PJPR01

We don't have to ride together, just arrive at the same place. Much easier to do! You already know where Blacks is anyway! Open invitation...I'll head there after the race, if you want to join, send me a text, otherwise, no worries! We did have a nice Italian meal in Poteau, just didn't ride back together, so I'm proposing a meal, not a ride! Lesson learned! Ha ha!

I'll throw in a free meal at Black's on Sunday after the race for you John...come on down!

Ciao Arveno...I have one from my 2002 Scura, but it's in excellent shape. You have a $ budget in mind? PM me. Shipping may be a bit pricey given the box side, probably $50 bucks at least.

Griso is beautiful...Have that exact color combo and year. It's overpriced by about $4K, but I'm sure the dealer knows that and will haggle. Nice collection of other cars there to look at for sure!

A good quality Radar detector (Beltronics, Escort, Valentine) highly recommended and allows more driving enjoyment. Why drive in a school of fish, and gamble on getting a ticket, much better to be in control of one's own destiny and the radar detector allows that. So many spots in Texas with wide open places, no traffic, plenty of room to let the horses run free! Enjoy!

Big congrats to Aleix...super riding and a reasonably fun race to watch. Jorge Martin shows lots of guts in his riding style. Aside from Marc's medical issues, the other tragedy is that as bad a season as Marc is having, he's still doing better than his brother. I'm beginning to doubt whether they should have elevated AM from Moto 2 to GP...or he may be years away from reaching his potential, like Aleix has shown. 200 starts is a lot of races never to have won. COTA will be exciting...another new winner likely unless the KING comes back, but I doubt he'll make it unfortunately.

Always good to have a backup place just in case…I like redundancy in terms of where to go for service in case one disappears. Of course a 50 mile drive in the 911 is a pleasure in itself…I just did a 500 mile round trip to Dallas and back in my 911…good to let it breathe on the open road a bit at full speed!

Another Josey Wales fan!! I knew you had good taste! You’ll be ten bears… I’ll be the grey rider! What a great scene among many!!! One of my favorite all time movies!

I realize this is a bit of thread drift, but there are 2 Porsche garages of extremely high quality a lot closer to you, both of which have stellar reputations in the Lone Star Porsche community. I don't know if you've tried their services in the past...but for convenience, would be a lot easier! Einar's garage (10 miles) and Modern Air Cooled (5 miles)...

As long as it's a nice sunny day, the racing will be enjoyable. Like most of the races this year, I'm guessing we'll have a surprise winner if Marquez is unable to participate. Regardless, it's always a nice excuse for a ride up to Austin, a little detour to Lockhart afterwards and then home. Makes for a fun day out. Red/black Griso is likely to be the steed of choice this year, Scura is going to go thru some tank off maintenance over the next couple of weeks, 4 new rubber intake boots/throttle body boots, rubber bumpers for the tank mount on the frame, a replacement fuel downspout that I've had on the bench for a while and it's time to put on now.

I’d like to see that bike! What dark side tire are you running out of curiosity? We do usually sit in Turn 15 or 16 also…will see what’s available!

No worries, would have not been a bother to interrupt at all, would have been good to put a face to a name and enjoy a conversation. A la prochaine!

I'm puzzled how to respond to the above p6x...You were close enough to hear me talking about putting a sidecar on my Guzzi with the owner of TSC, while standing next to my Scura, the only V11 there, so you decided not to say hello or introduce yourself? I didn't see a red 911 in the whole parking lot, so I'm guessing you came in another vehicle. Several current and ex Guzzi riders and the others I rode up with all sat together for lunch at the table at the back and enjoyed a nice visit. Cheers.

Excellent! I finally have mine now...# 853, another friend who will join is #861, and likely we'll have a 3rd moto join. The 4th one is unfortunately at an event in his Boxster this weekend down in Angleton with the Lone Star PCA group, fun track to race on if you get the chance to do so.

Good to hear P6X, but I hate to disappoint you in advance, our fairer companions are not coming on this trip. I’m tempted to bring the 911 also, but several friends are riding their motos, so I’ll do the same. Still waiting on my official tour number to arrive however and I’m running out of days here!

Los Angeles back in the 70's had horrific smog levels. Look at many cities in China today...almost unbreathable for their citizens. Some level of emissions controls are needed to provide a livable locale and not have to wear a filter over one's mouth just to breathe clean air or see the skyline. However, the extreme level of monitoring and then actual intervention on driving/speed controls taking over the vehicle does invade our personal preferences much deeper than we are comfortable with... I do find it ironic that Diesel cars, which I do like, and conceptually has been pushed so hard in Europe for decades is now considered one of the largest contributors to unbreathable air in these very same European cities which touted it in the first place. Why not roll back the diesel incentives and force more hybrids or some % of electric vehicles that can help cut out the pollution, but still leave the autonomy of the driving to the driver. I'm still pissed that VW (Porsche & Audi) falsified their emissions software just to try to meet deadlines, I had a lovely 2015 Passat TDI that I sold back to VW due to this fiasco. It was a fantastic car...I could go from Houston to El Paso practically on 1 tank (almost 750 miles). Who knows where it ended up...maybe offshore somewhere.

If the 5's are anything like the 3's and 4's before, you'll really enjoy them. They do make the bike quite intuitive...and turns are effortless. Think left and you're left, think right and you're right. Bring the bike up one day to the National Forest and scrub the edges off those new tires!

Oh crap...I'm on the black list again! Well...I had stopped at a nice French bakery close to the coast, and asked for a Napoleon (mille feuille), unfortunately they had none, so I had to "settle" for a scrumptious eclair de chocolat! The suffering was unimaginable! The postcard is of the famous Sun God from a French artist Niki de Saint Phalle, and was donated to UCSD when I was a student there back in the early 80's. We had many Sun God Festivals (aka drinking and dancing and music during those days!) https://stuartcollection.ucsd.edu/artist/de-saint-phalle.html

Hey John...I remember Mike well from Cedar Vale...soft spoken and very decent chap. I was afraid his medical issue may have taken a turn for the worse, I'm sorry to hear the news he passed. Look forward to seeing you guys there if you make it down!

It was a cold Saturday in San Diego last week, but nonetheless a welcome reward after a week of work conference. Although no Guzzis were available, a nice Triumph Bonneville was at Cycle Visions, and provided a decent set of wheels on a rather cool day around the area. A few pics...sadly, had to leave for home the day after and the weather had improved dramatically. I wanted to make it all the way to Julian and Lake Henshaw, but "wintry conditions" and freezing temps prevented me from getting all the way there...still plenty of other twisties to play on around Ramona (found the old Julian Highway and Highland road and rode past several of the wineries along the way...thanks for the tips earlier!) A few stops along the way from San Diego, thru Poway, Ramona, Solana Beach (always have to go by the Belly Up), Del Mar, La Jolla and a favorite stop at my old alma mater UCSD where I spent countless hours studying many years ago. Hopefully posting Triumph pics on a Guzzi forum will not be considered terribly against the rules!

Will be attending Sunday at Moto GP in Austin this year, possibly Saturday depending on other obligations. Easy 150 mile ride up from Houston. Most likely on the Scura. Who else is going? Hoping the King of COTA can get some challenge this year from the other riders and we'll see lots of great passing instead of a typical 3-6 second massive lead, and of course, hoping for good weather!

The Griso is a beast...and a lovely one at that. I think of it as a modern day Centauro. I'd concur on getting one of the newer ones just to enjoy a bit of the newer tech...but honestly both versions (4V and 8V) are enjoyable. There have been a few of them up for sale recently on the Ghetto as well, but you have to jump and be ready to commit, as they definitely don't come up that often. I certainly hope they become a collector's item (even if not financially). It does feel good to have a 2002 V11, a 2008 Norge and a 2015 Griso, now if I could get my hands on a Green 2023 V100...that would complete the fleet and would last me forever!

Most excellent!! Thanks for the additional suggestions, very Nice Video…lots of decent twisties there! Are any of those wineries along the road worth stopping at?

Thanks BB for the recommendation, I have secured a 2019 Triumph T-100 Bonneville for Saturday March 6th from Cycle Visions. I've never ridden one before, so it should be interesting to try out for a nice all day loop around the area. Scud...will shoot you a text the day before to check if you are still free to join depending on plans, I've sketched out a route from the shop up thru UCSD, up to Rancho Bernardo, Rincon, Julian and back wandering around, down to La Jolla or Solana Beach for a late afternoon lunch before returning the moto back. But I'm open to any other fun routes you could recommend! I have no idea how the Bonneville rides in the twisties, so will need to get used to it a bit before leaning it over 60 degrees (Just kidding!). Cheers and thanks to all.

Nice burgundy tank color too...not that common I should imagine.