Honda CBR929 Ian Payne Kawasaki ZX12R Jason Peters

Honda CBR929 Ben Warden Yamaha R6 Joel Haley

Honda CBR954 Paul Southwell (2/3 rear) Yamaha R1 Stoimen Stojanov

Suzuki GSXR1300 Wayne & Joanne Nimmo Yamaha TRX850 Tony Raditsis

Suzuki GSXR1000 Lyn Duncan Yamaha YXF1000 Peter Parissis

Honda CBR900 Jacinta Thomas Yamaha R1 Geoff Jones (leader)

Honda CB750 Mark Brown (1^st ride) Honda CBR1100XX Mark Hooper (1^st ride)

Ducati 620 Anton Tzar Honda VFR800 Anton Plenge (1^st ride)

BMW F650 Simon Albry (1^st ride) Honda CBR1000 Paul Punicki (1^st ride)

Honda VTR1000 Adam Smith (1^st ride) Harley Softtail 1450 Calvin Locke (1^st ride)

Honda Valkyrie Dino Fornito (1^st ride) 21 bikes, 22 people

Sundays ride to Snake Valley had a few good examples of what happens when you don’t pay attention. I’ll leave it up to you, the reader, to pick out the small and not so small indiscretions.

Sunday’s ride started in fine fashion with 21 bikes and riders looking at a big, blue western skyline. Geoff Jones gave a short talk on police road manners, expected riding and road conditions, predicted route and stops.

We travelled smoothly over the Westgate Bridge and out of town, through the first set of turn off’s near Melton and onward through Exford, Yaloak Vale and Anakie. Stoimen Stojanov’s band of merry men were about to get a look at the “Clubs” old hill climb track (in a terrible state) along with the unpleasant sight of a demobilised Honda, mine! Fortunately for all concerned, the problem was diagnosed and repaired fairly quickly (thanks Ben for your help) while the rest of group continued on to Meredith for the first scheduled break. Ben and myself arrived a mere 10 minutes later.

(Note: by this stage we had already lost two riders at the Kororoit Creek exit – last seen heading for Geelong! …Ed.)

Stopping and leaving Meredith is when the ride turned to ashes for some. First, Anton filled his Ducati Monster with leaded petrol and fearing some sort of catalytic converter meltdown decided to pull out of the ride. Secondly, Wayne and Ian decided to swap rear-riding duties.

Geoff led the group out of the servo and took the first left turn, no problems. I pulled over to be the second corner marker with Lyn. About a dozen or more bikes go correctly around and then Wayne Nimmo goes past and the corner markers take off. Can anyone spot the problem? Yes, you got it. There are still five or so bikes riding past the corner without any markers. About 50 metres up the road I realise that Ian is the rear rider, scramble back to the corner only to see Ian following a small group down the highway. I chased them down and pulled over (hopefully) the lead rider (Ben). At this point the confusion is starting to show. Ben and I head back to ‘the corner’ thinking the rest will follow. Wrong, confusion had taken over and this group headed off to Daylesford. I would like to take this opportunity to apologise to this group for not waiting for everyone to turn around and giving some clear instructions.

I’m now the rear rider and I chase and gather the corner markers through Mount Mercer, Dereel, Rokewood Junction stopping at Cape Clear (Fear) where Ben (again) is fixing Mark Hooper’s CBR1100XX rear puncture. Mark’s mate Anders (VFR800) had stopped to do the job only to find his brand new tyre repair kit had no plugs in it!

I was told that Snake Valley is only a signpost on the corner of an intersection. I am here to uphold the honour of Snake Valley by stating that there is more than a signpost to Snake Valley. For those of you who have seen will understand when I say, “go and see for yourself what makes Snake Valley”.

Meanwhile, back on the ride, we have gotten as far as Ballarat and its lunchtime. During lunch it’s decided the next stop would be at Bacchus Marsh via Creswick, Daylesford (no sign of our missing colleagues) and Trentham. Ed: help me out here: was it in this leg that Geoff stuck his leg in a hole beside the road allowing his bike to fall on top of him? Can’t remember! …Ed.

Stopping and fuelling at Bacchus Marsh got us the attention of the local constabulary, a divvy van no less. This very faithful hound followed us out of town all the way to the first turn whereby I had had enough and pulled over to allow the process to be completed. Usual questions, where are you lot from, where are you heading, don’t you know that you can’t wander over double lines, you shouldn’t frighten the elderly like that, blab, blab! I resisted using the same line as last time, that being “I’ll catch up to the leader and tell him to pull his head in”. Instead found “Yes, sir. No, sir” worked well.

After an engaging 15 minutes with our faithful hounds, I was free to continue my journey to the ride break-up spot, Diggers Rest.

Paul Southwell (Honda CBR954)

Here is some related email correspondence received over the next few days:

Stoimen,

My friend's name is Calvin Locke - he's got a 1450 cc Twin Cam Harley Davidson 2000 Soft Tail. Mine's a 1999 GL 1500 Honda Valkyrie Interstate. We ended up doing a damn good Pub Crawl from Daylesford to Ballarat to Deer Park, so from that point of view it certainly was grouse! It was, however, a bit disappointing that the group couldn't stay together. Are the Shepherds going to find their lost sheep? Shall we see how the next one goes?

Best Regards,

Dino Fornito

Hi Dino,

I was a participant on Sunday's ride and am on the Committee. On behalf of the Club I am disappointed that we lost you at the Kororoit Freeway exit. I had a fair view of what happened – it looked like the leader, Geoff on the red and white Yamaha R1, left it late to change lanes from the middle (of 5 lanes?) leaving you guys stranded out in the far right lanes. I doubt you even saw him take the exit, or possibly weren't aware that he was leader. I acted as corner marker, and at the time wasn't absolutely sure that you were with us.

Nevertheless, at the important pre-ride spiel, Geoff clearly identified the first risk - the Kororit turnoff, explicitly by name, noting that you would end up in Geelong if you missed it. It is difficult to emphasize to new riders how important this little talk is. And normally our Corner Marking System provides enough leeway for most problem situations to be avoided. In theory, one of the two “corner markers” should have chased you down and returned you to the fold. The fact that you were new and therefore not recognised as being part of the group complicated this safety feature. We will look at this corner marking process and try to fathom why it failed, and how to do it better in the future. I apologise for this failure.

As you may have heard, we had another break down of the corner marking at Meredith where a further 4 riders were disconnected from the main group. A change of Rear Rider being poorly advertised, and then various processes not followed resulted in the System breakdown, a fairly disappointing outcome that occurs about once every three years I guess.

I have attached a Word document providing information for prospective members, and outlining the Corner Marking System we employ. For more information about the Club including all our upcoming scheduled rides, please visit www.mstcv.unimelb.edu.au

It sounds as if you had an enjoyable day anyway. I hope to see you again.

Regards,

Ben Warden, Secretary MSTCV

Ben,

Thanks for your email. From our point of view, the reason for losing the group was because we had parked our bikes away from the main group. We saw the group take off before we had even mounted our bikes.

Another contributing factor was that I had a fixation in my mind that we were first heading to Ballarat. Hence I took the Western Ring Road, thinking that we could catch up. I know that Geoff mentioned the Kororoit Freeway exit, and it was my fault for not clarifying this point, but I really did not know what he meant by this exit - to my mind it could have been either the Millers Road, Grieve Parade or even Laverton exits. At the time I thought that we would take off with the group so I didn't clarify what he meant, but when the group took off without us, the problem just compounded. Since we had lost the group and were not familiar with either the first or last bike, we didn't know what to look for and where. As it happened, after taking the Western Ring Road turn-off, I conferred with my friend and we decided to go to Daylesford first.

The ride was still enjoyable, and I don't have any problems with this breakdown in the system - after all, no system is perfect. I would still like to participate in further rides but I stress that I would not envisage myself attending regularly, mainly because I tend to be a "fair weather" rider and may have weekend commitments from time to time. If that's OK, then I'll probably join. I have visited your Club site before and was contemplating joining, but, as you indicated, you require participation in at least 3 rides before applying. As far as I'm concerned, no apologies are necessary, because I did my bit to stuff up too.

Best Regards,

Dino Fornito

Hi Dino,

Thanks for your reply. As in all aspects of life, there is a second view. I appreciate your candid response accepting some of the responsibility for the corner marking stuff up. Nevertheless, we will try to manage large groups of new riders in a better way in future.

Re: fair weather riding, and hence limited riding. We have many riders who fall into your category. The Club itinerary is designed to offer a range of rides that cater for different riding styles. The fact that we ride every Sunday allows people to select rides that suit them calendar wise, destination wise and duration. The hope is that we cater for a broad spectrum of riders and their tastes. Hence, we hope to attract people like you. There is no stigma to going on more or less rides; the only reason we ride is for enjoyment. Some people have more chance to take advantage of the riding opportunities offered by the Club, and are probably the envy of others. So, the level of commitment we seek is as much or little as you wish to apply. We have some riders who have not ridden with us for years, but continue to pay their memberships dues.

The 'attending three functions before becoming a member' stipulation is to protect you as much as us. Because our rides vary greatly in length, duration and style, what suits you one week may be abhorrent the next. After three rides, you will have, hopefully, an understanding of where the Club is positioned in the riders market. Clearly, we are a riders club, with the emphasis on sports bike riding, non-manufacturer specific, with less emphasis on alcohol consumption on Sunday rides, balanced by monthly social sips. We pride ourselves on good organisation (ho-hum), punctuality and stability. We sell ourselves as "a ride every Sunday, rain hail or shine". Mind you, if it is bucketing rain, the ride will likely be disbanded or repair to a coffee shop.

Regards,

Ben Warden.

Hi Ben,

One of the things I thought about while being in purgatory, sorry rear rider, was that if some ride notes were supplied to the rear rider then in the event of rear rider being faced with any confusion or a split group the rear had something to go by. I am not sure how many times the group split situation has happened before, I can't remember it happening in recent times. Basically I feel that when there is a large group, especially when a fair percentage are first timers, Club members will have to be a bit more attentive, especially me.

Regards,

Paul Southwell.