There is a book called Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance. It’s supposed to be expressing spiritual enlightenment through observation of ordinary life with a motorbike. It’s twee, home spun, anecdotal, badly written rubbish.
So, a perfect template for this blog.
It’s just I’ve been trying to make small, but fundamental, changes to my driving attitude. Which has made me reflect on what is wrong in the first place.
The mistakes:
Do not try and impose your will on the universe.
Accept the situation as it is, do not say “should/ shouldn’t”. They should be doing 50mph/ indicate, they shouldn’t get in front of me then brake…
We probably all know someone who spends their life perpetually angry and/or upset because the arbitrary rules they impose on life aren’t respected by people or events. This is bad.
Ego.
It’s not about me. Remove self from the equation. When someone dives into the minimum safe gap you’ve left to the vehicle in front, don’t take it as an insult. Don’t risk crashing thinking “you’re not pushing in in front of ME.”
If you remove self, it’s not a personal challenge or a slight, it’s just the gap has been decreased so you need to roll off the throttle for a few seconds until it opens again. Over the course of a whole day it’s unlikely you’re going to lose more than a minute or two but everyone gets home alive and keeps their job. Also, if you accept, and expect, people pushing in you don’t get yourself into a state about it.
You can either spend the whole day angry and tense or relaxed.
The external situation remains virtually the same, but you can choose how you react to it. Instead of being a victim of external forces you are a passive observer of them. Taking control of the situation by not trying to take control.
It’s a work in progress, but it’s definitely the way to go.
Of course none of this applies to motorbikes. I swear, I didn’t even know what road rage was until I got a car licence. On a bike slow traffic is just a mobile chicane. Traffic jams are a stationary chicane. No-one cuts me up or holds me up. They may try to kill me with oblivious U turns in front of me, or pulling out without looking, or changing lanes as I’m overtaking, but that doesn’t give me rage, just wakes me up.
You see what you’ve done now? You’ve got me on to motorbikes.
After my initial reservations, I now concede the Triumph is the better bike. ABS brakes, bigger engine, and now I’m getting used to the gearbox, oodles of ‘go’ on tap. I think I was shifting up too quickly. It has a huge spread of speed for each gear. If you want to accelerate, on the slip road joining the motorway for instance, leave it in each gear longer and it will fly. And although I’ve only had it a few days, it has out-cornered my lovely VFR. I set a new PB through a really tight turn and my foot touched down (still on the footpeg). That pretty impressive. Not for my lack lustre riding skills, but that it could instil that much confidence in the grip and handling in such a short time.
When I rode it home I was thinking I was going to have to spend another £260 on a set of tyres. Nope. These will do just fine.
The Triumph is just better.
My reservation now is that it’s too good. There’s too much top end. It’s good for 160mph, but anything over 100 is an automatic ban.
I was messing with the VFR today. One jet is still blocked, I’ve ordered a new jet. I’ve got to spend a day stripping it down again, but at least then I know it’s in perfect working order. My thinking at the moment is to sell the VFR when I’ve sorted it.
I spent a few hours cleaning the road muck and accumulated cleggy oil of it (from the chain) with a rag and a toothbrush. Then gave it a good wash and polish.
Looking too nice to sell.
But the Triumph looks pretty too.
Hmm, looking at them together I see the similarities. Red, (obvs) single sided swing arm, high level exhaust.
Anyway, my vague plan is sell the VFR, then, later on, trade the Triumph Sprint ST for a Triumph Street Triple. It’s a 675cc, naked (no fairing) triple instead of the 1050cc, faired, triple.
That way it’s a lot less top end and you feel every mph because you are being blasted by the wind with no protection from the fairing. That should totally slow me down. It’s a Triumph triple and it handles just as well, so I can still have all the fun, just without the licence shredding top end. This one hits the ton with two gears left. Allegedly.
Amazingly impressed with Triumph though. Who knew?
Later,
Buck.