Wheelie.
Today my bike club went to Wheelie School http://www.iwanttowheelie.co.uk/ and I won my clubs longest wheelie trophy at just under 100 metres, it now has pride of place on the telly LOL :D
pics will follow, eventually, (I hope)
pics will follow, eventually, (I hope)
Post edited by thx1138 on
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Congratulations
Wheelies are a black art that I could never totally get to grips with.
It's not that I CAN'T wheelie - I had an xr250 that I could more or less scrape the numberplate with but on real bikes, they've always been a bit chaotic - I can manage a little "hello" wheelie and that's about my limit without binning it.
The front wheel just coming up under power or on bumps has never been a problem 'cos I've done it round corners and stuff. It's just the long, controlled wheelie that excapes me.
I did try to practise on my mountain bike - I thought it'd be cheaper that way but just kept falling off which seems a bit dangerous without a helmet so gave it up as a bad job.
In fact, I'm not busy atm so I'll give you an example of my wheelie ineptness.
Was on my old exup years ago at the ribblehead viaduct (you know, the one with the steam trains in north yorkshire) heading north to the cafe at Hawes which has a rag in a bucket so you can wipe the dead flies from your visor.
Nobody riding with me, nobody on the pillion, nobody in sight for miles except sheep and I thought to myself "I'm gonna impress the hell out of all these sheep - they're gonna be talking about how cool I am for years" so I go wheelieing (spelling?) over the top of the first hill I find at 90 miles per hour.
Sounding good so far?
Well, it was a really steep little hill and it had a very sharp right hand turn just after so I'm still airborn when I land and the road has turned right under me.
Was too much to ask of the bike's suspension - it was bouncing about under me but I managed to get a bit of right turn going off the edge of the road.
Now, 99% of yorkshire has dry stone walls at the edge of every road except, luckily, this bit butit did have a drainage ditch full of rubble.
I'm now up on the pegs, ready to jump off like a rat leaving a sinking ship but the bike decides it's gonna keep upright and follow this ditch at the side of the road.
Then, in front of me, I can see tarmac again and we're gonna make it. Me and the bike and the sheep all cheering " come on my son" when the world turns upside down.
Don't know exactly what it was that flipped me over but it was cruel - I ended up JUST at the side of the road, in a heap.
Anyways, I'd kicked up a lot of rubble onto the road so I started clearing it up when a bunch of lads on bikes stopped and helped me.
No real damage to mine - the screen had popped out and a few scuffs on the plastic so we managed to bump-start it (damn sliding exup carbs), I popped the screen down the front of my leathers and rode back to ingleton with them.
Ribblehead to ingleton is a really top road so me and this lad with a gixxer left the others and opened it up a bit at which point I nearly stacked it again.
The road does a quick left-right as it goes under the train track and piling into this corner at full tilt, I found my shoulder didn't really work so I couldn't brake.
Still, it's all part of the day out.
Anyways, grats again on being able to wheelie.
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No sheep were harmed during the making of this post
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I was wheelying Fazer 600cc, the mk1s that are quite quick to pick up, unlike my mk2 1000cc which is a bit dull at low revs.
standard except for losing the clocks and original lights, fork brace, renthal bars and mine had a k&n air filter, and mostly they had one disc brake instead of two.
all done in first gear, roll round the corner at walking speed, 10metres before the start power on, power off on the start line, front end dips, power back on - back comes up, rev limiter kicks in bike slams down, but if you blip the throttle with a feather light touch, less revs the higher the bike goes it stays there, and you get a gentle landing - with a nice big run off, we were using an old runway.
I also rode pillion on wheelies and stoppies, and got to burn the back tyre out of the instructors bike too. :D
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2l3a7lsEgFM
(but I do remember getting wheelie from my local woolies, before someone decided it was a good idea to torch the place :( )
Great game! Had it as a kid, then lost it, got it again as a ?2.99 budget re-release years later (1990ish?). Good times!
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Of course, the only reason anyone watched it appears in that clip wearing a bikini for no obvious reason.
Excellent.
Your face looks funny ... I guess I thought that the face-flapping thing only took place if you were jumping out of a plane or doing loops on a roller-coaster.
But if you're able to go fast enough then anything is possible, I guess. ( do you look red when get near me and blue when you whoosh on past?)
But his tongue wasn't sticking out ... not even slightly!
It's the wheelie meter-count mechanism
It's the ground for his battery
It's where the playing card goes to make the bike sound truly cool
It's where he hooks up his laundry line to dry it on his travels
It's an extra extra-large drinking straw
It's a stabilizer mechanism
It's a [insert sentence indicating boredom here]
a) moved to bedford
b) got a motor bike
c) changed your name to THX
if not all 3 .. then sush, I wasn't asking you..
YER
:-P [filler]
anti flip device, switch that controls rev limiter
you can see the switch working a little better here, as the bike is higher, notice also that the back tyre is soft. 18psi as opposed the usual 32 to 36 psi.
Also, there is only one brake disc on the front instead of two, to stop people panic braking and flying over the top, but there is plenty of run off. This bike also had a k&n air filter, renthal bars, and a fork brace, and was otherwise standard.
The bikes are 95horse power, with 600cc engines.
Have you tried 100 metre wheelies on YOUR fazer yet? :)
mrs.t won't let me try on her bike :(
Errmm... you can't actually hear but I'm making whipcracking noises here.
On a lighter note, here's a link to a pc remake of wheelie. It will show her just how safe wheelies can be.
http://www.acid-play.com/download/wheelie-rr
test riding this on Saturday
don't think I will try and wheelie it.
One of them was really into the idea of getting one but the general concensus was "great fun but they're asking too much for 'em"
For myself, I'm tryng to find arguments against getting the one of the two hayabusas that that my local place has for sale.
I really want a 125 or 250 at max but I've got 2 bikes am and absolutely REFUSE to get 3.
However, I've test-piloted hayabusas and love 'em.
Anyyone want a ropey old zzr 1100? cheap?
Oh, yeah, I know they're not exactly 125s or 250s but they're also fun in their way.
Not for me though - I try and stick to the cheap end of biking so I don't feel guilty about not washing 'em or scuffing the mirrors and stuff.
(am also tight as a duck's arse)