Bunburner Gold-ND/SD/WY/MT

[xr400guy]

I just completed my first(and maybe only) Bunburner Gold yesterday. 1500 miles in 24 hours didn't seem like such a bad idea when I left my driveway Wednesday morning about 9 a.m. I’ve read about other ADVer’s trips and thought it would be “fun” to try. The Saddle Sore 1000 was a tough trip for me, but I didn’t realize how much that extra 500 miles plays into it.

Starting in West Fargo, ND I rode west on I-94 to Belfield, ND, (about 320 miles of vast openness that always feels like forever). With my extra gallon and a half of gas on the back as insurance, I found I only needed 2 stops to make the 320 miles. Much better than my SS1000 trip through Canada where I was stopping every 75- 100 miles not knowing when the next gas stop was going to be, or how far I could actually make it on one tank.

From Belfield south on #85 to Spearfish, SD. Pretty uneventful. Lots of antelope as usual and not many cars. Once in Spearfish it was west on I-90 to Sundance to hit #14 which looked good on the map. Much better than I-90 it turned out. The ride up to Devils Tower was cool, so was the stop at the park itself. Trying to keep up the necessary pace, I didn’t stay long. Had a lady sitting on a park bench snap a couple of pictures(the only ones from the whole trip) and I was off again. Next was Moorcroft, over to Gillette on 90 again to catch up with 14 all the way to Sheridan. From Sheridan it was north to Ranchester and Alt. #14. Somewhere in this chunk was about 20 miles of “dual sport” highway. Gravel for a mile or so, then back to pavement, then back to fresh gravel and dirt, back and forth. I was to the point that dual sporting a CBR600RR at 70 mph was just something you do in WY. At least it was still light out.

From there things got interesting. Not only because of the much curvier roads, but because of the approaching darkness. I had ridden all this way to catch these great roads, now it was pitch black, I was getting cold, and my nerves were shot from the 968^th roadside mule deer of the day, (more on these critters later) and I wasn’t even half way done yet. I remember looking at my GPS and it told me Billings was about 100 miles away. (via I-90). Looking at the next road sign it showed about 115 miles, so that made sense. When I cross referenced my paper maps from Streets/Trips though, it showed me going over 200 miles to get to Billings. (via Alt. #14). Well as it turned out Alt. #14 (my chosen route) was the twistiest, blackest road I’ve seen in a long time. Up/down/left/right/10% grades for next 10 miles/use lower gear/truck runout area ahead/, etc, etc, etc. In the daytime this would have been Heaven for sure. At night, and at this stage of the game, it was pure Hell.

One thing I learned firsthand is what exactly WY road construction crews determine to warrant "ROAD DAMAGE-20 mph" on nice little yellow advisory speed limit signs. Hmmmm, wonder what this means, better slow down a little. At first glance it appeared to be some sort of freshly scraped blacktop???? (complete with freshly painted yellow center lines). It turned out to be God knows what, but it felt just like 4" of fresh mud under my tires. Made the same sounds of rocks and gunk being sprayed out in front of me. Sliding left and right like a dirt tracker. My headlights picked up little flashes of light from whatever material this was being spewn forth. Had a car come from the other direction at this point, I would have either been squashed like the bugs on my newly multi-colored gooey Arai face shield, or I would have barreled right over the armco out into hyperspace. Luckily I chose the right decision to just straighten out and come to a stop without doing anything too radical. And thank God it was pitch black so I couldn’t see the so called “ditch” or I would have really made a mess in my suit with how far down it was to ground zero. Talking with a guy at the gas station in Lovell, WY shortly after, I learned that this road was apparently a sore subject because they built it on top of some really rotten soil with an underground river or aquifer or something that never dries out. Go figure.

So this was my first death grip of the evening. Still about 12 hours to go. And did I mention the nice WY patrol officer earlier in the evening that was somehow teleported to the space directly beside me, traveling at a rate considerably above the posted speed limit? As I’m tooling along just minding my own business, Ipod going, I’m feeling pretty good for 700 or so miles into this thing. All of a sudden there is this guy with a big hat in a maroon Dodge Charger with flashing bright lights pointing at me to pull over. I didn’t see him AT ALL. Not much you can say at this point other than “Hello officer, what brings you out on such a nice evening? Oh, I was speeding? Cheez, I just wasn’t paying attention to the speedo. The sun going down was kind of blinding me. Better to watch ahead of me rather than to just focus on that ole speedometer you know?” License and registration? Yep, right here. Where am I going? Well I left Fargo this morning about 9:00, and I plan to be back there again by tomorrow morning about 9:00. Why? Well, because if I make it, I get this nice little certificate and a patch that says I did it.” Well no, I don’t smoke crack, but thanks for asking”. OK, that last part was embellished, but he had that look in his eyes like most people when you tell them you’re riding 1500 miles in 24 hours just for the Hell of it.

For the record, probably not the best thing to say to a patrol officer about to write you a ticket, but knowing there was no possible way out of this one, I thought he might appreciate my condition and feel sorry for me and my poor judgment to even undertake such an adventure. Though he did feel my pain and wrote the ticket for a lesser speed, it was not the most expensive part of my trip. That was yet to come later in the night.

So once I made it through the dark twisty night and got into Billings for another of many quick gas stops, I grabbed another partial Mt Dew (no time to drink the whole thing you know) and headed for the I-90/94 super slab and 625 more miles home. All was going well this trip with hundreds of deer (literally) in all 4 states. They were scattered in the ditches, in fields that my lights would catch, on the shoulder, in the passing lane, wait, IN the passing lane? I observed one little trend through my own unscientific experiment on this trip. If I honked my horn when I saw deer close to the road, 99% of the time they would turn around and go back the way they came from. This worked the first time, the 20^th time, the 75^th time and then I lost count. Granted, the first deer I saw early in the evening gave me that same “Oh Shit” feeling they always do. Where’s he going to go? Which way is he moving, is he just standing there or going left, or right? Is he hauling ass or standing with a mouth full of grass? After seeing this many deer just standing still, I began to think they were all going to keep doing this and make my trip a piece of cake.

What I didn’t put together until later in the night was that these were all Mule deer that I was experimenting with in WY and MT. Once I got back to my “normal” deer in ND (whitetails, the ones that I have always known to be very afraid of when they are next to the road) it became obvious that I had lulled myself into thinking I knew what a deer was going to do.

So at about mile marker 25 on I-94, near Medora, there stands Bambi’s mother in the passing lane, facing me. What happens next probably took about 0.5 seconds to actually happen, but it felt like it took 2 days to unfold looking back. I remember canning the brakes pretty hard to slow up. Then, quickly thinking “is she going left, or right”, I hit the horn to send her back from where she came (like the countless previous Mule deer did). I favored the right side of the road because she was supposed to go left. Well she didn’t go left, she went right just like I did and where did we end up? In an ugly Venison/plastic sandwich. I was probably down to 30 mph or so when we hit so it could have been 10 times worse. She went flying into the ditch and I came to a stop in the middle of the road, on the bike, and still upright. I was so surprised and happy that she didn’t send me to the ground that I creeped over to the shoulder to get off the road, and promptly proceeded to stick the front tire into some soft gravel I wasn’t expecting. Over I went, standing still no less, with the bike laying on its side, headlights still on. Yes, I felt stupid about that last part, but it really didn’t bother me at this point.

So as I’m shaking with full-on Adreneline rush, I pull off my tank bag with all of it’s various cords and straps, and get the bike upright again, trying not to further damage anything that wasn’t scuffed, scraped, or broken. Not an easy feat with the steep ditch I’m now standing in. Surveying the damage it could have been a whole lot worse. My headlights (but not the bulbs though, YEAH!) were smashed, both blinkers were hanging, and the subsequent left and right front fairings broken, and the upper cowl was cracked and broken. At 4 a.m. near Medora, this is another not-good place to find yourself stranded on the side of the road in the dark.

I’m happy to stand the bike up and find that it starts again no problem and I have all the lights I need to get going again. (I still have 350 miles to go til home). I took my Petzl headlamp (Always bring one with you, just for times like this) and picked up all my scattered cords and electronics, etc from my tankbag. I never would have found my sunglasses, and wallet had I no headlamp with. I then tried to find Ms Bambi in the ditch but couldn’t find her. I’m not sure if she just bounced off and kept going, or if she ended up farther out in the field to expire. Either way it was 4 a.m and she wasn’t dead on the highway and either was I.

Just to clarify, there is no way in Hell to tell what a deer’s going to do so don’t think you have them figured out. I knew better but pushed on anyway just to try to make the 1500 miles, rather than slowing down ahead of time. My result could have been a lot worse and I know better than to push my luck again. That being said, the rest of the ride home was uneventful other than testing the range of my tank and finding out twice that I overdid it.

Seeing my Aerostich 6-bank LED light for my Escort hanging from my steering stem GPS mount, I was happy to see that it hadn’t been lost in the ditch. I reached for it, got it plugged back into the Escort, all was well. Then reaching back for the bars again, I caught the damn thing with my glove in the dark and watched it fly off onto the road. Another $50 gone.

Rolling into the convenience store in Casselton, ND at 9:07 a.m. (4 minutes before crunch time), my GPS trip showed 1502 miles, my odometer showed almost exactly the same, and the Streets/Trips paper route showed 1525. There’s not much room for error on this one so I hope it all pans out with Ironbutt. Especially given I hit a deer en route. I hear of everyone’s odometers reading so far off, but mine was exactly on with the GPS. Is this typical? Just curious. I would think GPS’s run in actual distances traveled, without the margin for error of a speedo. Double checking my route with Streets when I got home it should be over 1520 either way. Hope so because I don’t think I’ll be doing another GOLD for some time. Or at least until I get more range from my tank. Maybe a Tour Tank would help. For now I need sleep. 3 hours of sleep the night before embarking on this little feat, then riding 24 hours straight, and then come home to a worried wife and 3 kids wondering where I was. How do you swing a back to back GOLD? Ouch!

[Gadget Boy]

Fantastic! That is a bunburning ride

[ZZR_Ron]

My friend had the same deer problem this spring. He decided to do a Bunburner 1500 on the way up to visit me, and hit a deer in northern MN.
Broke his collarbone, end of ride.

At 1493 miles on his odometer no less! (shouldn't hittting a deer count for 100 miles or sumptin'? )

As far as odometers go, I find all my bikes dead accurate, but the speedometers tend to read 5 to 10% high.

[AirForce]

Riveting report!! I'm amazed you did it on a sport bike and not a luxo-cruiser. You are to be commended...or committed

[Sevoman]

Cool story. I am disappointed you didn't take pictures in the ditch ;)!!
Glad you are OK and made it home safe. Not sure if 1500 miles is going to be in my bag of tricks anytime soon. Good on you for doing it

Josh
Tampa

[BigX]

Way to go!

[xr400guy]

Originally Posted by AirForce

Riveting report!! I'm amazed you did it on a sport bike and not a luxo-cruiser. You are to be commended...or committed

Thanks. It's kind of a dualsportbikecruisertourer kind of thing. Does the trick for what I need out of one bike. In a perfect world you get 10 bikes I guess. It does need more range though for this whole Bunburner thing.

[xr400guy]

Originally Posted by joshuaw

Cool story. I am disappointed you didn't take pictures in the ditch ;)!!
Glad you are OK and made it home safe. Not sure if 1500 miles is going to be in my bag of tricks anytime soon. Good on you for doing it

Josh
Tampa

I thought about taking pictures, but the semi's weren't slowing down for me with it laying there, and I knew my time was too tight. My adrenaline was keeping me from thinking too clearly. I was pushing it way too far as it was. Hopefully next time out I can stop and smell the cow patties. 1500 would really make a nice 3 day ride in that same perfect world I don't live in. My schedule makes that about as realistic as my wife saying "Honey, why don't you buy a new 1200 Adventure? And take a month off to enjoy it." Yep, you bet.

[xr400guy]

Originally Posted by ZZR_Ron

My friend had the same deer problem this spring. He decided to do a Bunburner 1500 on the way up to visit me, and hit a deer in northern MN.
Broke his collarbone, end of ride.

At 1493 miles on his odometer no less! (shouldn't hittting a deer count for 100 miles or sumptin'? )

As far as odometers go, I find all my bikes dead accurate, but the speedometers tend to read 5 to 10% high.

Hey Ron,
Nice to hear from you. Next trip is back up your way again. This one was fun, but that God awful flatland ride to get to the good stuff is miserable. I have to do it in a car enough to see the in-laws in Williston, ND. Coming up your way my scenery improves about an hour out my door and stays good the whole trip. I'll try to take in the roads you mentioned in one of your replies to my SS1000 report back in July. I have the whole gravel road at speed thing dialed in now for sure.

The deer hit should almost be a get out of jail free card for your friend for those last 7 miles.

Not sure if I'll make it up to ON this year again. Once I tell my wife I actually hit the deer, (she doesn't know yet, too much worry ) she'll think 2 trips was plenty. Take Care.

[xr400guy]

Originally Posted by ZZR_Ron

My friend had the same deer problem this spring. He decided to do a Bunburner 1500 on the way up to visit me, and hit a deer in northern MN.
Broke his collarbone, end of ride.

At 1493 miles on his odometer no less! (shouldn't hittting a deer count for 100 miles or sumptin'? )

As far as odometers go, I find all my bikes dead accurate, but the speedometers tend to read 5 to 10% high.

Hypothetically my speedo reads 100 mph while Mr GPS reads only 92-93.........

[xr400guy]

Originally Posted by joshuaw

Cool story. I am disappointed you didn't take pictures in the ditch ;)!!
Glad you are OK and made it home safe. Not sure if 1500 miles is going to be in my bag of tricks anytime soon. Good on you for doing it

Josh
Tampa

About the only other pic of the trip. The only other one the lady took just shows my ugly mug (with no middle finger proudly displayed) so it didn't warrant an upload :)

[apeirce]

Good job.

That is sort of over and above the usual.

It should be a bunburner gold medal.

[ZZR_Ron]

Originally Posted by xr400guy

Hey Ron,
Nice to hear from you. Next trip is back up your way again. This one was fun, but that God awful flatland ride to get to the good stuff is miserable. I have to do it in a car enough to see the in-laws in Williston, ND. Coming up your way my scenery improves about an hour out my door and stays good the whole trip. I'll try to take in the roads you mentioned in one of your replies to my SS1000 report back in July. I have the whole gravel road at speed thing dialed in now for sure.

The deer hit should almost be a get out of jail free card for your friend for those last 7 miles.

Not sure if I'll make it up to ON this year again. Once I tell my wife I actually hit the deer, (she doesn't know yet, too much worry ) she'll think 2 trips was plenty. Take Care.

Pm me if you're coming through this way, and I'll have a beer and steak for ya...

[xr400guy]

Originally Posted by ZZR_Ron

Pm me if you're coming through this way, and I'll have a beer and steak for ya...

Well, maybe 3'll be ok....... I'll need to think about an electric vest one of these days. I got chilled pretty good on this one and it wasn't even cold. 50's at the worst. Poly pro, fleece vest, and Denali fleece jacket finally did the trick but by then I was cold. Putting it on earlier probably would've done just fine for the whole trip. Spolied with the warm summer we had. Though I like the cold better than sweating my ass off at every stop light.

PS. Ms Smith was pissed that I didn't being a case of Keiths back with me last time. "You rode all that way through Canada and couldn't stop at a liquor store for 2 minutes???" Sure would taste good right about now. Have one for me if you get the chance.

I'll keep that beer and steak idea fresh in my head should the opportunity arise for an up north adventure. Thanks again.

[xr400guy]

Originally Posted by apeirce

Good job.

That is sort of over and above the usual.

It should be a bunburner gold medal.

Thanks. This whole long distance thing is really starting to grow on me. Watching these guys on sport bikes do nothing but ride up and down the same street over and over again and sit at a gas station and BS really made me think there was a better use for one. Since most of my riding is done solo anyway, it seemed like a perfect fit. With my screwy schedule I could never plan a good trip with anyone else anyway. This trip came up in about 8 hours. I was supposed to be planning a 3000 mile round trip to Portland,OR and back at the end of the month for a family get together. Mrs Smith just backed off on the offer to fly solo with 3 kids under the age of 8, so I'm back on a plane now. This BB Gold was my consolation prize so to speak. I think your ass will get sore after so many miles no matter what bike you're riding so just sit back, stand up, shift your cheeks, until the gas gauge says stop and it all works out in the end. Either way I wasn't in a car or at a desk. My ass hurts sitting here typing more than it does on my bike. Thanks for the good words. Ride safe.