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KicxStart Streetfighter show '99 The
6th of June 1999 was the day it all happened... |
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On
Saturday June 5th, one day before D-day, there was still a lot of
work to do on the website, but my laptop wouldn't boot. After numerous
tries I punched it on the head and suddenly it booted! It kept running
the whole day so I thought it was just a single hick-up.
Spirit's weren't up too high because the whole day rain was pouring
down so much that I decided to make an undertray for my seat unit
so the spray coming from the back-wheel wouldn't short the electronics
that are located there. In the evening I went to the building I work in to install Internet Explorer 4.0 on the laptop I arranged for Airhead (of Airhead's World of Motorcycles) to run his website on, and to upload my latest changes to the site using ISDN. At home I only have a 33k6 modem connection so it would take too long to upload the complete 7/11 Boulevard which is about 10MB big. Back home to pack my backpack with two laptop computers, a zip drive, food and tools in case I got into mechanical trouble with the bike, as this was going to be the first time I took the bike for a relatively long ride... so far I only used the bike for blasts around local backroads. When
I woke up the following day I was happily surprised when I looked
outside because there was no sign of rain... a bit cloudy with some
blue air in between. Made breakfast for me and my son with a smile
on my face :-) It
was time to go... I had to pick up Airhead first who lives just
a few miles from my house in 's-Hertogenbosch. When I arrived at
his place I first thought he had overslept himself, but after ringing
the doorbell a few times he appeared. I had expected his bike to
be in a somewhat neglected state judging from the pictures he had
shown me, but I was shocked when I saw what appeared when he took
of the cover!... Imagine what your bike would look like when you
place it in salt water for about a year... then roll it in the mud
before riding it trough a coalmine... crashing at every corner... Airhead drove up front because I wasn't sure if my bicycle speedo gave the correct reading and I haven't got any mirrors or indicators, but that turned out to be irrelevant because we were always traveling way above the legal speed limit anyway and Airhead's bike was also lacking mirrors and indicators. The rainsuit I weared turned out to be no use because we didn't get one drop of rain on the way to Leiden. We weren't sure of where the show was exactly, so we decided to follow a guy on a special V-Max... who turned out to be just as lost as we where. When we stopped to look for directions a guy on a Ducati Monster stopped and told us the right direction... we all nodded understandingly, but as soon as we got riding again it turned out no-one had really paid attention ;-( We finally got at to the show after following an Opel Astra with some guys that hadn't lost half their braincells from years of excessive speed. When
we got on into the show hall no-one knew what our stand was so we
had to wait a while until they had it figured out... ofcourse we
had been put in the darkest utmost corner of the hall next to a
big open door which created enough draught to make the flyers fly
by themselves. I often found myself laying across the table to stop
everything from blowing away. At least we did have power for the
computers, which we hadn't really expected. In expectation of the
rest of the guys we started unpacking the laptop computers. Like
everything should go wrong my computer wouldn't boot, which was
a disaster because Robby would bring the website on a CD-ROM with
him which we would put on display using that computer and we also
needed it because Robby had to offload his digital camera after
every 9 pictures he took. No matter what I tried, I even completely
dismantled the laptop (don't worry, I'm an IT-professional ;-) completely
to look for loose connections but it was all without cause. When
Robby arrived at the stand, drained to the bone because he wasn't
as lucky as us, the PC still hadn't given a sign of life so I had
to tell him the bad news. For a while he denied the fact because
he has an enormous trust in my ability concerning PC's, but after
trying to literally kick the damn thing into life a few time he
was also struck with reality.
Luckily
Dr. Bral kindly offered to let us use his laptop, so we installed
the software for the digital camera and started downloading pictures
from the camera to a ZIP drive. Robby convinced the dyno-operator from tuning shop and dragrace specialists "Mirage" to wear one of our shirts so the show was really crowded with RN(S) logo's. We even sold one of the T-shirts because Robby Nitroz' only fan appeared to be at the show, who is probably responsible for 90% of the hits on Robby's old Streetfighterpage ;-) You know who you are. Because I only wore a T-shirt and it was very cold at the stand because it was located next to an open door I had to visit the toilets every 10 minutes, which were located at the other side of the hall, so I had plenty of excuses to stroll around the fighters that were parked there. A bike that immediately attracted my attention was a black Katana 1100 which was very beautiful but didn't have any front brake calipers!... the other guys wouldn't believe it drove to the show, but I actually stood next to it when the owner drove off at the end of the show... nutter! (and that's a BIG understatement!). Other high points were three bikes, all with a minimoto bolted on top of the pillion seat, and a beautifully streamlined Kawa ZZR-1100, which Robby couldn't capture on film because it was too dark... I hope it does the same with speed camera's. We weren't the only ones that ran out of luck that day because the computer connected to Mirage's dyno gave up (the graphics card had died). They asked us for help, but as we only had laptops we couldn't lend them a graphics card and they didn't have the dyno software on disk so they couldn't use one of our laptops. The
bad weather ruined the activities outside, like burnout competitions
and stunt shows. There was a minimoto which made a burn-out that
was launching pieces of burning rubber into the public!!! You really
wouldn't like a drop of that on your head! At
the end of the show they elected the "Streetfighter of the
year", I didn't watch the outcome, because it's usually a bike
that got there the back of a van, never gets out of the owner's
living room and probably got built by everybody but the owner himself
after dashing out a year-income of the average IT-professional (don't
take it personal... I'm just jealous... maybe... naahhhhh.... NOT!) After collecting our present for being there and having to endure the crap show Yamaha had put on display for the whole day, consisting of a backpack, a t-shirt, a badge, a pair of pens, a keyfob and some stickers we all went home, but first Patrick had to stop at the tank station... ...the story ain't over yet... When
I tried to start my bike again there was a little click from the
starter motor (I presume) and the nothing... dead... finite... damn!
I was sweating like a pig wearing my wetsuit while the sun was shining
because it wouldn't fit inside my backpack anymore. Filled with
frustration I started dismantling my bike (I knew those tools would
come in handy) while Robby had to keep us amused with stories about
how reliable Honda's are... (he's probably right, but I wouldn't
want to be seen dead on one) ...And daring Airhead to ride pillion
with him while wheelying the bike. Finally I couldn't stand it anymore
and gave up on the bike, but luckily there was help nearby. There
was someone from the "Road Assistance" working on a car
at the gas station and I politely asked if he would have a look
at my bike, and he told me he would after he finished the car (off,
I hope). Ten
minutes later Robby came flashing by making a huge wheelie, then
wheelying back making a stoppie in front of us, returning to earth
with a large bang... fuckin' showoff bladefaggot ( jealous again
;-). He had the man from Road Assistance on his tail who had completely
forgotten about us. In no-time he had diagnosed the problem. It
turned out a bolt from a lead to the battery had loosened, making
bad contact. It was a long day with ups and downs, but generally we had a great day... too bad Jasper couldn't make it, but we'll set up a new webmaster-meeting soon enough.... if not we'll meet again at Dr. Bral's Northern Fighter Pilot Meeting! |
