Shadowfax-ST Blog

Adventurer A long anticipated ride out. The weather is not as forgiving as I had hoped but easily ridable - with caution in the shadows. We rode to Cornwall, stopped over the night a rode back via an ST owners West Bay meet. That was the plan as although cold it looked sunny and dry - mostly. The journey was made difficult by racing the Sun while suffering sub-zero temperatures, a dodgy route plan that took me over the frozen wastelands north of Honnington over snow-iced country roads most quads might fear to ride, and a Police-inspired diversion that put 10,000 motorists into conflict on un-gritted roads and nearly dismounted me on a frozen bridge where 5mph was just not slow enough. I was elated to make Cornwall, and although not travelling too deeply into it it made a personal milestone for me as so much of it remains unexplored by me. I stopped to take a photo - despite resisting earlier due to the temperatures - and felt a tremendous sense of adventure and achievement given the we

STOC Stats According to STOC, I achieved the 54th highest mileage of its World members over 2009 and highest mileage of UK members (12,000-odd strong). 22,385 miles (and that's with 3-months not commuting at all and a week off because of the weather). It's an odd sort of statistic - one impossible without the Online community of today; certainly a strange feeling. What of other riders not registered? How representative are these statistics? Am I REALLY so insane for commuting the miles, hours, and days that I did instead of spending the same time with my family? I don't need to answer that, do I?

2010 (already) Mechanicals It's been a busy old time so I've not been as industrious on the blogging side as I'd have liked to have been. The time I've scrounged to spend on the Web has been spent glancing through the ST-Owners.com forums, which has paid dividends in bringing along my meagre mechanical skills up to an "interested" level. I've not only become expert in removing Shadowfax's plastics but also competent (?) in exchanging his brake pads fore and aft, swapping out the engine and rear transmission oils, and nobbing about with his general well being. I've yet to master the brake bleeding and coolant swapping (needed with the addition of swapping out the thermostat, which is jamming on making fuel consumption les frugal) but there's time if not weather to do these. Rear tyres have continued not to last too long. The last one near killed me running out in the space of a run from Loomies to Portsmouth Motorcycles (about 20-30-miles) w