charles statman

I have a tradition. It is a good-luck/mojo kind of thing. Since about 87. DO NOT RIDE 3 days before a race. My race was Sunday. Last AFM race of the season.

Friday, on my way home, Sancho got mad and spit me off. It happens. You ride a bike, you play the odds. Every so often you fall. This is the first get off on the street in a few years. And it was cause I should not have been riding.

I was changing lanes to avoid a car that was turning right, the car in the left lane stopped, I stopped, on an oil patch, and washed the front end. Sancho goes skittering down the road on the left side, spinning. Like Moe, of the Three Stooges.

I see sparks flying, while I tumble. And all I can think of is "$3200 for the irreplaceable chrome tank. $3200, IF I can find one"

We all stop, I pick up the bike, bent left bar, broken clutch lever, scraped $1100 Staintune exhaust, bent shift lever, scraped fairing, broke seat cowl mount.... but the tank? Not a scratch.
Wow.




My brand new $290 Lookwell fabric jacket went poopy on me. Jackets are your armor. You buy high end gear, so it will protect you. My old Joe Rocket Jacket was 4+ years, and tired. So I bought this expensive Lookwell. A company from the Netherlands.




When you spend that dough, you expect the jacket to take 2 or three hits before you have to replace it. Nope, not this gem. I wrote the sales lady, and will be writing the corporate office in the US. Else they will not get a good recommendation from me.




I almost ground the toe out of my boots



And I was not kind to my knees



My knees are scraped, my forearm hurts, and my left hip, where I rolled over my laptop got very bruised. But I will live.



Yes, I look like a kid who fell of his bicycle. the forearm hurts, but is not deep. aloe vera & Hydrogen peroxide, I am guessing healed and gone in a week.

I did not show a photo of my hip, because, well, really? No one wants to see my keester! :)

The bike will be fixed next week.

no cops. no tickets, no insurance hike. :)

Coudl not go to the races. My pal Greg got more points than me, and will be 2nd overall in the class, I will be third. Ya know, that's okay. I am done with club roadracing for a while. I want desert. I want to ride fast in the desert. Bring it ON.