Ridin' For Harambe, Part 27
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Today's rider is forum favorite and long-time commenter Nate, showing off his new (to him) Beemer.
"Here are two pix of my new 1975 BMW R60/6, a true barn find from Ventura, Ca. it has 8,000 original miles and I rode it home, it's all turned up now, I still have some little things to address but it's safely rideable and fun." However, this ain't Nate's first aircooled-twin rodeo... and the crash pictures after the jump are not for the faint of heart.
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For a few years, Nate was riding the relatively rare Ural Solo. Most of us have seen the sidecar-equipped, Urals, and you may have read the amazing nonstop adventure that Sam Smith and Zach Bowman endured a few years ago in a brand-new Ural. (Is it really an "adventure" if another man is watching your dick on the freeway? It's a question without a ready answer.) The prevalence of Ural sidehack bikes has convinced many casual motorcyclists that the company doesn't make "singles" --- but they do, and Nate was the owner of one. Note the custom cane holder; Nate was badly injured in a previous crash (a gypsy cab ran him down at a stoplight) and he continues to need some assistance in that regard.
Unfortunately, he was badly injured again. "I'm sitting in my wheelchair because I also broke both knees... Notice the left fork is _BROKEN_ ~ I've been riding for decades and have never seen an impact so hard it broke a fork . the frame occasionally but never a broken fork and these are Ceriani forks."
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They sewed him up...
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![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff86b0d7e-a94b-4ace-94ac-84c6194dce9d_450x600.jpeg)
...and sent him home. So what is it about motorcycling that causes men (and yeah, it's almost always men) to keep riding after multiple injuries and terrifying near-misses? Why can't all of us, including Nate and your humble author, just give up and buy an SUV or a Tesla or something decent like a Nissan Note? Why would two young fathers like Sam and Zach risk leaving a pair of widows and a trio of fatherless children, just to ride some yester-tech sidehack along the California coastline?
I know the answer to that question, but I can't tell you. It's something you will have to learn for yourself, somewhere out there between the rush-hour traffic and the open roads of Montana. Here's the tough part: once you learn it, you'll never forget. Even if you'd like to.