Talked to an old college buddy tonight. He and another college friend are Harley riders. I suggested the three of us take a ride some time if he's not too cool to ride beside the likes of a sportbike. He asked what kind of bike i had (saw pic, we were Inet chatting). I told him 2008 Kawasaki ZX-14. He said, "It's too bad a Harley MTL (or something like that, I can't remember what it was he called it) could beat you in a drag race. I gave him the stats 9 second quarter mile stock, 0-60 in 2.5 seconds, over 100mph in second gear...yadadayada. "That must be some badass Harley," I told him. "it's a twenty four year old, leaky junker," he said. "We'll run."

Sounds pretty confident. From some of the other things he told me, he would have the money to build a monster speed bike maybe even out of an old Harly . I'm showing up at a mutual friends party in a couple weeks with my 14. I have a feeling he's going to have his CTL or whatever the heck he called it. Any thoughts?

They only talk among themselves. And they have told themselves for so long that Hardley's are the fastest, best'est, loudest bikes on the road. To the point that they really start to believe it. Even if you do race him it will not convince him. In fact it will be so out of his frame of reference his mind will refuse to believe his beloved Hardley lost the race. So he will just block out the memory. Been there done that, LOL!!! Borrow somebody's 250 Ninja if you want to race him, LOL!!!

If I beat him, I don't think he will ever hire me to work at his huge ad agency in beautiful West Bend, WI.

Don't let him or anyone ride your bike at some party. Last thing you want to do is kill you future boss. Let him win is all. Then meet him at the parking lot where work; race in the parking lot for a few feet. See if you still have a job after that one.

* Last updated by: Hub on 8/15/2009 @ 12:12 AM *

LOL! Private pavement

I disagree with Hub......Kick his ass and leave him whimperin'...... after all, you were looking for a job when you found the one your in! Besides, you can always run for pink slips - then when you're waiting for him to catch up, think up a witty way to tell him you were just kidding and he can keep is Harley. You'll get bonus points, he'll still hire you and then he will challenge your co-workers to beat you!

Then again, I'm just a dip-shit on the web that has never met you and has no stake in your employment........ food for thought!

Get him to put his money where is mouth is...

Bet him that if you beat him, he has to give you a job! Easy!

Rook hey give him this stat..... 80% of all harleys ever made are still on the road today, the other 20% actually made it home!! lmfao

when i was takin my zx9 to the track i did multiple runs against on of them harley drag bikes the guy had wheelie bars and all that good shit he neve stood a chance and that was my lil 9 heck the 14 you may be at the end of track while hes still getting off the line lol ive owned harleys have a lil one now but to me its all about the ride not what your riding what makes these guy with harleys think they are so much better than everyone else. ive got friends that wont ride with me since i got rid of my harley(which by the way did nothing but give me back problems)and i dont understand it cause the 14 would make thier harleys look so much better...lol

Ha ha hhahaaa. It will be interesting to see what a modded Harley can do if he is serious about the race. I'll be impressed if it's as close as a couple bike lengths but it sounds like that's nothing to be too concerned about.

As far as the job, I was just kidding. It was just my own thought. It was never directly mentioned in the conversation we had but I always have my line out there these days. It could be a really nice opportunity. I'll probably be doing some schmoozing.

KaBoom gains points giving me a morning laugh. I was Kaboomitzzing mit inn use is. But, say you want to play? I let my clutch burn so as not to tire the fish out as if I horsed it in with closed gills, the speed would over power it's muscles you'd practically kill it in the open mouth drown it, instead of tire it out on it's own run around.

Why do you think I back off and wait. Like playing with that Mustang or the recent 'night video' I have in the can; was some wild shit on that night. Helmet cam rolling in the dark trying to time the rpm/gear/speed feed I had to match the input to the advancer/toggle throw.

Lookit, a Harley has more torque in one cylinder, it's going to give you a low end problem and that is stay up with you >> WaTCH OUT! I'd roll at 170/180 tell 'em. Hishit peters out @140MyPooseaHorse IS Year Daddy!

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Dis 2 will pass >>... STay Loose, Howl'eee

* Last updated by: Hub on 8/15/2009 @ 7:41 AM *

I work with a girl who rides a Sportster. Its a reall nice bike, but its a Sportser. Nothing more needs to be said.

Her husband rides a big HD, I'm not sure which model.

Let me premise this recant of the conversation by saying IF I hit the lottery I wouldn't spend it very fast, but the first thing I would buy would be a HD dresser, and off I'd go to see the other half of the USA I've never seen, plus Canada too. I really like Harley-Davidson motorcycles. Its just that more than 50% of the riding I like to do an HD cannot do well.

So we are taking a break on the side entrance porch to the building, and her husband walks over from where he works. They start ragging on my "crotch rocket". "You guys all get killed because you ride too fast." "When HD riders get hurt in accidents, its because cars run red lights, when crotch rocket riders get killed, its because they did something stupid." You know the prejudice as well as I.

So since I case manage 300+ veterans anyway, I respond to them with understanding and firm compassion. "What I have said about HDs is merely facts. They barely have 140 HP. They do not handle well in tight twisty curves. Buells do, but they are HDs in name only. But what you are telling me is mere baseless prejudicial bullshit". Ok, so now I'm out of the compassionate part of my nature. LOL.

This stops them dead in their tracks. So they start offering me made up accident statistics. And I just feed them back AMA and MSF study statistics, and a little State Police for good measure. Sure the guy in the paper this week was killed because he was operating his sportbike beyond his skill level in a place you shouldn't do that no matter what your skill level is anyway. But no, he wasn't "some kid" he was 47. And I can, and did, bring up to them the fact that the higher incidence of sportbike accidents is due to a) the lower average age of their operators and b) the fact they outnumber HDs by such a huge amount. In fact, the accident rate for HDs short of fatalities is higher per 1,000 licensed riders than for sportbikes.

Anyway, being chastized for mindlessly repeating age-old HD sportbike bias trashtalking, and being confronted by adequate facts to cause them to quit arguing the accident angle, the husband starts on the "I know a guy who has a HD which can smoke that crotch rocket of yours."

Ok, now its on.

So I look at him, and calmly say, "If you know a guy who has a HD which weighs less than 600 pounds and have 200+ horsepower and wears license plate and legal registration and runs on pump gas, bring him on."

And he says, "I'm not talking about roadracing...." and I cut him off and say "I know, I'm not either. You bring him here, and we'll agree to a Sunday excursion at the drag strip when they do open-to-the-public fun runs, and we'll put your wild claim to a test."

That was the end of the conversation. They never learn. "That guy" will never materialize, because he doesn't exist.

I bought a Kendon stand up trailer from someone on Craigslist- showed up
to tow it home a couple of weeks ago , money in hand and all... the guy goes
"Wanna see my V-rod?"
I'm all polite and say sure... garage door opens up- massively huge turbo on the bike,
250 mm rear tire, ridiculously good looking paint job in black and dark blue...wow...
And what really bothered me was that I actually liked it a lot..

Maybe one day when I grow old... maybe..

I doubt that V-Rod could hold a candle to Bad.... :)

BnB or 1bad...I don't think they'd waste the rubber warming up their tire. Hit the boost and goomMMbye. I think those V-rods are pretty cool, though. I'm not totally anti-Harley. I'd own one but it is so far down on the list that I don't bother thinking about it. I'd own a Japanese cruiser before a Harley any day. I would have bought my Dad's Vulcan 1500 Drifter (2001, I think) but he got $6,000 for it. That's about twice what i was going to offer to keep it in the family.

harley make a bike called the destroyer .. out of the box with wheelie bars and in the right guys hands low 10's ..

and then there NITRO HARLEYS ..THEY MAY MAKE A GOOD CLEAN RUN 1 OUT OF 20 TRYS ...

Hope it's not a Destroyer. I doubt it. He said all his bikes were "old sh!t."

On the backroads of Idaho three Hardly characters blew by my brother and I on a straight. Unfortunately for the Hardly guys the road began to descend down,twisting wildly as it did.
Dave and I pulled up on the back wheel of the last Hardly ..which immediatly brought the pack to life.They were gunna show us that Hardlys could out turn sport bikes on twisty roads!!!!!LOL..Are they completely nuts ??

Got to admit it but the lead guy ..some guy in his 60's who had obviously ridden one of those road slugs for ever ..actually knew how to ride the thing..but it was funny to watch as he tried to look fast in corners.

My brother hung back ..but I simply could not resist ..

I dropped a gear and hit the juice..passed the two last oil fume spouting lumps of iron and climbed up behind the lead Hardly just to watch the fun of this guy just cranking his useless beast around the corners....everything was dragging ..and it got increasingly ugly as the speeds climbed.
He was right at the crash and burn limiter. I waited until he exited a corner .. blipped the throttle and boom. I passed him and was .gone..gone so fast and so far ahead it was kind of a let down ..no fun ..sooooo
I slowed down ..let all three Hardlys pass me again ..at which point they seemed to think they had caught and passed me ..and they then tried even harder..LOL.
My brother got in on the act ..He worked them all over on his FJR ..and I followed him pastthem all again..
We were going to go for a third fun go around ..but we had to make a turn.

Those things are simply stupid dangerous antiquated lumps of metal IMHO. No good on the straights cuzz they are guttles and clanky and noisey- useless in turns cuzz they are heavy lumbering monsters.
My brother owns an 03 Ultra Classic with ten thousand up grades..He describes it as a ridiculous bike- useless at basically everything except making noise. He is trying to sell it ..
but guess what ..
no one wants it
..
can't blame them ..

* Last updated by: painterdude on 8/17/2009 @ 2:57 AM *

Bsdzx14r :

harley make a bike called the destroyer .. out of the box with wheelie bars and in the right guys hands low 10's

Well, in these conversations, we have to keep it real. When I had the "debate" I mentioned above, one thing I said which I forgot to write here is, "and didn't spend more than $30k on it, total".

Of course, if I said $25k that would exclude half the HD line stock from the dealership.

Because if you aren't realistic, I can outspend you in many scenarios and beat you.

If some HD type wants to mouth off to me about his bike is faster than my zx14, let him bring a HD to the race which has a total cost no more than twice the retail of mine. Otherwise, it means nothing.

Because if I spent $15-20k more on my zx14 there isn't a HD wearing license plates on the planet that could run with it.

Please, not another Harley bashing thread! Don't we have something better to talk about than antiquated junk? Just my

Kruz

OK, you suckered me into this conversation. There is not an HD on the planet at any price that can run with a stock ZX-14. If you poured $100,000 into a blown V-rod and somehow was able to run competitive quarter mile times with a 14 it would still weigh a ton and handle like a barge and the 14 would run away and hide the first time you came to a turn..... or had to use your brakes. If you lightened it and made it handle, everything would have to be changed. You might as well jack up the gas cap and back a new bike under it... what would be the point?? Everything would have to be replaced. Harleys are overpriced junk and their owners are delusional. $35,000 for a Harley, are you kidding me?? I have a whole garage full of new bikes and I didn't spend $35,000.

Kruz

* Last updated by: Kruz on 8/17/2009 @ 8:29 AM *

painter bet after that run they had to stop and bolt thier bikes back together lmfao

whats fun to do with harleys is when u blow by them on the highway do it on 1 wheel they usually dont try to mess with you then lol

* Last updated by: scottjkyl on 8/17/2009 @ 9:14 AM *

The average Hardley has 58 hp at the rear wheel and weighs almost 700 lbs, with Screaming Eagle Kit and Stage one tune maybe 62hp. Let's see, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out a Ninja 250 would give it a good run for it's money. Now you can get more hp out of a Harley just like you can get more HP out of a riding lawnmower but at what price and what level of reliability?

Kruz

Don't we have something better to talk about than antiquated junk?

This is not junk. Eric upgraded his bike just for you, Kruz. Since you are trying to find a bike for, Rook, I figured we start finding you another bike too. You know the dealer show is upon us. I can't wait to see what they added to your box ear shorts on the handlebars, butt, that's part of owning a bike... Making Mods to fit the rider'w personal preferences. Looks like you need a seat also. Where did they place the key fob?

http://www.buell.com/en_us/bikes/blast/features.asp Press the yellow box is to see your feet CHEERS! Big K has a H-D hand signed ride it away!

* Last updated by: Hub on 8/17/2009 @ 10:15 AM *