Friday Fudge

Welcome to Friday Fudge. If it’s weird, funny, or strange motorcycle news, or it just plain won’t fit anywhere else on the site – you’ll find it here.

Crim vs. crim

Here’s a weird story for you. The tale begins in Miami, where a no-goodnik decided to help himself to a motorcycle that didn’t belong to him. He was spotted by the machine’s owner, though, and the initial theft attempt was foiled.

But the owner wasn’t happy with that. Instead of moving his bike to a safer location, he staked out the scene of the attempted crime. The wannabe crook showed up again, with unpleasant results for him – the owner shot him.

But our story doesn’t end there! Since this was in the U.S, you might think our straight-shooting biker might have received a medal. Alas, when quizzed by police as to who owned the gun he used, he said it was his. There was only one problem – the bike owner was a convicted felon, meaning he wasn’t allowed to have the piece. So, now he’s been arrested too. Maybe he’ll skate on the charges, maybe he won’t, but we bet he’ll resort to a baseball bat next time.

Source: Local10

Mad adventures

We’ve told you about the Adventurists before on this website. Basically, it’s an organization of madmen who have decided the modern world isn’t edgy enough for their tastes. That’s why they created the Ice Run, a little jaunt they describe as “1,500km across the frozen Siberian wilderness on old school Ural motorbikes to the only town in the world sitting on the Arctic Circle.” The 2012 edition was such a success that they ran it again in 2013; some of the finishers are wrapping up their journeys this week.

Here’s a video from another of their crazy capers, known as the Rickshaw Run. There’s no snow involved (this ride is across India), but somehow, the trip aboard 125 cc moto-taxis seems even more dangerous.

That’s not their only moto-taxi madness. They also have this adventure in the high altitudes Andes. Frankly, the idea of running one of these makeshift machines anywhere near those drop-offs, with oncoming traffic seemingly anxious to muscle you off the road, is terrifying. So, are there any CMG readers interested in signing up and giving us a report of the 2013 edition, running in October?

Stay on course

It’s important to stay on course when you’re racing a motorcycle. A great illustration of this rule came out of the annual Balikpapan Two Days Enduro in Indonesia, that saw 90 riders get lost in the middle of the jungle.

Instead of handing out trophies at the podium, authorities had to send in search and rescue teams after the racers after they went missing. So far, they’ve found 70 of the missing riders, but there are still another 20 riders out there, waiting to be rescued. Unless, of course, the crocodiles have found them first.

Source: Jakarta Post

Hell freezes over

Here’s what it takes to run the Hells Gate hard enduro in Tuscany. It sort of puts all that Canadian whining about snowy roads in perspective.