Well.... I went down yesterday

[thirdgenlxi]

It wasn't anything too bad really, although could have been alot worse for both me and the bike! We both got super lucky, heh. I'm perfectly fine, no injuries, no worries! Only thing hurt was my pride, lol

So a guy on our local NC sportbike forum, it was his B-day the other day and he planned this big huge 2 day adventure in the NC mountains with handful of other riders from the forum. We were gonna ride all day saturday, then one of the guys in the group has a vacation house waaaay up in the mountains so we'd sleep there and then ride some more on sunday. I had been looking forward to this ride all week long! I just moved to the area a week and a half prior and wanted to get out and meet some locals, this was the perfect time. It started out great, although somewhat rainy. I met up with a guy that lives pretty close to me at 7:30 am, and we rode to the meet spot to meet up with the rest of the group. We then rode further up in the mountains and met up with a few more (the guy who has the house out there). We filled up with gas up there then headed out and jumped right into the awesome western North Carolina twisties

It probably wasn't 10 minutes into the ride after we left the gas station, I was towards the back of the group like I always am, we were moving along at a spirited yet very comfortable pace for myself..... it wasn't any faster or harder than I always ride, which is always well below my limits. I don't push it on the street. We come into this tight decreasing radius lefthander that also has a steep downgrade in the middle of the curve. I braked before the curve, set my line, pivoted my ass off the seat and everything felt perfectly fine going into it.... and next thing I know... BAM I'm on the ground sliding. I was about 1/2 way through the curve when I went down.... you could see the mark in the road from my frameslider. I was probably doing about 35-45 mph or so, but really don't know for sure as I didn't look down at the speedo, I was paying attention to the road. So I slide and slide, off the road and across this big pull off that was right there in the curve (everybody said I picked the perfect spot to crash! LOL). I slid across a little gravel in the pull off and then into some grass, just before all the trees and a big drop off. I come to a stop, sit up and say "damn it, WTF??" LOL. I get up and take my gloves and helmet off, look around and say.... "uhhh where's my bike?!?!?". I look over in the trees, and there it is.... headlight is pointing UP at me because it went over the hill (about 45 degrees down), although was still at the top of the hill...phew! Amazingly, the bike landed literally perfectly centered (and backwards) between two big trees that were only about 4 feel apart.... didn't touch either of them. Phew! Luckily I had a few other guys riding behind me, so we had 4 guys and we were able to get it picked up and pushed up and out of the hill. Thank god they were there cuz even two people I don't think would have been able to get it out of there... it was a steep hill and the entire bike was over it!

I really don't know what caused it.... all I can come up with is maybe cold tires (we had been at the gas station for a lil bit, and were not even 10 mins into this ride) or maybe pressures a lil too high. It was definitely the rear end that stepped out cuz the bike spun around and was facing the opposite direction as I was originally going. Who knows for sure though... it could have been anything. Now I know I'm not the greatest or fastest rider or anything, but I do know my limits and when I'm approaching them, and this particular time I wasn't anywhere near that point. We weren't going that fast, and definitely no faster than I always ride up there on those same type of roads. And I mean I'm not exactly a n00b, lol.... I do have some experience. Not at all saying I don't or can't make mistakes, just that this was in absolutely no way an "oh shit!" moment.... it felt perfectly fine just like any other similar curve I've taken without any problems, but this time the tire just jumped out from under me. Oh well live and learn, right?

I didn't want to let it spoil my weekend though.... luckily the one guy had his Excursion there with a bike trailer, so he went and picked it up and we loaded it up and took it back to my house (which was a good haul from there, lol). We all had planned on staying at the one guys house that night and having a huge awesome dinner, and stay up until all hours of the night BS'ing around a bonfire. So I jumped in my car and followed him back to his place, hung out with him and his wife for the rest of the day getting all the food ready, and when the rest of the guys got back from the ride it was back to the original plan.... we all hung out all night and had an awesome time! Turns out one of the other guys on the ride went down later that day too but he was fine and he was there hanging out with us too. We all crashed there, got up this morning and had bacon and eggs for B-fast, and then headed out. Kinda worked out good I drove my car up there, cuz one of the guys (rides a '97 Kawi ZX-7R) noticed his bike was pumping oil out onto the ground right as they were getting ready to leave. So we loaded it onto the other guys bike trailer (same one I used), and I took him home in my car since we live pretty close. Took the Blue Ridge Parkway most of the way back... what a view! So it started out kinda sour but ended on a happy note.... we all made it back safely, and regardless of the get-offs, we all still had a great time

A few pics of the damage

It was all on the left side





First scratch on my original and flawless condition tank :-(



Swingarm scratched





Side fairing and stator cover scratched. Frame slider did a good job absorbing alot of it though! Keep in mind it slid across an asphalt road, then off the road across a gravel pull off, then into grass and then down a 45 degree decline hill between some trees. Really not bad overall, considering!







Tail scratched and cracked in a few places



Vegitation growing out of my chain and sprockets, lol. I had alot more but I picked it out before bringing it home



And this is the only reason I couldn't ride it and had to trailer it home





Right side was 100% untouched



Jacket... I love leather! It held up awesome, just needs to be cleaned and a few stitches now



Imagine that had been the skin on my arm.... YOUCH!!