A Tim's Top Gear Rick & Morty Themed Travel Challenge: We're going to Windigo, Morty!

I'm a big fan of Top Gear, and I especially enjoy their travel/challenges.  I've always dreamed of planning one, getting people silly enough to commit to it and then making it happen.

In the summer of COVID I'm finding myself daydreaming of possible adventures, so I started poking around on the internet trying to find how far north roads go in Ontario.  Bafflingly, Ontario has never connected to its own north sea shore by road.  For a province that has thousands of kilometers of ocean shoreline, Ontario seems intent on convincing its citizens that it's land locked.  I'd love to ride 1000kms north to the sea, but it's not an option.  James Bay is roughly in line with Scotland, so its not like it's in the arctic.

In the meantime, it looks like Windigo Lake north west of Thunder Bay is as far north as you can ride in Ontario on your own wheels:

...which offers us a great thematic riding challenge!  It's time to go to Windigo (instead of Bendigo), Morty!  Here's the inspiration in case you're not hip to Rick & Morty:

Here's the Top Gear style WE'RE GOIN TO WINDIGO, MORTY! Moto Travel Challenge:

• Each participant gets a $3000 budget for a bike and any farkles that must include a safety certificate.  Ownership is by WG2W Productions, pending the bikes return to Elora within 10 days of the event, at which point ownership is signed over to the rider.  Safety and taxes should be about $400, so that leaves about $2600 for a bike and farkles
• Insurance and ownership is managed by the event
• All riders must have a valid Ontario M class license
• Camping equipment is provided to each rider individually based on a sponsored selection of gear (rider's choice)  Each rider will be provided with bear gear.
• Each participant has to do any repair or maintenance on their own bike.  Only other competitors can assist.
• Google maps says it's a 27 hour ride to Windigo.  Riders can only be on the road between 7am and 7pm, so the most efficient (and luckiest) should arrive in Windigo on day three in the morning.  At 12 hours per day of possible riding, 27 hours =  2..25 days of riding.  The earliest rider with a perfectly timed ride would arrive at Windigo at 10am on day three of the event.
• Timing for the event takes into account speed limits.  Any rider caught speeding is disqualified.
• Any overnight stops while riding to Windigo must be wild camping following leave-no-trace rules.  Proof of camp site cleanup must be included on rider GoPro footage or a time penalty is applied.
• The rider who gets to Windigo (getting to Windigo means arriving at the lake on your bike and dipping a toe in) as close to 27 hours of riding after leaving the start line as possible, wins!
• Riders can choose how to use their daylight hours to ride.  In the case of a tie, the rider to get to Windigo the soonest and closest to 27 hours of riding after race start wins
• Winner gets a We're going to Windigo, Morty gold medal.  There will be silver and bronze finalist medals too.  Smallest displacement and oldest bikes who finish also get awards
• Any participant who finishes this long distance riding rally and is able to ride back to the start line within a week of the competition end can keep their bike! 

...followed by 469kms of
challenging unpaved roads
to the end of all roads.

A paved odyssey...

This isn't an easy ride.  It starts with almost 1700kms of riding on paved roads ranging from the biggest freeway you can imagine to single lane tar patched, northern frost heaved back-road.  You've then got almost 500kms of riding gravel up to where all roads end at Windigo.  Trying to do this on a one trick pony like a cruiser would be entertaining, but likely unsuccessful.  This is a challenge for a multi-purpose motorcycle!

The 599 highway isn't Google car photoed once you get on the gravel, and you're constantly dodging lakes this deep into the Canadian Shield.  The closest I could get was this photo of the Mishkeegogamang Band Office, which shows a graded gravel road out front.  Fuel stops are few and far between, some cunning planning will be required!

BIKES

There are some interesting choices at the bottom end of the bike market in Ontario:

A bike that'll handle the off-road part of this trip, though it isn't built for the thousands of kilometres of paved road leading to the hundreds of miles of gravel fire roads.  Capable of handling the camping gear too.  Should come in on budget on the road.

Low mileage, in good shape and comes safetied, so you'd have a bit left over for farkles.  It'd chew up the pavement side of WG2W effortlessly, but that windshield might never see Windigo (Morty).

Big Honda touring bike, high miles, but it's a Honda.  It'd be a handful on nearly a thousand kilometres of gravel, but some people like that.  Should come in under budget and ready to make miles.  The paves stuff would flash by on this and it could carry camping gear with ease!

Low miles, Kawasaki dependable, in great shape.  The Versys is short for versatile bike system, just what you'd need to get to Windigo (Morty).  The 650 is a lightweight bike that'll handle gravel, and it has luggage and mounting points for some soft bags.  I'd probably be able to get it for $2300 certified, which gives me a bit for some soft saddle bags, then I'm off to the races!  This'd be my choice.  Might spill my extra cash on some 70/30 semi-off road tires.

There are lots of other interesting choices that you could get road ready for under three grand in Ontario.  Seeing what people choose and how they prep the bike for long distance, multi-surface, remote riding would be half the fun.  To stretch the choices there would also be trophies for the oldest bike and smallest displacement bike to finish the ride, so some people might go after those rather than the timed competition.

PRODUCING IT FOR TV

All bikes have GoPros to capture footage and all riders agree to provide at least 15 minutes of speaking to camera dialogue per day while in the rally.  All competitors have to document their camp build and take down.  There will be a production/sweeper vehicle with a trailer in case of any bike failures.  The vehicle will be able to provide technical support in remote areas and be designed for the gravel portion of the event as well as offer a central point for production and media management.

Competition begins when all riders have their bikes delivered to a shared garage space in Elora.

Film Schedule:

Day 1:  All bikes have arrived.  Bike familiarity and maintenance, bike paperwork taken care of, all riders and production crew doing piece to camera introducing themselves and talking about the event and prep

Day 2:  Bike familiarity and preparation, filming continues

Day 3:  Bike familiarity and preparation, finalizing ride planning, filming continues.  All bikes in park ferme at the end of the day ready for the morning's off.

Day 4:  7am Race start in Elora.  Filmed by production vehicle crew and GoPros on bikes.

Production vehicle stopping in Thunder Bay on Day 1.

Day 5:  7am start.  Production vehicle stopping at Windigo to await arrival of riders (riders who arrive early will have a major penalty, so no one should be there until day 3)

Day 6:  Production vehicle at Windigo Lake awaiting arrivals.  End of day 6:  close of event party on Windigo

Day 7:  All rider camping gear to be taken in by the support vehicle for a lighter ride back.  Sweeping the road south to Silver Dollar (the beginning of pavement).  All competitors camping at Silver Dollar Campsite that night.  Confirm end of event with all riders.

Day 8:  Retrace/sweep route to Thunder Bay.  End of rally event in Thunder Bay.  Riders who want to keep their bikes have 3 days to return to the workspace in Elora in order to claim ownership.  Riders who want to find their own way home can do so and bikes will be transported in the trailer.

Day 9:  Production vehicle sweeps south clearing any bikes that have been parked.

Day 11:  Any bikes that have returned to the workspace in Elora have their ownership turned over to their riders.

Episodes:  45 minute edited

1)  Introducing riders, bike selection and  preparation - possibly include off-road training at SMART Adventures?

2) Rally Start:  day one on the road

3) Rally Continued:  day two on the road

4) Rally Conclusion: day three on the road and rally winners and finishers highlighted

5) where did they go missing riders review, post rally interviews while returning to Thunder Bay, final presentations in TB, sweeping up, who got to keep their bikes

Total production time:  3.75 hours of edited footage

Other opportunities:  Work with SMART Adventures out of Horseshoe Valley - include bits on how to ride off road, what riders can expect, how to manage bikes on loose surfaces.

Rough costing:

8 Competitors @ $3000 per bike = $24,000

Production Vehicle Cost (rental & gasoline):  $3000

Insurance & Paperwork costs at $1000 each competitor = $8,000

Production equipment (cameras, drone, on bike GoPros):  $5000

Production team hotels:  4 people x 2 nights Thunder Bay, 1 night on the road back, 2 nights camping in the north = $2000

Camping gear:  $1000/competitor + production crew = $10,000 (mitigated by sponsorship?)

Total rough budget:  $52,000.  Estimated budget:  $60,000   (mitigated by sponsorship)

Sponsorship opportunities:

- workshop/repair centre where bike setup takes place

- motorcycle farkle manufacturers or suppliers

- camping gear supply

- Tourism Ontario

- Northern Ontario

- motorcycle manufacturers

- competitor sponsorship

- Rick & Morty Themed prize swag

DGR: Social Connections Challenge: Remember The Ride

I took a swing at the Distinguished Gentleman's Ride Social Connections Challenge with MOTR Garage in the last post, but that idea might not tick the "innovative and disruptive" box - motorcycle coops already exist, though not in the format I'm suggesting.  My angle was to leverage retired teachers to connect men inter-generationally, but otherwise it's an existing concept and not particularly disruptive, though it is scalable anywhere public education exists.

I just heard back from Motorcycle-Diaries and learned that I did not win their 2020 Dream Ride Contest, though being a top 5 finalist worldwide was pretty good by itself.  The winning trip by Theo De Paepe on riding to the northern lights is a moving piece worthy of the win.  Participating in this contest and reading all of these moving dream rides got me thinking about how digital connectivity might be used to reach out to younger potential riders lost in the digital wastes of 2020.

My own piece for that contest was on riding my granddad Bill's path though France as a part of the British Expeditionary Force in 1939 and 1940 before the Blitzkrieg swept them out of continental Europe.  William Morris's war record was another one of those family secrets that wasn't talked about, but his military service during World War 2 is the stuff of film.  One of only a handful of his RAF squadron that escaped occupied France, Bill recovered downed planes during the Battle of Britain and then experienced three harrowing years in Northern Africa fighting Rommel as a driver in the RAF armoured car division.  He finished his tour in the white helmets motorcycle stunt team, doing drill and stunts on motorbikes!

Discovering my Granddad's history was a great way to reconnect with a man I was close with as a child, but lost connection with when we emigrated to Canada.  As I was working through that family history I uncovered another mystery the family had been very quiet about, the death of my great aunt Faye.  My mum's middle name was Faye, but I hadn't realized she was named after her aunt.  I also didn't know that Faye had died in a motorcycling accident in Norfolk in the mid-sixties when she was hit by an army lorry.  My mother had always stridently opposed me riding, and now that all suddenly made sense.  That my great aunt's death ended my granddad's life long love of riding and also prevented me from getting on a motorcycle when I first started driving is a lasting source of frustration.

Motorcycling isn't easy, but it speaks to your very being, and it tends to self-select a certain kind of person.  It tends to run in families because families are literally all certain kinds of people.  Trying to bury my motorcycling family history only worked on me because I was an immigrant child separated from his extended family.  While I had uncles and cousins riding in the UK, I was oblivious in another country.

Finding my way back to my motorcycling gene played a big part in me eventually getting my license, though I'm frustrated at the lost decades I could have been riding.  It got me thinking about how many people are separated from family and live in a cultural void where they feel like they come from no one and from nowhere.  But we all have history, and many of us will have ancestors who rode.  Motorcycles used to be transportation before they became recreation.  Any rider can tell you how often an old timer will come up and start chatting about a bike they once owned - it happens to me on the Tiger all the time (Triumph is an old brand with a long history and a lot of old-timers have owned one).

DGR's Social Connections Challenge wants to focus on disruptive, on-the-ground projects that help socially disaffected men who are more prone to suicide.  As a group, immigrant children are more socially disaffected than most, growing up in a strange country where they have no extended family.  The UN's latest report has over two-hundred and seventy million people living as immigrants in countries they weren't born.  On top of that there are many more people living without connection to their family history for various reasons.  Having grown up in a place where I had deep roots and moving to North America, I often meet people who have no idea where their families came from or even who anyone was before their grand parents.  In the early 20th Century motorcycles were transport, not a recreational activity, so many people have family history on two wheels they know nothing about.  I speak from personal experience when I say that making that connection is a powerful thing.

With that in mind, here's another pitch to DGR's Social Connections Challenge:

Granddad Bill on his bike in rural Norfolk well before I was born.

Inspiration:  As an immigrant child I’ve been separated from my extended family for most of my adult life and missed out on motorcycling through family as a result.  After my grandmother’s death I returned home to England for the first time in three decades and discovered secret family motorcycling history which prompted me to get my license.  Family connections have allowed me to bypass the postmodern amnesia many people face; that feeling that we are no one from nowhere. Ride To Remember would be an online resource that connects riders and would be riders to their family motorcycling history.  Realizing that riding is a part of your personal history is powerful.  Not only would this encourage new riders to ride by normalizing what is now considered a high risk activity in our sedentary, safety-first societies, but it would also reconnect us to a sense of continuity and belonging through our own family history.  Motorcycling is an acknowledgement of an inclination that often has roots going back generations.

Target Group:  disassociated men who feel that they don’t have a culture or family history related to riding.  The UN reports over 270 million people have immigrated internationally, and many others are separated from family through circumstances such as adoption.

Proposed Solution:  An interactive website/online community that collects and shares family history related to motorcycling: an ancestry.com for motorcyclists.  By connecting disenfranchised men to their family history, I hope to offer them the same sense of belonging and cultural connection that I have discovered.  By leveraging online connectivity and modern data management, Ride To Remember collates historical motorcycle related media in an easy to access database surrounded by a engaged community that encourages disassociated men to rediscover their moto-roots.

Project vision:  the pilot period involves setting up a .org site that creates an online relational database of motorcycling history using existing online documents tagged with details that allow users to search for material based on time, geographic location, names and other details.  A.I. image recognition software would be used to web-crawl and archive historical motorcycle related online images and online sources.  Long standing manufacturers, museums and vintage motorcycling organizations already have online presences that would provide regional structures in this growing information cloud.   With a growing data structure in place, analytics would allow users to quickly find connections.  They would also be encouraged to add information to the database, further enriching it.  We are at a pivotal time where a lot of analogue material will get lost in digital translation, this project would also encourage digitization of photos and documents for future motorcyclists.  The final stage would be an interactive database that connects people to their motorcycling past and reminds us that none of us comes from no one, nowhere.

Project leads:  writers, photographers and family historians who ride (like myself), anyone with family history in riding (motorbikes used to be family transport!) would be encouraged to share their ancestral motorcyclists.

Project title:  Ride To Remember

***

LINKS

The Distinguished Gentleman's Ride Social Connections:
https://www.gentlemansride.com/blog/dgr-scc

Over 270 million immigrants in the world today:
https://www.un.org/development/desa/en/news/population/international-migrant-stock-2019.html

My granddad's war history and my great aunt's death while riding was hidden family history that, once exposed, allowed me to embrace riding in a deep and personal way:
https://tkmotorcyclediaries.blogspot.com/2018/03/walking-in-bills-footsteps-1940-france.html
https://tkmotorcyclediaries.blogspot.com/2013/09/biking-family-history-part-2.html



The Motorcyclist, by George Elliot Clarke - an ode to George's father, who rode at a time when Canada made it difficult for black men to do anything:
https://quillandquire.com/review/the-motorcyclist/

We live in a broken world where families are torn apart while chasing (or being stolen) by globalism.  There is a power in riding that self selects a certain kind of person.  Remember The Ride will reconnect lost people to family two-wheel roots that run deep.

https://pier21.ca/home
Pier 21 in Halifax is the location of the Canadian Immigration Museum.  As a nation of immigrants, Canada is particularly prone to family amnesia.

Moto Anime: Bakuon!!

I've written about motorcycle related Japanese anime before, it's a whole sub genre of media from a country that is a motorcycle producing superpower with its own unique moto-culture.  You name the anime and there is probably a rider on the team who works in motorcycles somehow.  But there is one motorcycle anime where bikes aren't worked in, they're the main subject.  Bakuon!! tells the story of a group of high school girls who meet over a shared love of the sport.

Bakuon is Japanese onomatopoeia for the roar of a motorcycle's exhaust (the Japanese have some pretty funny word sounds).   In the opening of the show each of the main characters bond over their shared love of riding.  The experienced riders mentor the younger ones as they get their licenses and begin riding together, but don't assume this is a why so serious coming of age story.  Bakuon!! is edgy and laugh out loud funny.  Even non-riders would find this an accessible and funny thing to watch, but it'll challenge you.  Bakuon!! is shamelessly Japanese.  If you're unfamiliar with Japanese humour, which can feel very foreign to gaijin, this show might seem offensive.  All I can suggest is to maybe stow your Western superiority complex away and see if you can wrap your head around it.

Hane Chan is the character you follow into the story.  She's not really the main character, it's an ensemble,  but as a new rider trying to get her license you get to discover the joy of riding with her.  She also tends to explain to outsiders what craziness is going on in the group.  Her initial interest is sparked by her first day trying to ride her bicycle up the hill to her new school, and her actual interest in motorcycles is minimal, until she experiences riding for the first time:

How edgy is the humour?  At the riding school where Hane is getting her license she begins a conversation with the bike they lend her (as you do) who speaks to her with an older woman's voice. At one point Hane asks why the bike has such a masculine name when it has a woman's voice.  The bike tells her that because it's a practice bike at the academy it has had all the go-faster technology removed from it, so it was castrated.  When Hane discovers she's been riding a trans-gendered bike she just nods and goes about her day, as you do.  You might find this foreign in a Western mindset, but the lack of judgement around gender is refreshing.

An even edgier moment happens when the girls take a long trip up to Hokkaido.  When they reach the end of Japan they come across one of the teachers from their school who is attempting to commit suicide by jumping into the ocean because she's just broken up with another boyfriend.  She failed comedically (the point isn't a cliff and she falls onto rocks five feet below).  The girls take her back to their hotel where the teacher proceeds to get drunk and attempt to molest them.  At this point your appropriateness meter is probably pegged, but, as they do in all circumstances, the girls back each other up and get out of the situation themselves.  After that moment of girl-power the show signs off with them cleaning their bikes with their swim suits on.  Trying to keep up with the twists and turns in Bakuon!! is part of the challenge.

The humour in the show is unrelenting.  Each of the girls is smitten by a specific Japanese manufacturer (though Ducati sneaks in there too, but not without a lot of ribbing), and they're constantly giving each other a hard time over it.  At another point Suzunoki Rin, who tells a dramatic backstory about her accident prone father, has to explain how she has a Suzuki brand on her butt.  Physical humour operates on a different plane in Japanese culture.

In another episode Onsa, the Yamaha or nothing rider, accidentally licks Rin's drool (they both fall asleep on a train - it happens) and catches a Suzuki germ that makes her only like Suzukis.  This kind of brand fixation is a constant source of material in the show.  The only time it gets turned up even higher is when they make any reference to non-Japanese brands, who are all evidently incapable of making something that won't blow up on you regularly.  Considering the hard time they give each other, the shots at other manufacturers (like my beloved Triumph) comes across as funny rather than nasty.  If you're ever feeling hard done by when watching the show, at least you're not a bicyclist. They're relentless with the Tour de France types.

If you like motorcycles you'll love Bakuon!!  If you like anime you'll enjoy this show for its humour and a style that takes some interesting risks, like showing most men in the show without a face.  Yes, it can get edgy, but that tends to be a Western cultural dissonance thing more than any negative intent by the show.  The girls all play off each other for maximum comedic effect and the writing is willing to take unexpected turns to chase down a laugh, as it should.

As an anime with motorcycles but also about motorcycles, Bakuon!! offers you a deep dive into Japanese assumptions around riding that anyone on two wheels would find enlightening.  As a Japanese school girl anime it also breaks a lot of stereotypes.  A group of girls who ride makes this a feminist statement.  The girls are very self sufficient and never look to men or even adults for solutions.  The most skilled rider in the show is the untouchable club sempai (mentor) Raimu Kawasaki who always wears her helmet and never speaks, Top Gear Stig style.  At one point she lifts up her big Ninja effortlessly and frequently performs riding stunts that defy belief.  She was sitting in the school clubhouse alone when the girls show up and was evidently in the club when the school's current principal was at the school, she might not even be human!  I can't help but feel that she's presenting some autistic tendencies, further stretching the show's reach.

That Bakuon!! is also a comedy busts another malecentric stereotype.  If you can get your Japanese school girl mindset on (and everyone should), this'll amuse and entertain.  You should give it a watch.

You can watch Bakuon!! on Crunchyroll online.

Balancing Personal Responsibility with Sainthood

The in-law's cottage happens to be about 20 kms away from the bottom of the 507.  I like the 507.  It twists and turns through the Canadian Shield offering you bend after bend without the usual tedium of Southern Ontario roads.  I lost myself riding down it the other day.

Last week I was pondering how fear can creep in to your riding in extreme circumstances, like trying to ride through a GTA rush hour commute.  This week I'm struggling with how the Canada Moto-Guide and Cycle Canada are portraying deaths on the 507, which is evidently a magnet for sportbike riders who have confused public roads with private race tracks.

On the motorcyclists spectrum I tend toward the sportier end of things.  I've owned Ninjas, sports-tourers, adventure and off-road bikes.  The only thing that chased me away from sportbikes early in my riding career were the insane insurance rates and the fact that any modern motorcycle is already light years beyond most sports cars in terms of performance.  My old Tiger goes 0-60 in under four seconds, or about as fast as many current top-end muscle and sports cars.  To spend thousands more on insurance for a bike designed for a race-track just doesn't make a lot of sense, especially when you factor in the condition of Ontario roads.

If you missed the British MotoGP race at Silverstone last
weekend, do yourself a favour and look it up.  From start
to finish it was spectacular.

Having said that, I've been a diehard MotoGP fan for the past six years.  Watching riders develop and express their genius at the pinnacle of motorcycle racing is not only glorious to watch, but it has taught me a lot about riding dynamics, and I think it has improved my bike-craft.  I totally get speed.  Riding a bike always feels like a bit of a tight-rope walk, and being able to do it quickly and smoothly is a skill-set I highly value.

Like so many things in motorcycling, balance seems to be key.  Last week, among the idiotic commuters of the GTA, a frustrating number of whom were texting in their laps and half paying attention, I was unable to manage that danger and it led to a great deal of anxiety.  Rather than give in to that fear or throw a blanket of bravado over it, I looked right at it and found a way to overcome it.  Honesty with yourself is vital if you're actually interested in mastering your bikecraft.  I came to the conclusion that you need to approach two wheels with a touch of swagger and arrogance when that fear rises up.  This is done to moderate fear and give you back some rational control, especially when circumstances conspire against you.

The problem with swagger and arrogance... and fear for that matter, is that it's easy to go too far, and so many people seem to.  Emotionality seems to dictate so many aspects of motorcycling culture.  From the arrogance of the ding-dongs in shorts and flip flops who tend to the extremes of the motorcycling spectrum (cruisers and sportbikes), to the ex-motorcyclists and haters who can only speak from fear, it's these extremes who seem to speak for the sport.  I struggle with those emotionally driven extremes, but recently CMG seems intent on writing odes to them.

The CMG editorial news-letter this week makes much of not knowing why this rider died:

“He knew the dangers, and he admitted to going fast,” says his partner, Lisa Downer. “He knew when, where, how – it was just one of those things. A lot of people think the way the curve was, there was a car (approaching him) that was just a little too far over the line and David had to compensate. By the time that car went around the bend, they wouldn’t even have known that David went off, because the sightline’s gone. Or it could have been an animal, or a bit of gravel. You just don’t know.”


There were no skid marks on the road. Like so many of our lost, no one will ever know why.

Our lost?  Here's a video by that same rider from the year before:

"...the helmet cam shows his speedometer. “A decent pace on the 507 in central Ontario, Canada,” he wrote in the description. “Typical Ontario roads, bumpy, keeping me in check.” His average speed on the near-deserted road was above 160 km/h, more than double the speed limit, and at one point it shows an indicated 199, where the digital display tops out. At such speeds on a public road, there’s little room for error." - little room for error?

With that on the internet, one wonders how he had his license the following year.  You can come at this from 'it might have been an animal, or a car, or gravel', but I think I'm going to come at it from here:

"David was an experienced rider who’d got back into motorcycling just three years ago; he was 52, but had put bikes on hold since his 30s when he went out west..."

That'll be over 170 kms/hr on rough pavement around
blind corners next to a massive provincial park full of
large mammals...

An 'experienced rider' who had been riding for three years, after a twenty year gap?  And his first bike in twenty years was a World Super-bike winning Honda super sport?  Whatever he was riding in the mid-eighties and early nineties certainly wasn't anything like that RC51.  What his actual riding experience was is in question here, but rather than assign any responsibility to an inexperienced rider, we are speculating about animals, cars and gravel?

I generally disagree with the speed kills angle that law enforcement likes to push.  If that were the case all our astronauts would be dead.  So would everyone who has ever ridden the Isle of Man TT.  Speed doesn't kill, but how you manage it is vital.  There is a time and a place.  If you're intent on riding so beyond the realm of common sense on a public road, then I think you should take the next step and sort yourself out for track days, and then find an opportunity to race.  In Ontario you have all sorts of options from Racer5's track day training to the Vintage Road Racing  Association, where you can ride it hard and put it away wet in a place where you're not putting people's children playing in their front yard in mortal peril.  If you've actually got some talent, you could find yourself considering CSBK.  Surely there is a moral imperative involved in how and where you choose to ride?  Surely we are ultimately responsible for our riding?

Strangely, Mark's article, The Quick and the Dead, from 2017 has a much clearer idea of time and place when it comes to riding at these kinds of speeds.  In this most recent news-letter we're at "it would be easy to dismiss David Rusk as just another speed freak, killed by his own excess".  In 2017 he was quite reasonably stating: "If you’re going to speed, don’t ride faster than you can see and dress properly. And if you’re going to speed, do it on a track".  I guess the new blameless recklessness sells better?

There is a romantic fatalism implicit in how both CMG and Cycle Canada have framed these deaths that willfully ignores much of what caused this misery in the first place.  Motorcycling is a dangerous activity.  Doing it recklessly is neither brave, nor noble.  Trying to dress it up in sainthood, or imaging blame when the cause if repeatedly slapping you in the face is neither productive nor beneficial to our sport.  Up both ends of the motorcycling spectrum are riders who are all about the swagger.  For those dick swingers this kind of it's-never-your-fault writing is like going to church.  I get it.  Writing for your audience is the key to enlarging it.

Last Sunday I did a few hundred kilometres picking up bodies of water for the Water is Life GT rally, with the 507 being the final run south to the cottage.  The roads weren't exceptionally busy and I was able to fall into a rhythm on the 507 that reminded me of what a great road it is.  As it unfolds in front of you, you can't guess where it's going to go next.  Surrounded by the trees, rocks and lakes of the Shield, it's a gloriously Canadian landscape.

I'm not dawdling when I ride.  I prefer to not have traffic creeping up on me, I'm usually the one doing the passing (easy on a bike).  The big Tiger fits me and the long suspension can handle the rough pavement, but I'm never over riding the limits of the bike where gravel on the road, an animal or other drivers dictate how my ride is going to end.  The agility and size of a bike offer me opportunities that driving a car doesn't, but it doesn't mean I open the taps just because I can.  Balance is key.

There are times when a rider (or any road user) can be in the wrong place at the wrong time and no amount of skill will save you.  For the riders (and anyone) who perishes like that, I have nothing but sympathy.  They are the ones we should be reserving sainthood for.  Not doing the things that you love, like being out in the wind on a bike, because of that possibility of being in the wrong place at the wrong time will neuter your quality of life, there are some things you can't control.  

I'm well aware of the dangers of riding, but I'm not going to throw a blanket of arrogance over them, and I'm certainly not going to describe recklessness as a virtue while hiding in delusions of blame.  Doing a dangerous thing well has been a repeated theme on TMD, as has media's portrayal of riding.  Having our own media trying to dress up poor decision making as victimization isn't flattering to motorcycling.  If you can't be honest about your responsibilities when riding perhaps it's time to hang up your boots.  If you don't, reality might do it for you.

As Vale says, "it's dangerous, not only for you, but for all the facking idiots in cars."

Related Thoughts:

Training Ignorance & Fear Out of Your Bikecraft:
https://tkmotorcyclediaries.blogspot.com/2014/02/training-ignorance-fear-out-of-your.html

Parent, Child or Zen Master:
https://tkmotorcyclediaries.blogspot.com/2014/05/child-parent-or-zen-master.html

Do Bikers Ignore Reality?
https://tkmotorcyclediaries.blogspot.com/2013/10/do-bikers-ignore-reality.html

What else are you going to do at a cabin in the woods but pen and ink?

Fear and Arrogance

The other day I did a ride that isn't typical of my time on two wheels - I aimed for the middle of a city, during rush hour.  The siren call for this insanity was strong.  The Toronto Motorcycle Film Festival was having a best-of showing at the beautifully restored Playhouse Theatre in Hamilton.

From TMD you'll know I'm a big fan of motorcycle media and the TMFF's push to encourage Canadian films is something I'd like to both support and participate in.  Riding down to Hamilton on a beautiful summer's day was the perfect entry point and has me thinking of ways to get to their main show in Toronto in early October.  I'm secretly hoping I can find a project that needs a drone pilot aerial camera operator and likes weird camera angles.

But first, the peril.  Driving in rush hour isn't like driving at other times.  The people doing it are miserable, embroiled in the last part of their forced servitude for the day, the part where they get to spend a sizable portion of their time and income in a vehicle that has become an expensive appliance whose only function is to move them to and from the job it demands.  The aimless frustration and misery oozes out of them at every turn, sometimes expressing itself in sudden bursts of anger and aggression before settling back into a miasmic death stare of indifference.

So that was making me anxious.  Looking at Google Maps red roads of the GTA at rush hour on a warm, sunny day wasn't thrilling either.  Sitting in traffic on a motorcycle in moribund no-filtering Ontario sucks.  It sucks on the fumes of the massive SUVs all around you, their contents breathing filtered, air conditioned air while you choke on their output.  Edging toward a green light inches at a time on hot tarmac surrounded by this excess and misery is about as much fun as a deep periodontal cleaning, without the benefits, and with the destruction of nature as the result of this pointlessness.

I haven't had much time on the bike this summer.  My wife's surprise cancer diagnosis and surgery has meant other priorities take hold.  Finally back from weeks in a car, I was facing my first long ride in over two months, and it wasn't for the ride, it was for the destination.  Alanna wanted to ride pillion down, though she's still recovering.  I was worried about her, feeling very over protective and also dealing with my son's anxiety in us going after being away at camp for the first time this summer (don't worry, we're coming back!).

That's a lot of emotional luggage to take on a ride.  Even leaving our subdivision I was second guessing traffic and riding awkwardly, and getting frustrated with myself for it.  I'm usually loose and light on the controls and not stuck in a conscious state while riding - which makes me smooth and fluid, even in traffic.  We worked our way down to the dreaded Hanlon bypass in Guelph (which isn't because it's covered in traffic lights)  and sat in row after row of the damned things every few hundred metres.  I was constantly placing us on the road where I could squirt out of the way of someone not paying attention.  We passed two collisions, rear enders caused by the epidemic around us.  Sitting up high on the bike has its disadvantages, like seeing down into the vehicles around us and watching over half of the drivers working their phones on their laps.  I guess that's the new normal in a 2019 commute.

Down by Stone Road the guy behind us wasn't going to stop in time (he had a nice iPhoneX on his lap), but I squirted out onto the shoulder instead of letting him end our ride and took the next exit where we worked down country side roads instead, but not before being choked to death by a diesel black smoke belching dump truck that jumped out right in front of us causing me to brake so hard we bumped into each other.  I finally got past him after riding in his bleching, black haze for several kilometres, but by this point I was fried, and we'd only ridden through Guelph, the small city before the big one.

I was going to pull off at the lovely old church in Kirkwall and have a stretch and get my head on straight, but the F150 dualie behind me was about six inches off my rear tire even though I was going over the limit and I was afraid to hit the brake, so pressed on.  He blew past us coming out of Kirkwall only to pull up behind the car 150 metres ahead of us and stay there until he eventually pulled off some time later.  You gotta make time on your commute I guess.

Doubt isn't something that creeps into my riding, but it was starting to here.  The lack of control and extremely defensive mindset was exhausting me.  Alanna was suffering hot flashes on the back mainly due to Guelph's atrocious traffic and lights and was feeling wobbly, and I was starting to question everything I was doing.  We are coming home Max.  This isn't going to end badly!

We were both on the lookout for a place to stop when the Rockton Berry Farm appeared as if an oasis in the desert.  I pulled in and we dragged our sweaty, tense bodies off the Tiger.  Alanna went in and found some sustenance and I did some yoga.  After stretching and some Gatorade and trail mix I felt human again.  Talking to Alanna I mentioned how I was battling some demons on this ride and reminded myself that the best kind of rider is the Zen rider.  Matt Crawford describes motorcycling as a beautiful war, but this one was more like a pitched battle.  It's amazing what a stop can do for your mental state though.

After a fifteen minute break we saddled up again ready to face the horror of Hamilton's rush hour, but something had changed.  Instead of holding on too tight, I was letting go.  My riding was more fluid, we flowed with the chaos and when we got down to the mean streets of downtown Hamilton, they were a delight.  Unlike Guelph, who seem determined to stop you at every intersection, Hamilton actually times its lights so you can cut through the heart of the city with barely a stop.  Past the beautiful old houses and industrial buildings we flew, down to the up and coming area where that beautifully restored Playhouse Theatre sat.

As we pulled into the parking lot that was already filling with all manner of motorcycles, I thought over that ride down. I'd actually suggested that maybe we should take the car, but that would have sucked just as much and had no sense of adventure and accomplishment in it, though it would have been easier and safer - the motto of modern day life.
 

If you're in a situation where you're riding and finding it overwhelming, take a break and give yourself a chance to get your head back on straight. You'd be amazed what a ten minute stretch and reset can do for your mindset, and that mindset is your greatest tool when riding.  In spite of her cancer recovery, Alanna had pushed to ride because she wanted us to 'immerse ourselves in that biking culture' in going to this event.  Standing in the parking lot chatting with other riders, we were doing just that.

I'll cover the film night in another post, but the ride down was a reflective opportunity I couldn't pass up.  In Bull Durham, Crash Davis talks about how you go about the difficult job of being a professional athlete.  You've gotta have swagger, even when things are going against you, and that's equally true in motorbiking.  After this ride, I can see why many people who otherwise enjoyed it gave it up.  That fear, once it worms its way inside you, will talk you out of risk no matter what the reward.

Of course, the point isn't to not feel fear, but to feel it and work through it anyway.  That's bravery.  Not feeling fear at all is psychosis.  Baz Luhrman has a good take on this with his motto:  a life lived in fear is a life lived.  Letting fear dictate your life is no way to live.  We are already dead when we always play safe and stop taking risks.

What made it especially challenging this time was that I couldn't moderate many of those risks by riding away from the faceless hordes of commuters.  Spending a day with them in their pointless battle to destroy the planet was exhausting and terrifying, no wonder they box themselves up in the largest container they can afford, planet be damned.

The motorcycle films shown by the TMFF were great and completely new to me (and I'm a guy with Austin Vince's entire DVD collection - I know moto-films).  One of my favourite parts of this kind of documentary film making is showing what is possible, and I was briming over with it when we left.  I couldn't have been in a better mood to ride.

We exited into the dark for the long ride home.  It was cool and the streets were flowing and half empty as we worked our way back to the highway and shot up into the dark of the Niagara Escarpment.  Even the guy driving 10 under the limit who suddenly stood on the brakes for no reason (he had evidently received an exciting text message - he was two handing a response as we passed him on the inside lane of Highway 6) didn't phase me.  I was back on my game, staring into the dark out of my third eye.  When that eye gazes into the abyss, the abyss is the one that gets nervous.

Now I'm thinking about a third eye graphic for the helmet...

We got all the way up to Guelph, sane now that traffic had died down and all the sad people were in their row houses waiting for tomorrow to do it again.  If we're so smart, you'd have to think we could find a better way.

Shakespeare Arms by the university we met at over twenty years ago provided us with a late night dinner before we pressed on home, passing a skunk (the Canadian night is filled with them) galloping across the road into the graveyard ahead of us.  The last light (of course) caught us, then we were away into the night, the Milky Way glittering above us and the night smells all around.  We were home seemingly seconds later, our creaking, cold joints groaning as we finally seperated ourselves from our trusty Tiger.

***



We rode right into south central Hamilton at rush hour and out after 9pm, about 12 kilometres of dense, urban riding with more traffic lights than I could count, but we got stopped at three of them both coming and going.  I commented to Alanna about how Hamilton has its shit together in a way that Guelph seems oblivious to.

Passing back through Guelph past 10pm at night and covering about a kilometre less in a city with less than a quarter the population, we got stopped at nine traffic lights.  On our way south earlier in the day during rush hour, Guelph was a traffic light bonanza (even on the 'bypass') getting stopped at no less than six lights before we could escape the madness.  Guelph should rename itself the city of lights, just not in a Parisian sense.

Perhaps the moral of this story is really just don't go anywhere near Guelph if you can help it.  It's time they started urban planning like the city they have quickly grown into.  It'd make the chaos that much less overwhelming (not to mention, ya know, stopping the iminent demise of the human race).  There's this thing called IoT and smart cities?  Guelph should look into it - I'd be happy to help.