Damage Control

2:10 PM EST 02/25/06 – My time to sulk around is officially over as of this moment, and it’s time to get started repairing the bike.

Ok, I haven’t really sulked around at all, but I have avoided the task of removing all of the bunged-up parts on the R6 in preparation for repair. As it turns out, the damage to the bike was relatively light considering the speed I was going when I ejected (maybe 80) and how hard the bike and I went down (hard). Here’s a quick list of the damage:

NOTE: When I find my camera, there will be pics of all this stuff here, if you care…

Left rearset: This part has been bent into modern art. The main ‘V’ shaped piece that the peg and shifter attach to is even curled around quite a bit. This is a little surprising because that’s a pretty stout piece of kit, and I guess I figured that any bending force that extreme would break the mounting tabs off the frame, but alas, the frame tabs are in-tact. Also, even though they bent, they did a superb job of absorbing the damage to the side of the bike, a lot like frame sliders do. Cudos to Woodcraft for building some heavy-duty stuff.

Left frame slider: This little hero did its job admirably, and completely saved the frame and the fairing lower from damage. All I need is a replacement plastic puck, just as the designer intended. Yay Vortex!

Left clipon: The bar itself is bent, and the left-side switchgear is toast. Once again, Woodcraft to the rescue…a replacement for the bar is on the way for under $20, shipped.

Tank: One big dent. I’ll be bringing it to a local sympathetic body shop for repair and black paint this week. It’s a pretty big dent, but not huge, and easily fixable by a pro.

Bodywork: The upper is toast, the tail is rashed a lot but fixable, and the aforementioned lower is unharmed, apart from a few light scratches that don’t even go through the paint. The fairing stay is bent a bit, but usable for sure. Of course, by beautiful graphics job done by Fasttrack Motorsports is trashed, but in true Mark Peterson style (he owns the place) that will all be a distant memory as soon as my replacement stuff arrives.

I’d like to take a moment here to thank Mark once again. He doesn’t know me from Adam, and he has gone above and beyond…way beyond, in his support of my racing program this year. I was absolutely stunned when I discovered how much effort he put into the truck and bike with the graphics. But, apparently he was just warming up. I talked to him the day after my crash, and I apologized for smashing up his hard work almost immediately upon his having finished it, and his response was, “your job is to heal, and my job is your bodywork. Just get me the bike and it will be back and better than before in time for your next race.”

Mark is a Good Guy.

Ok, so that covers the bike, what about me? I’m getting better every day. My broken left big toe is healing, but is still pretty sore. My left ankle sprain is coming along slowly. I’m sure the fact that my broken toe stops me from using the ankle much isn’t helping, but whacha gonna do. My left shoulder sprain/bone bruise is coming along nicely. I’ve got maybe 60% of my range of motion back, and it gets a little better every day. Oh, and if anyone tries to tell you how we don’t bounce back like we used to 20 years ago or whatever, well, they’re right. At 22 these injuries probably would have been a memory by now. Whacha gonna do?

So, what’s next? I’m planning on being ready to ride (me and the bike) by the beginning of April. There is a track day at Putnam Park around the 5th or so, and I’m going to try to be there to see where I’m at physically, and to make sure the bike is all up to snuff. The next race on the WERA mid-central schedule isn’t until the last weekend of April, so I should be all set to go by then.