been riding 5 years and 90% are posers, not riders. Give it another 5 to 10 years for the posers to move on to the next fad and bikes will mostly disappear again in the USA.

I keep wondering what happened to the millions of small Honda bikes sold in the 60's and 70's in the USA.