5/17/09 - Alabama State Reunion

Five years ago I was asked if I would lead a new chapter of the Southern Cruisers Riding Club in Trussville. I accepted the roll and felt I could give them 24 months to get them started. As I said that was five years ago and I’m still in charge. It seems nobody wants the job. The club really hit its stride in year 2 and 3 but at this point appears to be in a downward spiral helped along by the crushing effects of the economy. With so many out of work the hobby of motorcycling has become secondary. But this too will pass as I was on the road long before it got popular and it was fun then too. Anyway, getting back to my story we as a chapter took on the task of running the Alabama state reunion for the first time. State reunions are really fund raisers so we had a member who was able to get us track laps and museum tours of both Talladega and Barbers race tracks, all for a reasonable fee. On Friday the 15th we did track laps at Talladega. We all followed the pace car which was a 40K+ Dodge Charger. They told us we would stay around 55 or 60. They lied. That pace car took off like a bolt of lightning. My speedometer commonly pegged past 80 trying to keep up. The first lap was pretty scary. The “Wall” at Talladega is intimidating the first time you go up on it, but after the first lap you learn to just hammer down and let the centrifugal force do its job. It was a rush to say the least, one I will never forget. After the track laps we took a long ride through the country and ate dinner at the Top of the River in Anniston. We were supposed to meet everyone after that at the bike night at the dog track in Trussville but more or less the rain knocked that out. As a side note after leaving the Top of the River we stopped at a gas stations that didn't take credit cards. They also cut me off at $4 of gas. I reset my counter and later that week after not realizing I was already on reserve I had the pleasure of running out of gas on the way home from work. This coupled with me forgetting my cell phone resulted in a long walk down the highway to the next exit where thankfully my older daughter was at work. I borrowed her car to get home. But again I'm getting off subject. By the way I blame Scott Brimer for that whole deal, he was the one who chose the idiot gas station.

The next morning I was at the Barbers museum viewing the nether regions of the museum that most folks never get to see, including dry storage. Later that day we circled the Barbers track as well. It wasn’t nearly as fun as Talladega because you really need a clear track there to have any fun and most of the cruisers were not capable of dealing with the hair pin curves at Barbers which is built for sports bikes. I had my BMW for that trip but couldn’t get it up to speed. That night we were hammered with more rain storms but managed to get the prize drawings and auctions in. We got screwed by our host hotel and even the comfort inn next door who bailed us out wouldn’t allow the DJ to bring his equipment. So we wound up using my younger daughters Karaoke machine for a loud speaker. The whole weekend was tormented by unexpected problems and bad weather, but I thought it was a fun event and we did manage to raise $1465 for St Jude’s hospital, the official charity of the Southern Cruisers.

Also to my long time readers I wanted to note that the Goldwing I rode when I started this thing was sold. I posted it online and it lasted all of a day before some dude from Chattanooga was riding it off into the sunset. I wish him luck as I know that bike has many more sunsets left in her. Fair the well oh friend... er, uh.. keep the the shiny side up :)