Moonbeam and Back: An In-Ontario Iron Butt & a Bike to Do It

The mighty Wolfe Bonham did a Moonbeam run this year as a part of one of his mega well-beyond an Iron Butt long distance rides.  I just popped it into Google maps and it happens to be a perfect first Iron Butt distance from home, and all in the province.

The starting Iron Butt is the Saddlesore 1000, 1000 miles in 24 hours.  They have a metric equivalent Saddlesore 1600 kilometre ride too.  The suggestion is to do a distance that can't be short cutted for credibility's sake.  Riding from Elora to Moonbeam and back is always going to be over 1600kms, no matter how you do it.  Another benefit is that by going up on Highway 11 through North Bay and back through Sudbury and on the 400, I won't be riding the same route twice.

The Tiger has become fragile, so I'm jonesing for a long distance weapon, not that the vibey and exposed Tiger was ideal for that, but it's what I had.  A few years ago Max and I rented a Kawasaki Concours14 for a ride in the Superstition Mountains near Phoenix, Arizona, and it was a glorious thing.  That Connie was a first gen C14, the newer ones have one of the highest load carrying capacities of a modern bike - so big that they could carry Max and I two-up again.  Another thing about getting back into Connie ownership (I used to own a C10), is that I'd have an excuse to frequent the Concours Owners Group again.

There is a low mileage (31k) 2010 current generation C14 for sale in Toronto with some cosmetic damage and a dodgy windshield.  I can sort out the niggles, and then this thing would eat miles like nothing I've had before.  There is a strange lack of Kawasaki Heavy Industries motorbikes on the Iron Butt finisher's list (Honda has six times more bikes, BMW over eight times more).  I want to represent!  I've owned more Kawis than any other brand to this point, so it'd also be coming home to team green.

This particular one is blue instead of tedious grey (Concourses tend to be very conservatively coloured), which appeals, I prefer a colourful bike.  The C14 has a number of optional touring pieces, including a variety of windshields, which is good because the slab on that Concours ain't comely.

Love the Milano from Guardians of the Galaxy.  The C14
would be getting similar higher visibility trim, especially
around those Testarosa strakes!

Fortnine has the National Cycle Vstream windshield for the C14, which would give me a smaller but more functional, better made and swoopier look.  The bike comes with a top box and panniers, so there isn't too much it'd need, other than sorting out the windshield and doing some touch up.  Seeing a blue bike, I immediately want to liven it up with some orange trim, Milano style.  Other than a full service and a few fixes, this bike is ready to do 100k.

The stock seat is already a comfortable thing, though I've enjoyed the Corbin on the Tiger so much I'd consider tapping them again for another custom saddle eventually.  The C14 Concours would be the biggest bike I've owned and could do something nothing in the garage can do right now, carry my son and I two-up while operating within the bike's weight capacity.  It would also be just what I need to make a run to Moonbeam and back in 24 hours as the summer winds up.

Lobo Loco: The Birds & The Bees Rally

You couldn't possibly hit them all,
so route selection is key.

It's a sleepy, summer, Saturday morning in Elmira.  The few locals that are already up are walking dogs and taking it slow, but the clock has just ticked over to 8am and we've begun our first long distance motorcycle rally.  We fill up, get a receipt showing our start time and place and text to the rally lead that we've started.  We rode over to Elmira to start because this is a target rich environment with over 1500 points on tap.

How did we get here?  My buddy Jeff met Wolfe Bonham, the creator of this rally, at Lawrence Hacking's Overland Adventure and they became friends on Facebook.  When Wolfe announced the rally on there Jeff asked if I wanted to give it a go and a rally team was born!  A week before the event you get a rally book pdf emailed to you with various locations in it.  You've only got eight hours to connect as many dots as you can and it would be impossible to hit all of them, so you've got to be crafty and find the best route from where you are to where the rally ends in Brantford.

The theme of this rally was birds and bees, so locations had some kind of connection to that idea and included everything from apiaries to bird statues.  Since neither of us enjoy urban riding on hot summer days, we plotted a route that would take us cross country and out to the shores of Huron before looping back around to Brantford.  Being new, we were afraid we'd bite off more than we could chew; we did anyway despite reducing our route goals half a dozen times.

The morning clipped along as we knocked out 1600 points in Elmira before 8:30am and were in Lucan by mid-morning.  Things started to go sideways when we had to navigate miles of sandy cottage roads before eventually getting to Kettle Point on Lake Huron.  Turning around from there at noon we were getting tired and the sun was relentless.  One of our key goals was to try and get to a bee beard happening at Clovermead Adventure Farm near Aylmer.  This only had a twenty minute window and was worth big bonus points.  We caught a few more locations before hopping on the 401 and pushing to Clovermead, making it (thanks to a very helpful gate keeper) in the nick of time.  Our cunning plan was to use the 401 as a pressure valve if we ran out of time, and it was already doing the job.

The bee beard was brilliant, as was Clovermead in general.  A rally like this shows you all sorts of local spots you’d otherwise have no idea about.  I was thinking about this as we got out to the bikes only to be told by Google maps that we were an hour away from the finish line with an hour to go!  Perhaps the bee beard was a trap!  We’d been tired but adrenaline kicked in again, the race to the finish was on!  We got back to the 401 and flew on down the 403 elated that we'd made the bee beard bonus but anxious about getting to the finish.  The traffic light coming off the highway felt like it was red for an hour!  We pulled into King's Buffet parking lot, already full of motorcycles of all shapes and sizes, at 3:56pm; that's tight!

Staggering into the dimness of the restaurant I felt sun-blind.  We drank lots of water while we wrote out a clean copy of our rally sheet that had to show times and odometer readings for each stop along with a photograph showing us and our rally flags in each location.  A rally volunteer then checked off each photo making sure that it fulfilled the criteria.  Most people hadn't eaten during the day so the all you can eat buffet went down well while we handed in scores and had our photos checked.

Our goal was to not embarrass ourselves at our first rally so we were hoping for a mid-pack result.  When the numbers finally came in we were 17th & 18th out of 34 finishers.  To top it off Jeff won most miles covered and I won the most bee related points trophy (thanks bee beard!).

The camaraderie of the riders is infectious at the end of an event like this.  There are no class distinctions between types of bikes and this rally had everything from big Harleys and the latest BMW adventure bikes to a 200cc Yamaha TW200 (which he took over the Burlington Skyway!).  Tales of daring do were shared and the overall feel was one of a celebration. Everyone there felt like they'd achieved something difficult and there was a real glow to the competitors, though that might have been sunburn.  

Everyone cheered and clapped as trophies went out for everything from the person who got most lost to the top scorers.  Riders were awarded for smallest bike, 2-up and most efficient route as well as a raft of other prizes.  The top riders scored almost double the points we did, showing real navigation and riding mojo.  Afterwards lots of handshakes and names were exchanged and a lot of new friends were made.  Revitalized after a big buffet dinner and all that good cheer, Jeff and I saddled up and waved to everyone as we  rode into a welcome evening rain.  I was only an hour away from home, but Jeff, after already riding almost 600kms, was going to put another 200kms on going to his cottage in Kincardine; that guy’s a machine!

Wolfe Bonham, the creator of this rally, is keen to put on more.  As he said in the introduction to the inaugural Birds & Bees Rally, if you're interested in doing more than just riding to a coffee shop and would like to discover new and interesting locations, long distance rallying might be just what you're looking for. I, for one, prefer to ride with purpose, and this certainly gives you one.  You can make this as hard or as easy as you'd like and the sense of satisfaction you get at the end is infectious.  We're already aiming for a possible October Hallowe'en themed ride that's in the works, maybe with a slightly shorter route this time.  Hope to see you there!

Think this sounds like a good time? Keep October 15th open, there is another!

The rally website: http://lobolocorallies.ca

Want to sign up for October?  It's HERE!

Photos From the Rally (anything with a rally flag in it was actually used for the rally)...

Our first stop 500 feet down the road from the gas station we filled up at.
By 4pm we were over 500kms covered, but we also went further than anyone else.

I had no idea this was on the way to Stratford.  I intend to go back and have lunch!

Ya gotta hit a lotta apiaries to win top bee keeper!

How to hold a rally flag down at a windy big bird on the Avon in Stratford - no swans out yet though, so no swan bonus :(

A welcome sign to a town starting with B!  100 points!  The grass was all trampled down around the sign, we weren't the first.

The closest I got to a bee beard.

Another spot I'd like to return to.  Some prime objects d'art for the garage in there!

The last stop before our final highway bombing run to the Brantford finish line.

One of only a couple of stops that were biological rather than rally targets.  Jeff's Super10 and my Tiger were flawless.

The difference between these patches and others you might see is that these patches denote
hardcore motorcycling skills over astonishing distances and times.

The good cheer was infectious after the rally.  It didn't matter what you rode, only that you rode it.

Wolfe Bonham, the author of the inaugural Lobo Loco Birds & Bees Long Distance Rally.

Jeff never says no to free gas!  We plotted the longest route, but we spent very little time looking at traffic lights.

Iron horses of many colours - you'll find everything from the RTW adventure bike to big cruisers and tiny nakeds on a long distance rally.

He's been everywhere man, he's been everywhere.

After riding hundreds of kilometres during the rally, everyone saddled up for the last ride home (or to a hotel - a number of riders travelled up from The States to participate, including one who did an 800 mile ride the day before to get there!).

From tiny Yamaha WT200s and KTM 390s to 1600+cc cruisers... there is no 'right bike' for a long distance rally.

We all rode off into the twilight as rain started to fall lightly between lightning strikes.  A suitably dramatic finish to an epic day.

We bit off more than we can chew, but still made it in with four whole minutes to spare!

It now has pride of place next to the wine rack, and has left me looking forward to future rallies.

The Inaugural Lobo Loco Birds & Bees Summer Rally Final Results

Jeff does more burn outs than me, so he got longest route.

We were aiming for mid-pack.  It doesn't get more mid-pack than 17/18 out of 34 finishers.

https://goo.gl/maps/b2y9jWfa3oN2
https://goo.gl/photos/zYV2dJz5aViRUK298
https://rides.jasonjonas.com/riderList.php?rcid=0&id=438
http://wolfe35.wixsite.com/lobolocorallies/results

Bike Bucket List: Ironbutt Glory & MotoGP photography redux

almost 1600 miles diagonally across North America.

My motorcycle bucket list includes earning the Ironbutt basics.  The first two rides are the Saddlesore (1000 miles in 24 hours) and the Bunburner (1500 miles in 36 hours).  The Austin MotoGP race happens to be just over fifteen hundred miles away, making it an ideal target for these badges of long distance endurance riding.

I'm not sure that I'd ever do an Ironbutt again, but it'd be nice to have done it once.

The MotoGP race in Austin is on April 10th this year.  Leaving on a Tuesday night would get me there for the event.  Even with a (more) relaxed ride back, I'd still only be on the road for seven days - 3 of them at the GP.

I roughed out hotel stops based on ideal distances, but it would probably be significantly cheaper to pick a hotel chain and stay with them throughout.  My hotel of choice would be Hampton Inn, so a revision based on where I can stop at those might be in order.

After Indy got cancelled, this is the only other race on my continent, so my only chance to ride to a race event.  It'd be nice to see the circus in action again this year, and Austin, while much further away, offers a chance at Ironbutt glory!

Video of MotoGP practice through the esses at Indianapolis.

I'd be nice to go down there with some good camera kit and see what I can capture.  I did pretty well with my little Olympus last summer, but another go with more effect gear would net even better results.

Many of the images I took had to be photoshopped a bit to hid the poor resolution and light intake of my camera (creating a simplified painted look in Photoshop hides these weaknesses).

 
 

I'm also getting frustrated with the lack of lens availability with the Olympus I've got.  I'm thinking of going back to a superzoom on my next camera.  The Nikon P610 has enormous reach (4x what the Olympus telephoto can manage with similar light loss).  What would be even better would be a full 1" sensor superzoom like the Pentax FZ1000, then I'd have a multipurpose camera with excellent low light ability - though they are three times the price of the smaller sensor superzooms.

I had a fixed lens superzoom a few years back and loved the flexibility, though it was one of the first electronic view finder cameras and lagged annoyingly.  It's light intake wasn't great either.  The new ones will benefit from much faster electronics and dramatically larger sensors letting more light in.

The Olympus PEN is an entry level mini-SLR.  I've enjoyed the size and convenience but the lenses are expensive and hard to find, and the kit lens has broken.  The body itself also broke under warranty when I first got it.  A second failure in three years has me thinking about moving on.  I'm looking for the simplicity and flexibility of a fixed lens superzoom again.  This would be especially handy when travelling on a bike where all the SLR clobber takes up too much space.

As a photographer I've always enjoyed being able to do more with less.  I've often seen people with suitcases of gear worth ten times mine take worse pictures.  As long as it can keep up with my eye and offer the control I need, a quality fixed lens superzoom will let me do that in spades.


Rough Planning Maps:

• Elora to Super 8 Airport North Austin: (20 mins from Circuit of the Americas)
• Elora to Best Western outside of Little Rock: 1045 miles 
• Little Rock Hotel to Austin Hotel:  535 miles
• CotA to Hampton Inn Marion (outside of Memphis) 654 miles
• Memphis to Fort Wayne:  584 miles
• Fort Wayne to home:  354 miles

Riding to a MotoGP Race, Next Level

Riding to Indy was a blast, one of the highlights of my summer.  I was all keen to sign up for the whole weekend next year, but then this happened.  With no Indy on the calendar any more, the chance of me riding south to see Valentino and Marc do their thing has just gotten quite a bit more extreme.  If Indy was level one, here is what more commitment would look like.

Level 2:  THE RIDE TO TEXAS

Riding to Texas, ironically, takes us right past the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.  This one's a bit tricky.  The Texas race next year is in April.  We can still get snow in April so it would have to be a weather permitting exit and then get south as quickly as possible to get clear of impassable roads.




Indy was a ~780km ride, Texas is over three times further at 2564kms; it's basically a diagonal trip across the majority of North America.  The IBA has a Bunburner 1500, and the ride to Texas just happens to be 1593 miles.  Could it be done in 24 hours?  If it could, it would need some recovery time afterwards, and some serious physical and bike prep beforehand.

If the race is on Friday, Saturday and Sunday of April 8-10, 2016, I'd leave on Wednesday, April 7 (very) early morning, aiming to cross the border and be out of Detroit before anyone wakes up.  Baring any major traffic problems I'd land in a hotel in Austin Thursday morning early, and pass out.

Friday, Saturday and Sunday would be practice, qualifying and race day, and then I'd begin the trek back at a more sedate pace.  Five hundred mile days would mean a stop in Arkansas and Indiana on the way back, leaving Sunday afternoon and getting home late on Wednesday, April 13th.

Could a ride to The Circuit of the Americas be completed within a week from Southern Ontario?  That would be over 3000 miles or a touch over 5000kms in seven days.  Boo ya!

Level 3:  THERE IS ANOTHER!

There is another MotoGP even I could ride to, but if you thought Texas was a stretch, this one is something else entirely.

The Argentinian MotoGP event takes place the week before Texas at the other end of the world.  If you thought the exit for Texas might be tricky, this one is downright diabolical.

This is a 13,655km (8485 mile) odyssey that would mean riding across two continents and crossing one of the highest mountain ranges in the world (not to mention the rain forests and dozen or so international borders).  Nick Sanders managed three trips up and down the Americas in 45 days, but he's crazy, and legendary.  John Ryan, introduced to me through Melissa Holbrook Pierson's fantastic book, The Man Who Would Stop At Nothing, did Prudhoe Bay, Alaska to the tip of Florida in an astonishing 86.5 hours, but he too was crazy, and legendary.

The ride to Argentina would have intention.  This wouldn't be a wishy-washy wandering around the world ride, it would have Terra Circa like intent.  I've thought about riding the Americas before.   Riding to Rio is about 16,500kms and I thought it would take 60 days (275kms/day - higher in North America, lower elsewhere).  Riding to Termas de Rio Hondo would be marginally shorter.  Pushing the average to 340 kms a day, it might be doable in 40 days.

That would mean a departure date of February 18th.  If you thought leaving in the first week of April might be weather problematic, leaving in the third week of February is positively terrifying.  I'd aim for a leaving 'window' between February 15-20 looking for clear roads to make a quick break south to get clear of the hard water.

This happens to fit nicely into a semester at school so it would be an easy absence to manage logistically.  With that in mind, I'd find myself in Argentina in the first weekend of April.  The end of the world is in the same country south of me, so hitting Ushuaia before coming back north and seeing Machu Picchu would be a nice idea.  Going down that way is a few hundred extra kilometres out of the way.

At this point do I have to return the bike?  If so, the ride back could take place over 18 weeks.  If not, the flight back happens in just under one day (though coming back via Texas would mean I'm on a plane with a whack of MotoGP types!

What to take?  Honda, Yamaha, Ducati and Suzuki all have factory presences at MotoGP and they each offer a viable choices:

Yamaha's Super Ténéré is what Nick Sanders does his double ride up and down the Americas on.  When they took it apart after the trip the engine still looked brand new.  This is one tough bike.  That story impressed the motorcycle Jedi I work with so much he bought one.  It'll handle less than perfect roads and swallow miles with ease... and it's bullet proof.  I'd get mine in Rossi colours.  Whatcha think Yamaha Canada?

Honda's African Twin is being resurrected next year.  Rumours have this bike being off-road capable and more than able to manage anything Central and South America might throw at it.  Canada to Argentina would be a solid way of proving the new Africa Twin's metal, whatcha think Honda Canada?  I'd get mine in Marquez colours.

Ducati's Multistrada is a long distance beauty with lots of tech thrown at it.  It doesn't have the dependability rep of the two Japanese bikes above, but it appears a very capable all-rounder that would have no trouble managing the variety of roads to Argentina.  It's so pretty and I haven't heard of any epic treks made by one, so it's a bit of a risk, but what's a trip like this without some risk?  This ride would give the Multistrada that world beating rep.

I'd get mine in Ducati red, whatcha think Ducati North America?

Suzuki's V-Strom is a road focused adventure tourer, but it has some off road cred after BIKE Magazine took one from the UK back to the factory in Japan where it was made.  Anything that can ride across Asia can manage Canada to Argentina.  Suzuki has only recently returned to MotoGP, it'd be nice to remind everyone that they're there by riding a Suzi through all those countries.  Whatcha think Suzuki Canada?

My opportunity to ride to a MotoGP race hasn't ended with the death of Indy, it's just taken on a higher level of commitment.

Timing

Good book so far!

After enjoying The Perfect Vehicle so much I started on The Man Who Would Stop at Nothing.  I sent the author a quick email saying how much I enjoyed The Perfect Vehicle and hoped she'd keep at writing so well about the craft of biking.

After ripping through the first couple of chapters I did what anyone in the information age would do and looked up what John Ryan is doing at the moment.  The assumption was that he was making time somewhere and putting miles behind him.


I have a unique talent for lousy timing, and my starry eyed thanks to Melissa Holbrook Pierson for writing The Perfect Vehicle contained no idea of what was happening with her and motorbikes right now. She was very kind to right back so positively.  More people should drop a line to the writers they enjoy and say thanks (says the English teacher).

John Ryan, the main focus of my current read, is a record breaking Iron Butt rider.  He covered huge distances in record breaking time.  I stumbled across the Iron Butt Association when I was planning my Lake Superior circumnavigation earlier this year, so Melissa's latest book on this hidden subculture wasn't completely new to me.  As I was researching circling Superior I saw a blog post where the rider casually mentioned that he did it in less than 24 hours.  I was astonished!  And intrigued!

RIP John Ryan

I've been greatly enjoying The Man Who Would Stop At Nothing so far, so much so that I wanted to link John's blog to this one.  That was when I discovered that he'd recently died in a seemingly benign road accident.  I'm frustrated that he was rear ended by a cager in a Mustang, and that no other details of the accident are forthcoming.


So here I am, a week later, mulling over John's fate (yes, I'm a muller).  There is no doubt that motorbiking is a dangerous pass-time, one that demands the utmost attention, and I now suspect a degree of fatalism.  If John Ryan can be taken out by some idiot texting in his Mustang, so can we all.

I've been osculating between despair and bravado in responding to this. A small part of me wants to question what the point of it all is, and the other (larger) part is thinking, 'fuckin' ay! He died doing what he loved."  We should all be so lucky.  I've lately had the fear that I'll go shovelling the driveway, or be at work... how horrible!

In the book Melissa has a great quote: "Give your best years, your now, so that at some distant point, which may never in fact arrive, you can get all the pills you'll need to extend your shuffle to the grave."  The fearful response to two wheeling is, I think, based on this truth that so many people live by.

Melissa also talks in great detail about the calculus of risk in riding.  Knowing John as well as she did, I suspect she'd appreciate the fact that he left the world on two wheels, even while wishing he were still here.

I crossed the line a year ago when I decided to go take the course and get on two wheels.  It's approaching mid-winter here in Canada and that feeling of immersive freedom is as far away from me as it can get.  I'm sorry that John is gone, and reading the rest of Melissa's book is going to be tinged with that regret.

Does any of this stop me from getting back on two wheels as soon as I can?  Not remotely.