[Baron]

Hurrah!!!
It’s been a while since I posted here. It’s been a very busy season for me. I’ve had downs and I’ve had ups, did a lot of new things, went down a couple of times but managed to get back right up. So this will be a long post.

First things first, I put about 14k on Circe this season. Not bad given that my season started in Mid-May and ended in the beginning of December. Combined with &k from last year I now have about 21k under my belt.
All in all it has been a good season, I learnt to some extent how to hang off in the corners and take them more aggressively, I did become recklessly aggressive and that’s just a reflection of my mindset at this point in time. As my riding buddies say, I ride like I am running away from something.

About the three times I went down this season.

1. Went down three times this season, all them a result of loss of traction. First one happened when I was taking a left turn, manhole cover came out of nowhere, traction gone. Luckily the fairing survived that one since the handlebar took the brunt of it and acted like a frame-slider. It got bent, the shifter was bent but apart from that everything seemed okay. A week later after straightening out the handlebar, replacing the shifter, I was all ready to go.

2. The second one happened when I got caught in the rain on my way back. Visibility was poo so when I saw a red light which for some reason I had missed, I braked hard, the front wheel locked and down I went, the fairing took a bit of damage this time but apart from that everything was okay. A day and a spare fairing later, I was good to go again.
At this point, riding and gym were my two ways to escape reality and run away from my issues so there was no way I was letting anything like get in my way.

3. The third instance was simply because although we haven’t had snow snow so far, I was going home at night, damp road, lost all traction turning, went down on the right. Good thing was that my buddies house was right around the corner, so parked Circe over there for the winter, as I had originally planned and that was it for me. End of the season.

Two things I take away from these three things,

1. I am glad that I follow ATGATT, if it wasn’t for it, I’d probably have road rash and at the very least cracked elbows from impacts.

2. I really really need to go the track. I am very aggressive by my nature and the fact that my aggression spills into my riding is …well…let’s just say that it’d going to get me killed if it goes on this way. So while university does drain me of any money that I do make, I will try to save up some for some basic track gear and head to the track next year. There is also the fact that I need to get a new used 250 or some other bike as a track bike because I can’t afford to wreck my primary mode of transportation.

Hopefully I;ll be more active post March when the term ends and I get a respite from my ever busy schedule.
….To be continued.