I'm a speed freak, yes I am.

Ok, so ya'll remember in my last post how I was getting nervous about my weird state of excessive confidence and insufficient skill with regard to the moto? Well, it's getting worse.

But don't ya'll worry...yet. Nothing bad has happened. However, I have to make a confession: I am a speed freak. Not the stay-up-all-night kind, AKA a tweaker. I mean, I love speed. I love making the world go by in as much of a blur as I can muster.

Some of you might think "duh! I could have told you that!". It's fairly common knowledge that I like to go fast. I routinely drive at 90mph+ and fairly often at 100mph+, but that's in a nice climate controlled Audi with multiple airbags and crumple zones with four big ol' meaty tires. It's pretty benign to drive 100-110mph in my A3.

But it's an entirely different thing on a motorcycle. It's just a little bit like going fast at ADT but WAAAAAAAAY more intense.

So, last night I was riding home down the 15 to the 163 at a fairly mundane 70-80mph and pretty much just keeping up with traffic. At some point, a guy on a sport bike passes me. Now, usually I don't care since I don't usually feel the need to keep up with people I don't know. But his bike was interesting, so I wanted to take another look.

Well, the thing is this guy was cooking. He was pretty adept and just didn't slow down: 90-100mph with out a break. The guy deftly slinked between cars with barely a thought.

As I was trying to catch up, I was getting held up by some inconvenient traffic. Once I got free of that, I opened up to catch up with the guy. At one point I was doing 110mph, maybe 115mph. Not really that fast and I only held it for about a half mile or so till traffic got too dense for my comfort.

But here's the thing: I got such a rush off that. I never say that. When I go REALLY fast I usually feel nervous. Not excited, or elated but nervous. This was different. I was high on that burst of speed. Intoxicated, spun. That's when it occurred to me that I am just a speed freak. It also confirmed the wisdom of my choice of my first moto. If I had one of those crazy fast liter bike, this might not have been such a benign experience. That little 650cc bike of mine can GO! I have a hard time imagining what a bike with twice the power would be like. Scares me to think about that.

BTW, I never caught up to that guy. He was gone like a shot! Maybe he was on a liter bike.

However, this experience has made the need to expand my skill somewhat more urgent. I need to get on the track and learn how to operate my bike at high speeds so at least I know what to do if things get sticky.

To that end, I have got myself some leathers. A nice two piece, full zip Alpine Stars track suit. Pictures are coming.