Raya Ride

After 10 days into Syawal and everyone is back home after their Raya trips, its time for Sunday ride again. The ride everyone missed. The ride, weekend warriors always longing for. Its synonymous to Ramadan imprisonment of the devil. When Syawal finally arrives, the bikers broke loose too :-).

It took only one SMS to trigger the event. It sounds like this:

"Ada org nak jemput jamuan raya roti canai budak kelate kat Grik pd Hari Ahad ni. Jomla semua. Jumpa kat Petronas JPJ Sbg jaya pkl 8.30pagi"

At first there were 4 blokes at the Petronas station, when we finally moved, another one joint right at the back out of no where.

It immidietely started with a fast pace sprint. 3 bikes grouped at the front and the gap got bigger when the back 2 (me included) were held back by a red light. Then its like playing catch up, we only regrouped somewhere 25km later. At times I got up to 210kmh or so (2 way trunk road with no barricade). Traffic were on the heavier side. Too much for an introductory ride...in fact I was thinking of starting slow and build up from there.

Then the fun begins.

25 miles of slow and fast sweepers. This was the day you wish your fork was slightly harder, shocks more compliant or engine slightly more responsive. Of course it depends on how fast you are compared to others.

In my mind I was thinking if I should lean more here, am I coming too hot, if the tyre can take it, is the shock compression too hard or the forks too stiff as I wasn't feeling comfortable here. Off course, the tyre pressure is always never perfect for some reason :-(.

While I was day dreaming, the guy in front off me was getting further and further away. Just put my head down and try to be smooth and enjoy the ride. It was all over after 50 minutes. Thats 55km of local and 45km of canyon roads.

1 and half hours of male bonding, eating and drinking roti canai and nasi campur should relax the mind a little bit. Another 2 blokes joint us - late sleepers maybe. Then there were 7 of us. Perhaps we drove other customers away with the loud hackling and scary biker looks (smell?) Some of the things we talked ranges from the new i-Pad, X5 Nokia, tour Malaysia in 1 day and how this can be facilitated with two sided underpants :-), the murder case of the decade and of course about bikes (new techs in VFR12, $1 pirated brake linings etc)

Then its the trip back. This time on the same but reverse route (track!) . Suddenly, everybody was even faster than when they're coming! Even the bloke behind me then, was gone after couple of corners. What happened? I soothed myself by thinking that peer pressure brought out the sane part of me, while the others fell for it. But, some part in me thinks that they are better than me.

As the speed and lean angle were building up and I managed to hold the red Busa from overtaking, suddenly water drops fell on screen. The road turns wet just when we were about to hit the long sweepers ... I slowed down remembering, I want to ride another day....lost the battle but not the war, yadee yadaa... whoosh, and there goes the red Busa overtaking me - damn.

And when the clouds broke open with dry roads coming up, the leaning started again. Feels like hell break loose! Its time to bring up the RPM mid corner and let the slipper clutch show its stuff.

Just like most things that saves the best for last, the end of the route offers a 270degrees cornering which everybody looks forward to. As if the entire ride hinges on this one last turn for salvation. I took a deep one and exhaled.

Right at the penultimate straight line ahead of me, there was a Kancil coming into that very last corner! It was just too late to overtake. Damn, I thought. I slowed and reserved some distance while building up the speed again. I have to have a decent midcorner. I managed a last hangtime while cursing the Kancil doing that :-).

It was then I saw the front guys waiting to regroup (left photo). Everyone still in one peace. Alhamdulillah.

As if the canyon carving wasn't enough, everyone has to rush back home. Perhaps, this is the time to regain the one and half hours lost time during breakfast. Riding formation-single line, riding pattern- zigzag through traffic, zigzag speed- 90 to 140kmh. Its actually pretty cool to view the pattern behind 5 other bikes. Its also thrilling to see some crazy overtaking maneuver 10 meters from oncoming traffic!

It started to rain again. For some strange reason, rain always fall when you're about to reach home. Just for you to be looking so bad that your family will wonder why you have to ride at all...