Actually, it should be about version 35 at least. The new 450X has something like 1400 k’s on it and I just got it.

Two days after Tom Groggin, I rode to Omeo, then did the Haunted Stream with Arty, a cool guy from Omeo I’ve met.

I saw four or more goannas and the riding was very good.

I did 343 k’s for the day without a refill. Go the Safari tank.

Yesterday, I went out with Lakes locals Legs, Mick and Pete. We did a quick 144 k or so blast, but with much of it on sandy single trail type stuff in the local forest. It rained the night before and it was mint.

Today, I rode out with regular offender Jamie, who lives locally. We checked out a new track that I’ve dubbed ‘Kokoda 3′.

Same deal as always, no virgin single trail, but countless hours spent finding and cleaning up old logging roads so that our impact on the bush is minimised.

They make for a great ride though when the track type is constantly changing.

We found some great new seldom ridden tracks with a soft sandy base that led to some cool rocky tracks that climbed up high, leading us to the super good Mt Elizabeth area. Think Woollybutt, tree ferns and loam.

You all know how much I like smooth, loamy, leaf littered tracks up high and this hill has some corkers.

Right out the back is Pinnibar and Kosciousko (or however you spell it). I was salivating as I contemplated the plethora of new riding fodder before my eyes.

We smashed across to Mt Wong where we found more great tracks. We rode about 60 k’s of awesome tracks that had great variety and not one part I didn’t like.

Check out the size of the tree ferns. There were approximately 8.54 squillion of them and this was a little one.

We rode some new tracks to both of us on the way home. Some high rocky ridges above the Tambo were great, then we raced to get home on some fire type trails.

These were different to the ones around the North East though, as they were mostly hard based with a sandy topping that made for high speed feet up powerslides.

I have managed to wrestle my Pro Circuit 496 back from Don and fitted it yesterday. The top of the airbox was cut out without removing it with a hacksaw blade, the main jet went from a 145 to I think a 165 and the pilot screw went from 3/4 to 1.5 turns out. It made a big difference to torque and is essentially a gear higher everywhere, being much easier to ride.

Louder though and some new packing with a quieter end cap is in order.

We were home before we knew it and despite stopping frequently to discuss track conditions and choice, we covered 252 k’s in 7 hours easily.

I started with a tank that was about 3/4 full and could probably squeeze another 100 k’s out of it. Did I mention how much I like the 21 litre Safari tank?

Fellow Adventurers, I have a good bike for sale.

It’s my CRF 250X from last year.

They called it an 09 model and it was delivered to me in Feb 09 but really it’s a leftover 08 model. They had too many 08’s kicking around and didn’t bring in an 09. There were no changes anyway and even the current model is the same and probably next years’ too the way the GFC impacted upon manufacturers!

Due to me falling off and breaking my hand, it only travelled 3000 k’s.

At 2037 k’s it shit an inlet valve and Honda rebuilt the motor, replacing the entire head, using stainless steel inlet valves. They worked fine and the valves have not moved since.

It comes with Force bashplate and radiator guards, new tyres and UHD tubes. Chain and sprockets are ‘yeah - nah’ but I can barter.

Some plastics are new and it’s appearance is near new. It has no substantial damage or problems. Couple of minor dings in the front rim.

It comes with some spares and I can talk turkey with a purchaser regarding tyres and more.

It’s shown with pivot pegs and an IMS ten litre tank fitted, but they don’t come with the bike. They may be available at a good price if you want to pay for them. The bike will come with the standard tank, which is not fitted since Don and I mistakenly picked up the wrong tanks back at ‘bike delivery and set - up 101′.

I want $7500 for it, which is a very reasonable price considering it’s condition and history.

This years’ 3 day adventure to Tom Groggin was good fun. We had a group of mates collectively known as the Crusty Mongs book the entire tour. They are an affable mob prone to hanging shit on each other at the drop of a hat, with the banter starting weeks out with my threats of a curfew.

They responded by bringing along enough Carlton Draught to cause a nationwide shortage. Despite their bravado, they took home enough Carlton to avert that same shortage.

In a reminder of the importance of preparation, one bloke rocked up with wheel bearings that were near falling our of his front wheel. We couldn’t risk failure in the middle of nowhere, so were forced to squeeze his bike into one of the support trailers, take him to Corryong and purchase new bearings. He travelled in a back up vehicle to Groggin via the bitumen, fitted the bearings and missed the first day’s ride.

A couple of others turned up with worn sprockets that made me frown. I only allowed them to ride at all since we had spares (including some for the KTM), otherwise it would have been ’sorry mate - here’s your bucks back - you can’t ride’. As it turned out, they both finished with hardly any teeth left and if they had failed completely it would have put us all on the back foot, as the back up four wheel drive was already full with two other breakdowns that could not have easily been prevented with pre tour maintenance.

This tour was not a walk in the park for the faint hearted.

We started from the new destination of Koetong, which introduced some great new tracks.

On the brilliant Glendart track, Hawk morphed into George of the Jungle.

Here’s Rob holding the log ‘in - situ’. Hawk hit the pointy bit with his body armour and snapped it off clean.

The only damage was a busted front fender bag.
Next time Hawk, follow the ancient Red Indian saying -’move head - arrow hit tree’. ie: don’t collide with shit if possible.

Some climbs were steep and rough. Weren’t they Monga.

It was so steep, Wayno went down all by himself without a bike.

The Zulu creek hill had many shuddering. Here’s Dave’s take on the matter:

If you look hard at the above shot, you can just make out a grip hiding amongst the rocks.

Milesy was doing his best to uphold our Eco accreditation by checking for wildlife trackside.

A bit that looked something like Erzberg had a few struggling. Personally, I thought it was a really cool technical challenge, but I think some of the guys are still having nightmares about rocks ledges.

Actually, try waaayy rougher. Just ask Ed.

A large dead Ash had fallen over the track at an angle, presenting an interesting challenge. Another busted branch lay at an angle in the general landing area, increasing difficulty.

The group were that spent when they got near the station that they wimped out on riding the 3 minutes to the top of Mt Pinnibar to see the wicked view and complete the day one adventure. Many of them were to regret their decision later. I went up alone to take in what was an incredible vista as the sun was starting to set.

Arrival at the station proper saw the back up crew in full swing and brilliantly organised. Dinner consisted of wicked - good enormous eye fillet, potato bake and salads. My meat bill was ginormous, however money well spent in my books. Countryside meats in Albury has been supplying our tours for years now and is in my mind without peer. Lockies steaks are always succulent.

Despite the super abundance of alcohol, they were nearly all in bed well before the midnight curfew.

Sunday morning saw us rise to the usual big cooked breakfast with the multi choice cereal option. We made a late start for the Rider Training session since there was some routine bike maintenance needed first.

Air cleaners, chains to be lubed, valves to be shimmed.

Ed’s 250 was made of won’t go, so Wayno and I attacked it to check out his intake valve clearance. As suspected, it was about nil on one valve.

I had a shim kit along with us so in short order we inserted a thinner shim and voila, he had compression to ride home with.

Note this is only a temporary fix and once a valve has no clearance it will need to be replaced, inlcluding re - cutting of the valve seat to ensure a good seal.

Then off to rider training Groggin style, on a loamy green grassy dustless paddock.

The wheelie practice saw some forget where their back brake lever was, with theatrical results.

Others got a grip on it without doing ‘the thing with the flip’.

Others were challenged initially and performed the age old favourite ‘The Octopus’.

The front brake slide challenged nearly everyone as always.

Once sufficiently skilled up (actually, nowhere bloody near it!), we ran the ‘Groggin 500 Grasstrack’. Not racing proper, but there were certainly winners and losers.

In the last event, Danny took on Clunt to see who’d get the bragging rights. Clunt was clearly faster than ‘wide - line - Miles’ and after a few laps was ready to pounce for the win.

When Clunt was closing, Danny did what most blokes do and panicked, opting to forget everything I told him about wide, smooth lines being fastest and going for the blast up the quick inside route.

Instead of biding his time though, he decided to Red - Mist - Up and try to use Danny for traction. The result was inevitable.

Here’s some action shots taken by Rob:

In the wash up, it was hard to pick a winner. Clunt was faster, no doubt, but Danny had rolled the furthest after the crash. In the end, it was decided that Danny had sooked the most upon crashing and therefore lost.

Sunday arvo saw most of us take a quick blast up Pinnibar. Much of the track had been tooled up by Trevor in his dozer and consisted of moist red mega - loam. I went up at full speed grinning like an idiot.

Sunday evening was a corker. First up, a Huntsman spider that the girls asked me to remove from the cabin provided hours of entertainment. I let it crawl all over me, which was fun.

Until it decided to perch on my face and refuse to budge.

At this stage, Don was having fits. He hates spideys and continually tried to brush it off my face with a thong. That just made me paranoid that it would rag up and fang into may face. Luckily, I convinced Don to stop trying to swat the spider on my face and I managed to escape death by huntsman.

Later, courageously, Don let the spider crawl on his arm.

It crawled up onto his shirt and he spun out when he lost sight of it, so he ripped his t shirt off and flicked it repeatedly, trying to get rid of Brown Fang, but the spider just vanished.

Amazingly, it appeared to have been flicked straight onto Mong’s head!

I laughed when I heard a story about a dog apparently sleeping in someone’s gear bag overnight. This photo proves it’s truth, however I found one real problem:

The next day we all geared up to head home.

We stopped on Mt Pinnibar to take in the sights.

Danny scored a rock that gave him a fat wip.

Too close to the blackberries perhaps?

Jock had a good (??) crash on the way home.

All in all, it was an unusual but very successful adventure. It was physically challenging yet rewarding. Despite tours to Groggin being logistically difficult for us with our move to the coast, everyone loves them, including us and we will continue them next year.

Normally March is hot and dusty. If we go on tour, we can often be found swimming during the day to cool off, sometimes wearing full riding gear. Not this week, this year.

Don and I needed to scope some tracks between Mitta Mitta and Omeo for the Blast to the Beach, so I drove to Omeo (1.5 hrs in the car), unloaded and rode another 70 k’s or so on the bike to meet him at Lightning Creek.

The route followed the GAR (Great Alpine Road), but to avoid some twisty bitumen around the Blue Duck I went via the Knocker. It’s above the snow line and remember how you can’t trust the weather in the high country?

Sunny in the valleys, raining in the mountains. As I had a long day ahead, I stopped early to fit the raincoat to prevent a wet uncomfortable day. Being a half - sucked - twistie, I had to be cautious.

The first 70 k’s was transport so if I got wet I would get cold. Once wet and cold it’s not much fun.

Along the way though, there were things to keep me warm. I must have just missed this tree falling as I’d seen a vehicle towing a horse trailer coming the other way not far back.

I had to fashion a little ramp from logs and branches to make it over this one. If I’d been riding the lithe 250 I might have had a go at jumping it and actually took a run up at it with the intention of doing that on the 450, but thoughts of stuffing it up and crashing, getting stuck under the enormous and heavy fuel tank caused a bout of pea - heart - syndrome. So at the last minute I gutted out and only rode onto the log, where I dismounted half way and rolled it over.

The dose of pea - heart was not unwarranted. Despite my usual state of preparedness, I was riding alone, which is in breach of my usual rule number one.

Sure, I had my mobile phone, but it was tuned to ‘won’t work here ‘cause no - one lives here so Telstra don’t care’.

My UHF in helmet comms set up was tuned to ‘big hills in the way in all directions and nobody can hear me’.

My GME Personal Locating Beacon was in my Camelbak, ready to spring into action in case of emergency - just needing someone conscious to set it off …………..

So I took it easy.

I caught up with Don at Lightning Creek and we set off on some cool tracks that don’t see much vehicular traffic. So much so that there was a giant toad stool farm in the middle of the track.

The normally very placid Lightning Creek was up due to the recent rain, but despite it’s 12 crossings it wasn’t too bad and we hardly got wet.

The tracks were in ace condition and some had seen a bulldozer recently. The Four Mile - Eight Mile tracks were just grouse, turned to Mega Loam.

Don turned up with a sad looking rear tyre and when he got stuck on a particularly steep and slippery hill we contemplated going the other way.

After hearing him bitch and moan repeatedly over the UHF, I went back to check out the commmotion. We swapped bikes, to give him a go on mine with a newish back tyre.

I rode his to the top and waited.

Not long after I heard more bitching and moaning, so back down I went to see if my bike was still in one piece. After being told to harden the f&%k up, he pulled it together and rode his bike up easily.

Despite the impasse, he later declared that track to be possibly the best track he had ever ridden. Big call, but it was way cool.

Later on we checked out the Mitta river near Omeo, which was in flood and a dirty brown colour.

We rode on to Omeo and met up with a young bloke called Arty, who had offered to show us some cool tracks around Omeo. He was a great guide and was fast, despite starting and finishing with a fully flat rear tyre.

Some of Arty’s tracks were a little overgrown and rutted from the rain.

We cruised over to the Blue Duck via some back tracks and checked out our lodgings for night one of the Blast to the Beach. The place is being remodelled by new owners Mike and Lana and is looking way better than before.

250 odd K’s and the day was done, with Don having to cruise back via the Omeo Highway and me to Omeo. It was time well spent though and both the Yack to Omeo and Blast to the Beach tours are shaping up to be Epics.

If you’re coming on one of these, don’t be fooled, they are both long and arduous rides. Longer than any of our previous adventures with plenty of challenging terrain. Start training and include some 200 km plus rides into your regime.

I accept that many of you blokes are expert tool users and don’t need advice on their use. I mean, Wayno is known as the Toolenator and Don is tool of the week, so they’ve got a fair grip on their tools, however the following succinct description of some of our favoured tools has just come in from Baynesy and I thought it may have some relevance. Especially if you are anything like Don.

DRILL PRESS:
A tall upright machine useful forsuddenly snatching flat metal bar stock out of your hands so that it smacks you in the chest and flings your beer across the room, denting the freshly-painted project which you had carefully set in the corner where nothing could get to it.

WIRE WHEEL:
Cleans paint off bolts and then throws them somewhere under the workbench at the speed of light. Also removes fingerprints and hard-earned calluses from fingers in about the time it takes you to say, “Oh, shit!”

SKILL SAW:
A portable cutting tool used to make studs too short.

PLIERS:
Used to round off bolt heads. Sometimes used in the creation of blood-blisters.

BELT SANDER:
An electric sanding tool commonly used to convert minor touch-up jobs into major refinishing jobs.

HACKSAW:
One of a family of cutting tools built on the Ouija board principle… It transforms human energy into a crooked, unpredictable motion, and the more you attempt to influence its course, the more dismal your future becomes.

VISE-GRIPS:
Generally used after pliers to completely round off bolt heads. If nothing else is available, they can also be used to transfer intense welding heat to the palm of your hand.

OXYACETYLENE TORCH:
Used almost entirely for setting on fire, various flammable objects in your shop. Also handy for igniting the grease inside the wheel hub out of which you want to remove a bearing race..

TABLE SAW:
A large stationary power tool commonly used to launch wood projectiles for testing wall integrity.

HYDRAULIC FLOOR JACK:
Used for lowering an automobile to the ground after you have installed your new brake shoes, trapping the jack handle firmly under the bumper.

BAND SAW:
A large stationary power saw primarily used by most shops to cut good aluminum sheet into smaller pieces that more easily fit into the trash can after you cut on the inside of the line instead of the outside edge.

TWO-TON ENGINE HOIST:
A tool for testing the maximum tensile strength of everything you forgot to disconnect.

PHILLIPS SCREWDRIVER:
Normally used to stab the vacuum seals under lids or for opening old-style paper-and-tin oil cans and splashing oil on your shirt; but can also be used, as the name implies, to strip out Phillips screw heads.

FLAT BLADED SCREWDRIVER:
A tool for opening paint cans. Sometimes used to convert common slotted screws into non-removable screws and butchering your palms.

PRY BAR:
A tool used to crumple the metal surrounding that clip or bracket you needed to remove in order to replace a 50 cent part.

HOSE CUTTER:
A tool used to make hoses too short.

HAMMER:
Originally employed as a weapon of war, the hammer nowadays is used as a kind of divining rod to locate the most expensive parts adjacent the object we are trying to hit.

STANLEY KNIFE:
Used to open and slice through the contents of cardboard cartons delivered to your front door; works particularly well on contents such as seats, vinyl records, liquids in plastic bottles, collector magazines, refund checks, and rubber or plastic parts. Especially useful for slicing work clothes, but only while in use. Great at removing stubborn ends of fingers.

‘FUCKING THING’ TOOL:
Any handy tool that you grab and throw across the garage while yelling “Fucking thing” at the top of your lungs. It is also, most often, the next tool that you will need.

‘U - B’ TOOL:
You’d be fucked if I hit you with it.

All right, the title is clearly from my perspective! In truth, international drag racers had little to fear from our exploits, but shit, there were some cool customers driving some trick machines at Bairnsdale recently.

I had the CRF450R tricked up as described in the last post. No, not the bugle tune, you idiot, but my most recent ranting.

Here’s how it went.

The meeting started around 4 p.m. I had no idea whatsoever what went on or how to wear it. So I unloaded the bike in the pits and went down to suss a few things out.

As it happened, I watched a few starts from both in front of and behind the christmas trees, asked a couple of questions and it was all very simple.

It was an 1/8th mile strip, or about 200 metres.

There was no stuffing about. If you wanted to race, you simply lined up. First in best dressed. Line up at the white line and follow the directions of the marshalls. They point at you and direct you to move into the area behind the start whilst those on the grid already do their thing. Then they point at the line and you’re up. Do a burnout if you want and let’s see what you’ve got.

Compared to the cars, all I seemed to have was a fairly pissy burnout. I was nervous as anything, but luckily I was early and got half a dozen runs by myself to work out the quirks and stomp on the bugs.

A clear light came on at the top of the tree when you were close to the line, then as you inched further forwards, a blue light below it came on to let you know you were in the zone. Now you just wait for a half dozen or so yellow lights to flash through to green and off you go.

I ran a bit of front brake and loaded the clutch, then when the last yellow light was on, I let both levers go, just cntinuing to slip the clutch a little.

It was very different. Traction was not an issue, but keeping the front end down was. Second gear, 1/4 throttle, nuts on the fuel cap and slipping the clutch saw the front end want to lift every time.

On the dirt, there’s a bit of slip at the back wheel which allows you to bury the throttle a bit more, but here, it all about ‘control control’. In practice, when I tried more, I got less. Speed that is.

Once the front end was down though, it was full noise.

A bit further down the track though and you can have some fun.

Mostly this was just showing off, giving a tug on the bars as I bashed from 4th to 5th. I was telling myself it was all in the name of traction control, but the chance of her breaking loose on the bitumen at around 120 was zilch.

The new ignition and jetting curve that Pip programmed into the bike was awesome. It went better everywhere, but particularly in the top end, where it had bulk more over rev, allowing me to hold gears longer. It’s the same curve that AJ Roberts uses. Wasted on me normally, but not at the drags.

Have you noticed the complete lack of Suzuki drag bike in the last sequence of photos? Simple answer really, I was smokin’ his butt!

That is, until near the finish line when he came up on me at conservatively 800 Kph, resulting in a dead heat. He reckons he pipped me, but I know I won.

Then I raced a Harley softail. I think he’s still out there somewhere, I beat him by that much. Relegated to air compressor duties well before the lights even came on.

Later, a Buell. Fool. Halfway down the strip I was about 3.6 kilometers ahead so pulled a rudely big wheelie just for fun. Yeah, he might have pipped me on the line, but everyone knew he was a tool, riding a Buell.

The organisers lined up local gun Matt on an RMZ250 to take me on, since we were both motocrossers. Matt is a national level gun rider, but turned up about 20 hp down on my beast, so got smoked.

When it came Christmas tree time though, ‘Pistolis at dawn’, the bullshit went out the window. I went forwards fast and he was forced to contemplate his absurd lack of horsepowers. Notice no Suzuki in this shot?

Could ride but. (New Bairnsdale speak) At the end of our race, I did an impromptu wheelie then burnout for the crowd. He countered with the old ‘go away you silly old bugger, move over for the one handed burnout in circles thingy’. Crowd pleaser that one.

We lined up a special ‘drag’ where we both just did strip long wheelies. Crowd loved that.

Then it got more fun. Drags under lights is way more romantic. Burnouts adopt a whole new persona.

Fifth gear, pinned.

Didn’t help much and in fact I got slower as the night went on. I had worked 17 or 18 hours straight at this stage with hard days before hand and was fair buggered.

The GSXR 750 smashed me in our last duel. I tried too hard, used too much mumbo and not enough clutch, got wheelspin and floundered off the line. We were neck and neck at the 50 metre mark then all I could do was wave goodbye as he buggered off into the distance.

All in all though, it was a hoot. Low cost, lots of fun. I’d recommend a run at your local strip between your mates just for fun and bragging rights.

Don’t bother with road tyres. Just drop the forks, raise the gearing, chuck on some leather and go have some fun. Note to self: get a launch control fork compressor device next time to allow more mumbo off the line.

I started with 30 psi in the back tyre, dropping it to 10 psi on advice. With the hard walled Metzeler street tyres I was running I could hardly tell the difference truthfully. I ran 30 psi in the front for less resistance.

I could have done with a little more spring pre load on the rear to counter squat, but at the time it was way hot in the full Teknic leather suit (I use it to ride the Blackbird to work) and I couldn’t be bothered. I was flying anyway.

However if it was coming down to something serious like ‘Rod versus Wayno’ then perhaps the special adjusting tool (hammer and drift) would have come out.

Near the end of the night, my mate Dwayne, who works with me, had his name drawn from the hat to win a ride in this freakish blown FJ Holden that could pull better wheelies than my CRF.

Dwayne is a rev head from way back. He didn’t let on, but I’ve got a sneaking suspicion that he manned up and hid the latent fear that most blokes would have had. The thing rocked and in a pre run, it launched off the track on two wheels near the end of the strip at about 756 Km/h!

The driver took it easy on Dwayne and backed off halfway down the strip. It was a six second run.