There are days when you ride and days when you dream. This morning ended up being a little bit of both… From the minute I hit the road I intrinsically felt that this was going to be a good day. A really good day. And for the first time in what feels like months there was the ‘promise’ of a great ride hanging in the air. As if you could touch it or simply reach up and grab it for yourself.
Around 8 AM I hit Pacific Coast Highway and ‘really’ got on the throttle, and as I found my way through the relatively light traffic I once again felt that sense of excitement and wonder about riding. Almost like it was new again. In all honesty it feels like it’s been quite awhile since I felt that way. To feel free while riding.
Lately life has been just a bit busy and yet here I was heading up the coast finally finding the ability within myself to the put the real world out of my mind for the duration of the ride and simply enjoy the experience. I can’t even describe how much I’ve been missing that feeling.
To be fair nothing substantial has changed in my morning routine yet somehow all the extracurricular baggage that I’ve been hauling around these past few weekends was gone. Suddenly my mind and my soul felt free to soak up the road and not get bogged down with any of that external crap. I don’t know about anyone else but there are few feelings that echo so strongly for me as a clean mindset, a fully fueled up bike and empty, open canyon roads.
By 8:30am I was hauling up Las Floras Canyon, riding MotorMilt’s 9 since he’s still recovering from his knee surgery and feeling like I was on rails. The bike was just locked in and unlike the last few weekends there were no individual corners today - instead there were collections of them. All morning it felt like a fluid motion from bend to bend, as I slide from one side of the bike to the other and back again. Lean after lean, corner after corner, the bike and I just got it on. With a rock solid, you’re stuck in the groove sort of way. I wish I could bottle that experience and save it for the workweek. It was that good.
At the top of Las Floras, I hit Piuma and then took Saddlepeak down. The whole way I consistently found myself up around 8.5k to 9k while in first gear in order to stay high in the powerband. Now that I’m a bit more accustomed to riding both my bike and Milt’s higher in the RPM range I have to say that the 999’s are just different beasts when you can open them up. I thought they were rocketships before - now they’re rocketships with afterburners. Between the speed, the sound, the rumble and twitchiness, it’s just an incredible rush. My version of skydiving.
My only complaint is that when I went from 8 or 9,000 rpms in first gear and shifted into second on Milt’s ‘04 999 there didn’t seem to be much left. My ‘05 on the other hand feels like it has a heck of a lot more power when you get into second. So instead of shifting a lot today, I spent most of the day in first, trying to be as smooth as possible…
After grabbing a bite to eat at The Rockstore, I headed back south on Latigo Canyon. “Rails” does not adequately describe how the bike felt on the way home. Corner after corner the duc and I were speaking the same language. It was amazing. Rarely have I had rides where the entire day felt so secure and so planted.
It was still relatively early when I hit the top of the mountain and started coming down the backside. The ocean breeze had picked up a bit but the cloud cover had finally broken up, and the entire valley felt like it was lighting up right before my eyes. If there was ever a reason to have an out of body experience this was the morning. It was as if the canyons were just waking up as I was riding through them. The road winding around with such passion and fright and speed and excitement that it almost didn’t seem real. These canyons have to be as close to heaven on earth as one can get. I can’t imagine a more spectacular backyard to ride anywhere else in the world.
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