From: Moike Tue 10:02 PM Subject: Monday Night Cafe-Racing Review Well, what an interesting night... As I parked the Helix-hack in front of Coffee Society I noted that I was the first to arrive. But it was early yet, and the evening had just begun. Over the next half-hour riders slowly trickled in. Matt on his 900RR, Scrubbo on a nice RT, Creech on the Buell... his girlfriend fresh from finishing the MSF course in tow, astride her Nighthawk. Even the green of Steve's triumph was visible in the growing pack of fine two-wheeled machinery on display in front of the cafe. "Small group." I think to myself, "Gonna be a tame night..." Just then my ever-keen hearing detected the sound of a high-reving poorly tuned in-line four approaching on Stevens Creek. All heads swiveled East as Keith, the Squidly's stunt rider lofted his ZX-6 into an impressive wheelie in a display of showmanship and skill. And then for some reason he decided to feed in more throttle. There was a hush over the crowd as the front and rear axles of Keith's Ninja lined up perfectly vertical in relation to the unforgiving asphalt. The massive Givi topbox skated mere inches off the deck as Keith's legs dangled helplessly in the air. Somehow, maybe with much prayer, and Biaggi-like luck Keith maintained control and got the front end back down. A cheer erupted from the crowd... "Maybe tonight will OK after all." I muttered. A coffee shop was randomly pulled from the hat and Derek took point on his VFR leading our horde into the fray of SF Bay Area traffic. Being bored with riding the Helix-hack the standard method I opted to climb into the sidecar and take advantage of the fact that I recently put the throttle and brake back on the proper side. While this was the utmost pinnacle of poserhood I did get many startled looks from cagers who I can only assume thought the pilot had fallen off and that I would soon be meeting my maker. My mind could not even begin to formulate what I would say to the cop if I got pulled over. Having safely arrived at our destination with no casualties we proceeded to overwhelm the cafe staff with our sudden influx. Creech of The Mighty Bowels on the otherhand overwelmed the plumbing rendering yet another coffee shop bathroom inoperable. After several minutes of waiting for an expected mystery-guest to arrive the masses grew restless. I attempted to entertain the fray by jumping on the Helix-hack and taking a crack at burning some extremely small donuts. This started a chain reaction and before I knew it there where bikes doing wheelies and stoppies in all directions. How someone did not end up dead I do not know. I can't be sure, but I swear I even saw the wheel of an RT up in the air out of the corner of my eye. It was deemed then that we should draw another coffee shop from the hat before The Man arrived to issue wood shampoos. So off we went... Arriving at Moulin Rouge Coffee Roasting, the entire group proceeded to do several laps around the conveniently located roundabout next to the coffee shop. Not to be outdone I threw the Helix-hack into the roundabout and proceded to gain momentum until I had a pretty good three-wheel drift going. Reaching escape velocity I then exited the roundabout straight at the group, locking the rear and pitching the Helix-hack sideways in an Akira-like slide that I was later told "Would have been a really really impressive highside". The rest of the night was pretty textbook. More coffee shops, many wheelies, Keith did a burnout in front of one of San Jose's finest And Greg annoyed a bunch of undercover cops on a sting operation. The night ended at TGI-Friday's with food and one last round of bench racing. A good time was had by all... Not feeling like enough hoolganisim had been propagated that evening Matt, Justin, and I proceeded to talk Keith into riding his ZX-6 down the flight of stairs in front of TGI-Friday's. Keith not content with simply riding down a flight of stairs proceeded to drop the clutch from about 40 feet back and rocket off the top step. All I remember is seeing a ZX-6 w/luggage sailing through the air three feet off the ground. Keith landed a good six feet past the bottom step in the TGI-Friday's parking lot in a shower of sparks and a suspension crunching thud that undid any work Jim Lindemann had put into that ZX-6. Amazingly he remained upright, and it only cost him his steering-head bearings and broken Givi bag mounts. Later he was heard to comment "I could have went faster, I had more than enough room to stop." And with that my droogies, another Monday night of Cafe-Racing had drawn to a close. -Mike- -- -Mike- DoD 5010 - AFM 803 - http://www.squidlys.com 99 ways to phone in a pizza order: 18. Crack your knuckles into the receiver.