1st Brighton Mini Meet, ride report.

[Birdy]

My best mate and I planned to go to the Brighton mini meet, but turned up a week early, so we had our own (very) mini meet. I have written it up, hopefully my tale will amuse anyone who is doing as little as me.



Have Cub, will travel. Beer powered map fantasies and boozy internet day dreams can kickstart the reality, but nobody ever travelled without leaving their bedroom. To shake these cubs down, we were going to have to put some miles on them before leaving the country. If we were going to know them inside out before getting stranded in the heart of Africa, there would be no better way than a few long trips in the backyard.

A quick scour of Horizonsunlimited.com for motorcycle traveller events unearthed two. I instantly volunteered for both. The first was in Brighton, 190 miles from Lincoln by the AA’s reckoning. It seemed like a good idea, get some practice miles down, and meet wiser, more experienced people into the bargain. Two birds and one stone, two idiots on cubs and one damn long ride into the deepest south.

The morning of the shakedown came like the first day of the summer holidays, with these two excitable kids stealing to their loves like schoolboys from their books. Stood by a pair of purring C90s, stacked high with pants and showers in a can, we were practically floating as we threw soft luggage on the backs of our beasts. Packing is always exciting; even if it is only for a long weekend in Brighton, it’s a tangible antidote to inertia; even if that inertia is only to be dragged along by three horses. Pulling out of my drive, powered by sheer stupid enthusiasm and 95 Ron, the cub felt like an unstoppable force; it would take one hell of an unmovable object to stop this kitten.

If packing is the antidote, shiny black streaks of sixty mile an hour roads are the virus. After a few hours in the saddle, stopping only for smokes and fuel, the enthusiasm was dribbling away faster than the oil was disappearing from my sump. The virus was winning. Fast ‘a’ roads are not much fun when fifty is an optimistic top speed. Throttle to the stop and head down to minimise wind resistance, and still everything on the road was passing us. When even side by side single combat locked lorries find you an annoying hindrance you know you have a rather unsuitable vehicle. With the first hundred miles under our belt, and (so we thought) the backbone of the ride broken, we decided to skip onto the backroads. After all, it was only twelve in the morning, and we weren’t due at our rendezvous until seven. Eighty miles, seven hours, should have been a breeze. Note those two words ‘should have.’ Shoulda, woulda, coulda. Windy speed limited roads to nowhere are much better hunting grounds. Time disappears in a haze of nailed apexes and side to side flip flop flowing. Everybody should learn to ride on a bike so underpowered. Without the power to point and squirt, brake hard, roll around the corner, accelerate hard on the straight, brake and bake all over again, momentum has to be conserved. The quest for that holy perfect line very quickly becomes an obsession, even the slightest loss of speed has to be paid for so dearly that its conservation becomes consuming.

So consuming in fact, that you get horrendously lost while not paying attention to road signs, and instead, pay a three hour levy for the privilege. Three hours of left to right zig zagging through country roads, to travel fifty miles south. But the roads were friendly and the pretty little villages more interesting than miles of cats eyes and biker mincing barriers. It also meant we drove through a village called ‘Knob End.’ God is in the journey, not the destination.

One hundred and fifty miles down in 6 hours. We were now directly above London, and had to decide whether to go straight through the centre, or around the M25.
The lunatic stalked streets of London would make more sense for the vehicle, but our deadline made us take the rather left field choice of the motorway. Quick fag and a fatty lunch for fortitude, and into the fray. Chance favoured us immediately; God likes C90 pilots, as we flew down the slip road, we ended up in behind a queue of lorries. Without slipstream, the bikes’ top speed varies in between forty and fifty, depending on the wind and the gradient. In the lea of a lorry, this speed can be pushed way past fifty, sometimes up to the vertiginous heights of sixty, off of the top of the retro cool speedometer. The suck can be clearly felt as the articulated monster rushes by, and then drags the bike along to speeds an 89cc moped should never see. As lorries turned off, or sped up, or changed lanes, we switched vehicles, piggy backing another for x miles, then finding another helpful big brother. Safe? Not likely. Perching atop a bike not much bigger than the average pushbike, with anorexic tyres and zero road presence is risky at best. Zipping like a frisky gazelle round the wheeled hooves of fifty tonne elephant juggernauts is suicidal at best. To add to the fun my fuel gauge was winking at me, warning of severe thirst, pushing me to slipstream ever closer, until I could practically hold onto the numberplate of whichever happy symbiote I was feeding off of at the time. Terrified of put put putting to a stop on the side of the busiest motorway in the country, but unable to throttle off for fear of losing the slipstream, I buzzed along with the both petrol and speedo needles jammed in the red.

The Cub holds £3.80 of the finest unleaded when fully brimmed, and my petrol gauge had flatlined ten miles back. Even someone of my mathematical ability could work out that there couldn’t be much juice left. The ‘distance to services’ signs still refused to show their beautiful faces, laughing at me in their absence like shy sirens. The uncertainty mocked me, not knowing how far I had to coax my thirsty donkey made my arse chew the vinyl seat. ‘What would I do if the engine suddenly faltered?’ ‘How will I get out of this box of ten wheelers without power?’ ‘It it best to jump and run, leaving the dehydrated bike to its demise?’ ‘Does Tom have the same problem as me, or is the skinny bastard still on half a tank?’

I was wrong. Sometimes ignorance is better than a little bit of unwelcome knowledge. The ‘distance to services’ signs had revealed themselves, shyly counting down in giggles ‘18 miles to services,’ ’15,’ ’12,’ ‘8.’ Those sirens I had so lusted after turned out to speak with the uncertain protraction of a Cornish inbred and the bitterness of a menopausal divorcee. I swear at points they went back on themselves and claimed the distance was actually increasing as I rolled forwards. The interminable countdown reminded me of a dinner party full of bankers and IT consultants I once went to, where the hands of the clock kept running backwards. It’s crazy how the phrases ‘financial year,’ ‘office party,’ ‘impending economic downturn,’ and ‘when I was at Cambridge/Oxford/Starbucks/BMW showroom,’ can send clocks into exponential retreat. The four hours of that party must have been eight by any other clock. The countdown was now victim of that same cruel quirk, dangling its carrot before me, and then bashing me over the head with the pointy end. ‘6’ ‘5,’ ‘3,’ ‘3,’ ‘5,’ ‘2,’ and the cub kept rolling on, seemingly on fresh air. ‘1 mile to services’ flashed up on the board, barely visible through the phalanx of lorries flanking me. For fear of missing the slip road, I dropped off of my host and moved into the left lane, with Tom following. Bereft of any lorry support, I had to complete this mile without any aerodynamic assistance. Hope had almost faded past dusk, when the BP sun rose across the horizon of the road. I felt like a Siberian villager, stepping out of his urt and seeing the glow for the first time after a long dark winter. I indicated, turned into the entrance road of the services, and as a tandem with Tom, promptly rode directly the opposite direction to the pumps. The diversion took us into the lorry park, which was a great place for parking lorries, but a pretty terrible one for getting petrol. We turned the bikes around and headed literally straight in the direction of the pumps, not bothering to find an access road. The route took in several large curbs, but the Cub happily hopped up them with a little wheelie and a small unweighting of the rear. As I rounded the corner of the petrol station the engine coughed a little, took an asthmatic last breath, and died. I had just enough momentum to coast to the pump. She made it, with the will of Allah behind her, lorries in front of her and the temperance and restraint of a penitent saint within her. 90 miles for less than the price of a packet of fags, now that is an undemonstrative thirst.