PETE ’ S PEOPLE
“ One of my better adventures was when I decided to take a Kawasaki ZRX1100 to a small , quiet , peaceful , town in France , where they held a classic car / bike rally / road race day .” Chris duly turned up at this rather staid and formal meet where , after spending a half an hour with his pidgin French , he managed to convince the French organisers that he was legit , and they finally allowed Chris to enter the mad Kawasaki . Further to this , Chris ‘ forgot ’ to mention to the beret wearers that the Kawasaki was also fitted with a one hundred horsepower booster-shot of nitrous oxide . This would have been fine , perhaps , but the organisers also had a certain fact of their own that could have been imparted a little sooner . We will leave it to the imagination as to what happens when ‘ crazy racer ’ on shrieking modern rocketship encounters ‘ ye olde worlde ’ roading . What they had failed to mention was that the old town , on top of the hill , was still paved with 16th century cobblestones .
CLUB LIFE Way back in 1993 ( yes , that ’ s thirty years ago now ) Chris joined a certain ‘ MC ’. He relates that these were some of the best days he ever had . “ We had a lot of fun getting up to not a lot of good ...”, as Chris himself reminds me , he “ hasn ’ t always been clever ”. “ The club met in a pub by the River Thames in Buckinghamshire on a Thursday evening . There used to be a general loop . We ’ d meet at a burger van at the end of the High St , and would ride to Henley , about 13km , over the bridge and back to Maidenhead via a roundabout , which was perfectly suited for knee downs , then get on the A4 and down the Marlow Bypass Road , finishing back at the burger van . Last one there had to buy the burgers .” “ We were young , we were keen , we went to rallies , we drank beer , we made memories and we became lifelong mates . Once we all took chainsaws and nails to a rally called Stormin ’ the Castle in the North , so we could make our own furniture . We made this massive picnic table , sat at it , and set fire to one end so it would keep us warm as we drank .” Now in its 33rd year , Stormin ’ the Castle is one of the largest bike meets held annually in the UK , at Witton Castle in County Durham . Obviously , the behaviour
Two-up motorcycle gymkhana is a test of motorcycle control
KIWI RIDER 85