Bourbon Pundit

Ride report - 4/3/04

...or in other words, "that's gonna hurt in the morning".

I rode with 3 other riders who knew this area well, very well. One of my clients, Don has a BMW KT1200LT, one of his guys, Dwight on a new Suzuki Bandit 1200 600, and Russ on a Harley Electra Glide. I figure with two touring bikes in the mix, one pretty large; how much trouble can we get in? Keep in mind these guys were bitching that it might be too cold on Saturday to ride.

Dwight took the lead out of Brownsburg, south on some back road...I haven't a clue what number it was, and I can't find it on my map, but we ended up somewhere near Morgan Monroe SF where I rode last week. However, I took all super slab there then, and I'm not sure what we rode on could even be considered slab. Note to self, don't let Dwight lead again...he's fast; either his brake light is out or he rides like Dana. But the Harley was keeping up so I figured I just hadn't gotten my bike legs yet this year.

From Morgan Martin, it was back roads down to Bloomington, which was a good place to get gas and take a quick break. Traffic in that college town sucks or there was something going on, either way we got the hell out of there. It was at this point I should have taken a couple aspirin.

Out of Bloomington, it was on to SR45, which in my estimation qualifies as Indiana's version of the Deal's Gap. Here's the map:

Through this section, Don was leading and once again, I figured it a big K1200LT can do it, so can I. His bike probably has over 100 pounds on me without the rider and Don is a bigger guy than I am, so I figured I had him bested here by a long shot, especially since I probably have 50 horses on him. Well, that power was useless because I wasn't going to pass him outside the double yellow if i couldn't see ahead, and I couldn't because it was nothing but blind, tight corners with just enough straight to get the engine spooled up enough to be really hard on your brakes for the next corner. Throwing the FJ around on this road was a handfull and I knew half way through it, things were gonna start hurting. This road is better suited, if you're attacking it, to the CB-1.

At Bean Blossom, we turned south to Nashville, which is a nice little Brown County tourist trap. All sorts of shops and people milling about on a warm day. Heading toward Columbus we turned North on some back road they obviously knew about and it was more of the same, but this time hardly any oncoming traffic. Still, I wasn't going to pull a pass. I figured if I did, I'd either smack my helmet on the pavement or I'd smack it on a tree as all of them seemed to be right on the road edge. After we got North of Camp Atterberry, we got to SR252.

Don pulled onto the highway in the lead and I was next. Looking at him, his front suspension was going up and down pretty hard and I'm trying to figure out what's going on as I'm just holding station behind him. I thought, "he's trying to drag race me"...naw, no way, well, I checked my mirrors and we were way ahead of the Bandit and the Harley so I figured I got suckered into it and I didn't even know it. Well, I was only in 3rd, so I just rolled on the gas and left him in short order...ah the power of the FJ! Sometimes I forget I have almost as much as a Hyabusa in total and probably more torque in usable ranges.

We stopped at a small town church for a stretch before the last leg of the ride. Don decided he wants to trade rides next time. Russ on the Harley kept up all day, but you could see the scars on his floorboards. Must be a hell of a rider to muscle that big tank through all of that.

The sun was going down and it was getting windy and cold so the rest of the ride from East of Indy back to home, I decided was going to occur on city streets. Don and Russ took off toward Geist where they live and Dwight followed me to the speedway where he kept going toward's home.

Dinner and two beers later and I was asleep and this morning my shoulders are feeling the effects of the day. Sorry, only one pic at one stop before we met up with Dwight, but I had my hands pretty full after that point. I'll definitely be doing that ride again.

Update: Here's my front tire...a bit more scuffed that it was when I left.

Posted by nose at April 4, 2004 11:38 AM