Deer strike.

[flynrider]

I thought I'd post this separate from the upcoming post on my weeklong Colorado trip (still processing pics for that one), to avoid clutter.

On day 3 of my trip I'd packed up my camp near Silverton, CO and headed north to have breakfast in the picturesque mountain town of Ouray. This stretch of US 550 is called the million dollar highway and much of it is carved right out of the rocky mountainside.

It was a beautiful Wednesday morning and I was thinking how great it was to be riding this road with almost none of the usual weekend traffic. Halfway to my destination, I stopped for a photo op at Red Mountain Pass. This is the last photo of my pristine undamaged bike.



About 15 min. later I was rounding a sharp curve about a mile from Ouray when it happened. Just as I was exiting the curve at about 25 mph, I caught a flash of brown out of the corner of my left eye. I was a bit confused because there had been nothing but a guard rail and a steep cliff in that direction. Before I could really process this info, I was face to face with Bambi, who had made an impressive leap into the left side of my windshield. The impact knocked the handlebar full lock to the left and down we went.

In this pic the impact point was about where you see the shadow of the trees on the road. Since the right side of the road is mostly a rocky cliff, the deer was headed for those trees for cover.



I had maybe 1/2 second of braking before the impact and estimate I was only going 15-20 mph when Bambi hit me. The windshield shattered and the bike went down (with me still on the seat) and slid about 15 ft. before coming to a stop in the middle of the lane.

One weird thing was that when the bike stopped sliding, the engine was revving high. There was nothing touching the throttle and I was stumped at what would cause that? Maybe some quirk of the FI system? Anyway, I quickly slapped the kill switch and all was quiet.

A couple of guys in a Jeep coming in the opposite direction stopped and helped me lift up the bike and get it to the side of the road. As we moved it, the trees began to rustle and Bambi popped out to have a look. She had a gash on her right hindquarter and was limping a bit, but it didn't look like anything was broken and she hobbled off towards the forest. She'd probably live if she could heal up before any predators found her.

I was very surprised at the relatively light amount of damage to both myself and the bike. I wasn't wearing any protective gear, other than my helmet (which didn't even get scratched). The only noticeable damage on me was a 1/4" scratch on my pinkie and one of my favorite airplane t-shirts had evidently received some road rash.



The bike came to rest sitting on the left crash bar and handlebar. Major props to the designers of the OVER Racing crash bars I got from Samurider. With the bike on its left side, nothing to the rear of the crash bar received a scratch. The peg, shifter and even the rear turn signal were completely untouched. The crash bar was bent a bit toward the engine case, but didn't touch it.

Here's a rundown of the carnage. The NC Plexistar was, of course, a total write off.



Probably the most expensive damage was to the gauge package. Everything still works and I was able to duct tape all the cracks and holes to keep water out (looks really sharp!). The headlight trim ring also got rashed. The clutch lever end (no RLET) was scraped up, but the lever remained intact.



The mirror got a good scraping, but didn't break and was still usable.



Lastly, the fabulous OVER engine guard did what it was supposed to do. Although there were several mm scraped off the stainless tube, it protected the rest of the bike admirably. Best farkle money I ever spent.



Overall, I'd say both the bike and I were quite lucky to survive this encounter with so little damage. After calming down a bit and readjusting my gear, I was back on the road in about 20 min.

Total damage to the bike was the windshield, headlight ring, mirror, gauge plastic and left crash bar. What really hurt was that this was the first time I've put a scratch on a motorcycle in 27 years of almost daily riding. It was a nice streak while it lasted

I continued on with the rest of my 7 day trip without a windshield and an embarrassing amount of duct tape holding the gauge plastic together. I really missed that windshield. The bugs were thick and a few days later I got caught in a hail storm and had nothing to hide behind. Later that day, a bee flew up my sleeve and stung me on the upper arm.

I'm still working on the pics and maps for the rest of the trip and will post it soon.