Conditions Very Iffy, but They're Going Anyway

Motorcycle racing from IOM and Ireland.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=LU-ynRoqDEs

There's an incredible save at the 3:00min mark and a kick-butt song to spice things up.

"IFFY"!!?

Last I checked, "if" suggests some amount of uncertainty or variability. Those conditions aren't "iffy", they're "mental"...

Okay, stopping around 1:37 'cause I can't watch that and go right to sleep.

Insane, but beautiful...

I wish I could watch it as my invincible 20 year old self and think it was wicked cool rather than my 40 year old self and see it as flipping insane.

At least I know the brass ball companies major customers.....

-Rob

Wow... just wow... that looks like one hell of a harry ride..

I ride like an old man comparatively.

But, I'll probably live longer.

Did everyone see the fireball at 0:51 - 0:53?

Wow, imagine how good you'd have to be for that to seem like a reasonable thing to do.

But when does the teeny pop-rock stop and the kick-butt song start?

Some of those passes were holy-berkeleying-goddamn-what-the-berkeley insane.

Also, HOLY E36 M3 @ the jump @ 2:57.

I'm pissing my pants just watching this.

Hey! I got an idea... lets do our races somewhere with zero runoff, marginal road surfaces, trees, stone walls to make it excitin'. Speeds somewhere around 185 AND LETS DO IT ON LITRE BIKES, IN THE WET!

Brilliant!

Jolly good.

Off to get my affairs in order.

Hmmm.Making a pass at 165 with the front wheel in the air? Hmmmm.

The wobble and save around 3:00 made me pucker a little.

In reply to Giant Purple Snorklewacker: you forgot to add just a wee bit of rubbing too.

Those saves are easy. Just let go of the bike and settle back down on it when it stops thrashing around.

That looks like quite a thrill.

Cast iron, grapefruit sized cajones . No need for afternoon coffee now.

chuckles wrote: Those saves are easy. Just let go of the bike and settle back down on it when it stops thrashing around.

Right. Because it's so easy to settle back down on the saddle with leathers full of poo.

Just watching these videos gets my adrenaline going and pulse hammering. I cannot imagine the clanking sound as these guys walk around.

If life had a reset button....

I do not see how those riders can physically lean over the tops of their bikes like that. Their big brass ones have to get in the way

Pucker factor. I just lost a sofa cushion.

Giant Purple Snorklewacker wrote: Hey! I got an idea... lets do our races somewhere with zero runoff, marginal road surfaces, trees, stone walls to make it excitin'. Speeds somewhere around 185 AND LETS DO IT ON LITRE BIKES, IN THE WET! Brilliant! Jolly good. Off to get my affairs in order.

oh bullocks!!!

Brett_Murphy wrote: The wobble and save around 3:00 made me pucker a little.

Holy schitt. I had something similar happen to me (at MUCH lower speeds) and it still bobs back up every so often. These kids have got GUTS.

I love watching those videos.

The unfortunate part is that real road racing like this has taken many a life. It is dangerous.

That it is. But it's also why people do it year after year. Can't have one without the other, if you get my drift.

I finally finished watching the whole video, and I've come to a conclusion after seeing the last few minutes with no music and the uninterrupted forward camera view. I am just not made of the same stuff that those guys are made of.

I love motorcycles, and when I was a teenager , I was an avid, competent & reasonably fast off roader. Through my twenties I also did a lot of road riding, at times well above the speed limit. But I never went into triple digits for more than a second or two except on the interstate. I never went much more than 120 or so, because things started happening too fast for my comfort/bravery level. I knew I wasn't the badest rider in town, but I also knew what going fast on two wheels was really like.

At least I thought I knew what going fast on a bike was like ... the end of that video looks like a racing game being played back in Fast Forward! That was nearly sensory overload with out the other sensations that a video can't provide.

On the other hand, I do see an advantage to the tendency that litter bikes have of keeping the front wheel in the air. Its hard to have head shake that way.

.

Racers in other motorsports look at rally drivers and say we're crazy. But us rallydrivers look at them fellers that run the TT and say they are the absolute craziest batE36M3 nutcases on wheels. I spect that if you can do a lap of the Isle at those speeds and live, you are probably one of the most skilled in all of motorsports as well...

I love watching the event in HD - it's almost sensory overload just sitting on the couch.