The Alphacorse Blog

Okay, I really want to blame the fat guy on the Aprilia wearing nothing but jeans, a t-shirt and a helmet, but I’ve fallen too many times to know who the real problem was.

I was on a lovely ride on roads I’d never been on out of Pepin with a guy I’d never met before. He’s a regular on the MN-Sportbike forum on Yahoo and a super good rider. He knew I was just starting out, but he was a total gentleman and didn’t slow down very much for me. I kept up and threw myself around a bit too much; I really want to learn how to lean a lot more, especially before my advanced race track course this month. He’d already done track time, so he didn’t have to move at all when he took curves at 80+. Either way, I was hitting my limit and pressing it a bit, and the scenery was awesome. One of these days I swear I’ll stop and take pictures.

So we take off out of Pepin and there are a bunch of guys parked on the street getting ready to head out, too. One of them is on a super nice Aprilia and I gave him a thumbs up. He took off right after us and kept a nice distance behind me the whole time. I saw him cross the yellow a couple of times, and I left him behind often enough that I figured he was happy right where he was. I was even pointing out gravel and shit for him.

We came out of some nice twisties and were heading toward a long slow curve to the right which I could see would become a long straightaway before another long curve to the left. I slowed, saw gravel, stuck my foot out for Aprilia Guy and moved on. Unfortunately, A.G. decided he needed to pass me. I was only going 30 or 40, so why not? Well, here’s why: he passed me on the turn and continued in front of me on the straightaway, where he could have passed me easily and with warning.

And he passed me on the outside.

Dumb fuck.

Here’s where I zipped into the dumb fuck suit: I sped up to catch up to him. Not to beat him, just to prove to myself that I could keep pace. I also have a problem with people passing me anytime, but that’s not going to change real soon. I was pissed and wasted a good 10 seconds thinking about what a cockass the guy was. Instead of planning the next turn, I fell into it too tight and too fast, clamped on the front brake, and realized that I wasn’t going to fix my stupid choice and froze. I almost kept myself upright across the 10 feet of gravel, but I slid instead. As I lay next to my Ducati as the big cloud of dust rolled off, I saw that the bike was still running so I turned it off and jumped up, just like Kellie did when she tossed her Aprilia last month.

Now, I’m not making any promises, but about 5 Harley guys pulled right over. My buddy pulled up, we looked at the bike and saw only one thing that needed fixing: the spring had come loose from the kickstand. Someone asked if anyone had pliers. I had lipstick. Harley guy whips out his Leatherman, all the other guys clucked and worried about me and when they saw I was just going to talk a lot, they took off.

I was wearing my brand new Scorpion helmet, my perforated jacket and pants and my Joe Rocket, white baby groupie boots. All I got was that lousy rash where my sleeve had been unzipped and probably pushed up to my elbow. I road home and, just like my friend said I would, kicked my ass inside my helmet all the way back.

I decided to stop flirting with a new Suzuki or lusting after a faster Aprilia. I’m sticking with my Ducati 900. She obviously has a lot more torque than I gave her credit for.