This took place back in 93. Our local track always has an all motorcycle event one Sunday a month. During this they always have a wheely contest. All year I had won every wheely contest and now for promotional purpose a $100 dollar bounty was up to who ever could beat me and they put it on the flier. Now I am no serious stunter but back then it was more of a distance contest than show and the crowd loved it. I was on my stock 89 Black/Silver GSXR1100. About 10 bikes entered and I always went last. First, Let me tell you when they put your name on a flier it put's the pressure on to win and it did this day because some of the guys were good and out to dethrone me. Everyone gets two tries and you keep your best mark. As I was sitting back watching the other riders take there turns I had those feelings of excitement and butterflies come up. I was nervous as a cat. There was a big crowd and some fine wheely riding by my opponents. One thing about a wheely contest is that a normal guy that rides wheelies on the street will often fold when in front of the crowd. There's a lot of pressure that goes with riding on one tire down the track with the stands and fence full of people watching you. It came time for me to do my thing. I cranked the Suzuki, whipped the throttle a couple of times. Did a standing circle burnout for crowd appeal and rolled back to the burnout box for my run. I take off and clutch it up in first gear settling in on being smooth with the throttle and finding the balance point of the bike. I hit second. Bike is up high, I look over to the left of the bike to see the track because I can't see over the faring. I am going good now and bump shift to third. I am picking up speed now and can feel the effect of the wind on the bike. The GSXR moves around some but I just turn the bars a little and use some body English to correct it. Bump shift again to forth gear and I am moving pretty good now. I am past the 1/8th mile marker and the bike is starting to move around a little more and I am really hard on the gas. Maybe 90 to 110 MPH on the back tire now. I decide to not shift to fifth and just wind forth gear out. This is when I look at my shadow from the sun on the left of me and I can clearly see the three spokes of the front tire and it is not spinning. I had lifted the front wheel at such a low speed that it had long stopped turning. To cure head shake when the front in comes down you apply throttle and hang on. To bad I was already wound out! The bike started coming down and I tightened my grip on the Clipon's. I saw smoke from where the front tire started skidding for a second when it touched on both sides of the bike. It tried to tuck the front end but I held on. Then...... It started to speed wobble. At first I thought I could control it but it was quickly becoming a Tank slapper. To be honest at this time I was feeling shear terror. It was heading towards the Guard rail and it was like trying to wrestle a steer. It got so violent that it actually through me up on the side of the bike and jerked my hands loose from the clipon's Most of my body was off of the left side of the bike and I was holding on to the tank with my right arm trying to Bear hug it and stay on. I remember looking and the bars going back and forth from lock to lock like some kind of mad motorcycle dream. Then it happened. The back kicked out and I was going down... my weight hanging off the left side had made the bike pull away from the guard rail and as soon as I hit the ground I let go and started to slide. I must have flipped over a couple of times because at one point the gas tank was sliding by my head. I remember thinking " My *** was on fire" But that was just road rash from the slide. I was sliding on my back now and the bike was flipping end over end and I could see the headlight assembly with those two GSXR double headlights flying through the air (not on the bike!) along with different sizes of black and silver plastic parts. I could hear the sound of the motor on the rev limiter and I was hit by the canister from the exhaust. I just laid there wondering what all I had broken on my body and if I was bleeding really bad anywhere. I got up with some help and was taken off of the track. They had to actually use a broom to sweep up the pieces of my GSXR. Later my buddy said it was the coolest wreck he had ever seen and pieces of the bodywork were thrown high in the air and over the fence. To me it felt like and eternity while it was happening but it only took a few seconds to trash a GSXR. The bike was toast and I parted it out. I had a bad case of road rash but no broken bones. Anyone that has ever saved a tank slapper knows the shear terror that they are. People still talk to me about that wreck. Be careful out there the ground is hard. BigT.

 

Damn sorry to hear bro.. did you have steering stabalizer?

 

So you didnt win

 

 

That's quite a story.

 

I read/hear a lot of stories about people fighting to stay on the bike...may I ask why? The couple times a bike I'm on has gotten pissed and bucked me off to one side while wobbling violently, it usually is all downhill from there. I've learned once it bucks you off, just let go. If not, you're basically deciding to hang on to an out-of-control missile, one that will coast quite nicely at high speed for quite a distance, while you blindly hang on and wait to see what it will smash you into and kill you. Just bail and accept you've crashed.

 

Say it ain't so!

 

and you werent at balance point if you had to shift when you "wind out" your gear

 

It's nice to read a story written in the english language! Too many people here don't know the first thing about grammar!

 

Your right I was not at the balance point anymore, at that point I was just going for distance. Thanks on the Grammer. Just trying to tell it like it happened. To bad it was not on video.

 

good story

 

 

wuts up with that pic ??

 

forgot to double space after each period... j/k