Ah!!!, Back in the day.......
Coming into Cooma on the Snowy Highway after the '70 Alpine Rally. Getting along smartly on my YDS5 at about 140kph, suddenly there's this dreadful noise, rnnnnnnnnnnnn, and pass me goes an Impala (rare as even in those days) at about 160kph. The rider is 'tucked in' and doing a fair impression of a dog humping a golf ball
. Well I'm a little distracted by this apparition, slack jawed and eyes as big as golf balls, but no sooner does he get pass me and the noise changes to, blllllllllllllllllllllll, and he's slowing suddenly and I'm taken by surprise and doing braking dramatics to stop myself from inserting my bike and body up his elementary orifice.
He dives to the side of the road and, now that my braking and heart rate are under control, I pull over with him to see what's wrong and can I help. Almost before the his wheels stop turning the rider has the plug out, cleaned and off again. Looking over his shoulder I could clearly see the whiskered electrode. Something had been sucked in and bridged the gap - no air filter
.
We kept company into Cooma, refueled, shared the hand dryer in the rest room to get warm and then set off up the Monaro Hwy for Canberra for what became one of my more memorable rides.
This was when the Monaro was a winding, narrow, bumpy, B grade country road. It became our private race track. 'Tucked in' we were 'up it for the rent' chasing each other at 140 -160 all the way to Canberra. He was probably a more experienced rider than me and I could see the Impala was a good handling bike. The rider seemed to be able to put the bike anywhere and make any correction mid corner effortlessly. It would hold a tight line through sweeping bends, straight as an arrow like, 'it was on rails'. The YDS was wobbling, weaving and wallowing like a beached whale. But I could clearly make it up with acceleration off the corners. We really didn't get maxed out but clearly there wasn't much in it for top speed.
We went are separate ways parting in the Canberra traffic. I had to stop and refuel
.