Woke up this morning to a gorgeous day here in Florida. Figured it was the perfect day to take my friend’s daughter on the bike ride I had promessed her. Since the busa has a GSXR tail conversion and the passenger seat is not ideal for 200+ mile ride, I took the mighty DR650. I picked my friend’s daughter up at around 11:20AM and we hit the road. One hour later we make it to the riding area I wanted to take her to and I pick up the pace a little and hit the first curve, but as soon as I exit and get the bike straight, the front end starts feeling weird and gets worse quickly. I pull over and look at my front tire and is completely flat. Boomer!!! This has always been my fear on this bike and I hate tubes with a passion. To make matters worse, I had left my tools and mini compressor in the busa’s tank Bag and my spare tube was sitting on my bench in the garage. I decide to limp the bike another mile to a gas station and call a friend to come help. 30 minutes later (he lives out in the area we were riding) he shows up and I tell him I have inspected the tire and there is no nails in it or anything that could have caused a flat. He pulls his compressor and we air it up to see what happens and air is leaking out of the bead area. He grew up on dirt bikes and is very familiar with tube tires and the first thing that came out of his mouth was: “ man you ran this tire low on air and the rim pinched the tube”. Then I remembered that last time I had this bike out I noticed the front a little low on air and said I was stopping at the nearest wawa to air up, but never did. My heart really started pumping when all the possible escenarios started running through my head. Can you imagine if that tire would have lost all the air as I was leaned way over with a passenger on the back? I can’t even explain how I feel thinking about how I put this girl’s live in danger by not following the basic rules and checking air pressure before leaving the house. I guess the TPMS system I installed on the busa has me spoiled. Long story short, I had to leave my bike at my friend’s house and he was kind enough to let me drive one of his vehicles back home. Tomorrow I’ll have to grab my tools and a new tube and drive an hour to fix the bike and ride back home. I’m definitely researching options to convert these wheels to tubless, so I can eliminate tubes be able to just plug it on the side of the road like I’ve done to the busa before.
Moral of the story: ALWAYS check your tires before you go on that nice ride you have planned as it can be the difference between you getting back home safely or being transported to the hospital injured.
Moral of the story: ALWAYS check your tires before you go on that nice ride you have planned as it can be the difference between you getting back home safely or being transported to the hospital injured.
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