COBRA

I (Bruce / thump4fun) am planning a trip down to the Dragon in June with a couple of non-Buell friends.  We’re leaving the afternoon of Friday, June 26 and plan to ride the Dragon on Saturday.  We’re then riding the Blue Ridge Parkway for as far as we feel like, until heading back to Columbus on Monday.

We’re not making any reservations in advance for lodging, but don’t plan on making this a very expensive trip.  $50 motels for 3 nights, fast-food during the day, maybe a steak one night, and gas is about all it takes.

If anyone else would like to join a Buell(er), a Honda Interceptor, and a Honda CBR on a nice long weekend for a ride on the Dragon followed by some beautiful scenery on the Parkway, we’d be happy to have you along.  Just give me a shout and let me know.

Just be sure to have your AMA membership up to date for any breakdowns!  LOL

We’ve missed the past two Wednesday bike night meets due to weather, but rather then holding off until next month we’d like to get together to get things going with the club.  The weather looks like it will hold this coming week, but even if you show up in a cage, that’s fine.

We’re meeting on Wednesday, May 20 @ 6:30pm at Barley’s Smokehouse near downtown - the site of our very first meeting.

Be sure to come out so you can lend your voice to what we’re going to do with the club!

A good time was had by all at the  Grandview Euro Bike Night this past Tuesday evening.  We had 5, count ‘em, FIVE Buells out there!  And a wannabe you’ll see in the pics - LOL!  Which according to Mike is about 4 more Buells then any night before.  Looks like the club is making an impact on the local bike scene! 

There were, of course, a lot of BMW and Duc’s at Grandview, with the oddball Honda and even a Harley or two.  But having several Buell’s all parked together drew some attention, as well as Harry’s M2 now decked out in black and carbon.

If you didn’t make it out you missed a tour of the Spagio kitchen (which was pretty interesting) and some free food (which was very tasty).  For those that have never made it out there at all, the scene at Grandview is definitely a little more…shall we say…’refined’, then the Quaker Steak and Lube crowd.  LOL!

I’m sure we’ll be going out there some more this summer.

Mike took some great pics from the night, which you can find on the COBRA Pictures page or on Mike’s own Flickr page.

The first annual Thunder and Lightning event has came and gone this past weekend, and I’m happy to report that not only was it a great turnout all around, but COBRA showed their support well!

Even with the weather being an unknown factor on Saturday there were about 35 riders that came out…with 5 of those from COBRA! Not too shabby of a turnout I’d say! We’d love to have more members out to show our colors and support, but when 15% of the total attendees are COBRA members, that’s a pretty good start.

The morning started off a little later then planned as the organizers waited for late comers to arrive due to the weather. We then split into 5 groups, with each group going to one of 5 different 30-minute sessions. The sessions held were:

• Suspension setup
• Buell racing
• Riding tips
• Dyno
• Basic maintenance

I think the sessions had some great information for riders of all skill levels and backgrounds, so we all were able to glean some knowledge.

Mark even got his bike up on the dyno machine after talking with the techs.  I think once we cleared up a misunderstanding in the results he was pretty happy with it. 

It was then time for lunch and the trivia run.  The five of us COBRA members ended up with another 5 riders, making a decently sized group of Buells riding around the countryside.  I think we got lost twice and probably added 10-15 extra miles on our little tour.  LOL

The way back we had some pretty significant wind which made for an even more interesting ride.  The results of the trivia ride didn’t turn into any wins for COBRA, but the random drawing gave Dennis the best give away…a free pass to a track day from Fasttrax!

Congratulations Dennis!

It was a great day out, leaving Columbus at 6:30am and arriving back at Northstar about 9:30pm.  We ran into weather (rain and wind) for the first hour or so, but then it cleared up somewhat.  Total miles for the day was 330 from Northstar, plus miles to/from our homes.  I did 352 miles to/from my house and I’m probably the closest to Northstar, so I know everyone else did at least 350 miles.  Not a bad day’s ride.

We hope to see more of COBRA at future events!

Here are a few pictures from the day…