Spare a thought for the motorcyclist in winter.
Some gracefully accept the inevitable gaps in riding and store the bike for the worst of the winter months. Some of us, through questionable judgment, a lack of other transportation options, or sheer stubborn refusal to admit that winter has the best of us, keep on riding. All three of those factors have played a role in the few times that I’ve been caught on the road on two wheels when the snow began falling. Not good.
In my book (see an expanded table of contents), I tell about the time an unexpected snowfall caught me out when I was a college student and my only two forms of transportation were my feet and my humble Honda CB360T.
Having procured work for the local newspaper during my long holiday break from college, I was using my old Honda for basic transportation, despite the season, because that was all I had. In any case, I didn’t have far to go on the evening in question, just a ride of a few miles across town to shoot a quick photo at a Christmas activity. Job done, photo in the camera, I walked outside into what had been a crisp but dry winter evening, only to find a thin coating of snow on my bike and more falling steadily. And it was sticking to the street.
I strapped the camera over my shoulder, grimly thinking that if I had to replace it after using it as body armor in a crash, I’d be out a week’s worth of my meager wages. Maybe two weeks’ worth if the boss wasn’t generous in calculating the old camera’s depreciation. I made it out of the parking lot, the rear tire threatening to spin with every tenderly made gear change. I made it down the main street at 20 mph, creeping along on the slick snow, unsympathetically ignoring the drivers I was delaying behind me. I made it through a particular S-curve I’d worried about all the way home and remembered to cross the railroad tracks at a right angle, steady on the throttle, hands off the brakes. Two blocks from home, on a side street, no traffic to worry about. Just come to a nice smooth stop at the stop sign, which I did, without locking up the wheels. Yes! I’m going to make it! Exultation!
That’s when I put my foot down. And it slid out from under me. And the bike fell over, taking me with it. Shards of a shattered turn signal lens skittered across the snowy street with a holiday twinkle, the clutch lever curled up in a festive imitation of a runner on Santa’s sleigh, and I unleashed a holiday greeting to the empty street that was none too jolly.
But I did save the camera.
That chapter in the book recounts several stories of mishaps and misjudgments from my younger days, under the theme of wondering how I survived my youth. It’s a question I know lots of fellow riders my age have asked ourselves, and frankly, I was at lot more sensible than most.
I wish I could say that such things only happened when I was young and foolish, but that wasn’t the last time I got caught out on the streets by unexpected snow. Two more times it happened when I was twice the age of my college intern days, both back when I was commuting daily to a regular job at my motorcycle-friendly place of employment.
Living just seven miles from the office, I commuted on two wheels every day the roads were clear of snow and ice, but twice I miscalculated. I had a much-used Honda NX250 dual-sport that served as my “rat bike” for winter commuting. Fortunately, I had ridden it to work the day that unpredicted snow began falling about half an hour before quitting time. The dual-sport tires with their blocky tread were as good as I could get for handling the slushy streets I had to survive on the way home, and if I had been on the street by myself, I wouldn’t even have been worried. The trouble was that I was in a long line of afternoon, homebound traffic, which in my experience is the worst kind of traffic. At that hour, too many people are stressed after a day of work and in an excessive hurry to get home and pour a stiff drink or kick the dog or whatever it is they do to vent their frustrations. As I was easing along at about 20 mph in a 25 mph zone, the woman in the car behind me made a risky and illegal pass in the sloppy snow. Then a quarter of a mile later we all waited together at the stop light. Seriously lady?
The second time was the more harrowing event. The temperature was right around freezing that morning, but the roads were clear and dry with not a snowflake in the sky as I looked out my window. The afternoon promised to warm up some, so I decided to ride the Speed Triple. All was well until I got about a mile from the office and found about an inch of wet, new-fallen snow on the streets, more snow falling heavily, and salt trucks out carpet-bombing the pavement with highly corrosive agents. How the hell can it be totally dry on one side of town and snowing like the Swiss Alps six miles away?
I somehow slithered through traffic and down the winding driveway to the office without dumping the bike (something I still consider one of my best-ever pieces of riding). Let me tell you, sportbike tires make lousy snow tires. As the bike sat in its covered parking spot, the snow and salt began melting into a metal-pitting soup. All day long at work I felt like I could hear the corrosion crunching away at my Speed Triple. Immediately after work, I rode straight home in the 40-degree afternoon and washed the poor motorcycle.
I’m sure I’ve learned my lesson and I’ll never make that mistake again.
But that’s what I thought back when I was a college intern, too.
