Not a big poster but have recently got back from WSBK at Aragon so thought I’d share the experience. The group consisted of seven of us. Two live in the South of France whilst two of the group were getting the long ferry down to Spain. That left three of us riding down, me on a V2, Rich on a V4S and Bob on his Streetfighter SP. The initial plan was the three of us doing the overnight ferry from Portsmouth to Caen with a stop at La Rochelle. Well the plan got f%#€$$ up pretty quickly. Mark in France rang on the Monday afternoon to see if we were all sorted. Told him we were virtually set to go and we’re riding to the ferry the next day. He then casually dropped in the fact that he didn’t know we were doing Caen to Tarbes in a day as we were supposed to be all setting off from there on the Thursday morning. Shit I’d booked the wrong date as we needed to be sailing that night. It was too late for that days sailing so the options were doing France in a day 500 miles or sacking the overnight ferry and do the Dover to Calais the next morning. Spoke to the other two guys who said they were free the next day so Dover to Calais it was. Had to ride to Rich’s first thing as I had put on a new rear tyre but didn’t have a torque wrench that big. Got to Rich’s in the morning put the torque wrench on and it virtually clicked straight away. Rolled off the ferry midday and saying off the Peage we reached Blios which still gave us 400 miles to do the next day. At least we were doing that on the back of a good nights sleep and not setting off at the crack of dawn. Fairly straight forward ride down to Tarbes where we met tue other guys. More importantly Mark only has one working lung so gave up bike trips a couple of years ago and bought himself a BMW240i. That meant we could dump our rucksacks in his car for the next part of the trip. From Tarbes Steve who lives in the area led us across the mountains and waved us by when he knew we couldn’t get lost. Even though it’s a days ride from his Steve plots a two day route so we can enjoy the local roads. The roads varied from tight hairpins to some faster sweepers. It was great to be able to ride the Panigale with no luggage. On one section I rode about 10-15 miles at the front and turned off down a gravel track which allowed me to park up and watch the group pass without being seen. One by one the group past but no Steve. As time passed I moved to the side of the road as an Andorra plated V4S Tricolour stopped. Turned out to be a British guy living over there. As we were chatting Steve turned up and said he’d had a problem with an earplug as had had to stop to sort it out. He carried on to catch the group up and I followed a few minutes later. About half a mile down the road at a roundabout there were two options. Semi remembering the route I took the second option but didn’t see anyone else. Turns out as the others arrived at the roundabout on separate groups they’d taken different exits resulting in the group getting split. So much for waiting at an obvious split. If the road continues straight we stay on it, if an obvious deviation someone would wait. I turned on my intercom and set in Ripoll and spent the rest of the day making my way there by myself which to be honest was a great ride. Once there we all met up at the hotel. The next day was a ride to Alcaniz which is about 10 minutes from the circuit. Again a mixture of tight stuff and some more open corners. Bob and myself went for a more spirited ride than the others but Mark gave chase in his BM. It was strange doing an overtake and seeing a car following you through but Mark treats it like a bike and gets the overtakes in. The rest of the weekend was watching the racing. Whilst I could have jumped in Marks car it would have been a shame to ride all that way and not take the bike to the circuit. It’s obvious that WSBK is nothing compared to MotoGP in Spain as there was no queues to get into the circuit be it on a bike or in a car. On the Monday it was a days ride to Tarbes via Anso where Tim and Paul went their own way as they were getting the ferry from Santander. For me the best road of the trip was from there to the border tunnel with France. It consisted of 80-100mph knee down corners if you were that way inclined. Once through the tunnel the road becomes more narrow with an increase in traffic. The next two days was the slog back up through France to Caen via Vitre which is a great town we used to stay in when visiting the MotoGP at Le Mans. Apart from having a rucksack back on the ride was ok but was glad to roll into a McD’s in Caen and then onto the ferry. Next day we docked about 6.30am which meant we hit the M25 in the rush hour!! After a few years riding Super Nakeds and Adventure bikes it was great doing a European trip on a Sportsbike. We did just under 2500 miles and I’d say weight on the wrists was manageable the worse thing for me was the seat. I think the one on my Beta is as comfortable. However seeing the bike parked up at the circuit made it worthwhile. The plan was to put it onto the track full time but now I can’t see that happening. Maybe it’s time to sell the 998 and get a V4 for a few Euro trackdays. Apologies for the long post but I can ramble on ]
