Ducati Monster Forum

Pascedero Road: (I think? leads from Castro Valley to 84 in fremont)

Following a buddy, knew we were going too fast due to me sliding the rear on a left hander.

Slowed my pace (following a buddy on a 929) due to this fact, just in time to come around another left hander about 80 percent the way through just to hear his tires screatching and general bike crashing noises.

I was (luckily) at this point following with some space between us.  Choices of powering through into the oncoming lane, running him over, or uprighting the bike and praying, I chose the latter.  Front wheel hit gravel, locked and the front wheel just disappeared. I was headed toward a berm and basically just went limp and let what was gonna happen, happen.

Luckily, somehow the bike falling out from me caused my boot to wedge itself between my tank and the road, causing me to get pinned (Saved the tank) and the only damage to me was cosmetic.  Front ferring, rear cowl and carbon fiber thingy below the seat, took the damage. I only slid for about a foot before the bike hit the berm and stopped.

My toes, my fingers, my penis and all other non-essential extremities appear to be working, so I'm fine. Massive ego crush though.

My buddy that crashed high sided when he got spooked he was going to fast and hit his front brake mid lean on a dot in the road.  He suffered some nice helmet rash, a broken shifter/peg and a couple harsh comments from myself.


We both walked away. I wouldn't ask for more.


Not the best birthday ride tho. 24 now. :(


Ride safe folks.  Post pics of damaged duc later. Getting drunk atm.


Sorry to make the beast with two backs up your ticker 'Belle.

Glad you walked away. 

At least I'm not the only one to screw up the ticker.

glad to hear that it wasn't worse.
i think you are referring to Palomares Rd.
btw, happy b-day.

be safe people.
Ciao!

Wow, 2 crash reports back to back! Glad to hear you're okay, too.

Agreed, I think you were on Palomares Road.

Glad to hear you and your friend both survived ok.  Hopefully you both learned something from the incident.

Good to hear you made it out relatively unscathed.

That road seems to be a bit deceiving and has been the location of a few crashes.

Ya I don't think he learns from any of his crashes.

I learned not to follow him.  [bang]


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(http://img715.imageshack.us/img715/5789/467625358954dbb12b9db.jpg)
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Pretty minor overall, pride took a beating mostly.

No gear damage, only slid for like 6-12" but the gravel did a number on the paint. His bike was fubar before, and worse after, I didn't take pictures of it tho. He had to ride home with out a left peg, lol. I think that his 7th life outta 9, he's pushing it.

Palomares road is a great one for newer riders when heading from the south end to the north (Sunol/Fremont towards Castro Valley), as long as you pay attention to the dirt and gravel in the first few miles.  There aren't really any tricky turns in that direction.

However, heading from north to south there are at least four decreasing radius turns that will catch you out if you're pushing it.  The big 180 degree left sweeper just past the summit tightens up at the end and has a dip right where you don't want it.  Is that the one that caught you?  The other decreasing radius turns are all right turns.

It's also important on a road like that to be at least two seconds behind whoever you're following so that you have time to stop before you get to them.

I love riding Palomares Road, but you have to respect it.

A lot of E Bay roads are pretty trashed and fairly technical.  Fortunately there doesn't seem to be much car traffic on them.  Glad you're OK.  I wonder if there's any way that the crash could have been avoided.  Sounds like you feel that your following distance was OK.  What would you gauge it to be in feet--I'm curious.  If it was indeed 2 seconds, perhaps 2 seconds isn't enough? I have a habit of following too closely myself and have been fortunate that no one directly in front of me has gone down.  I'm trying to prepare for that event, however, by using your response here.

I was approximately 2 seconds behind. I was following much closer earlier on but I slid the rear on a previous turn and made up my mind we were going too fast.

I can't really see how it could have been avoided completely, if I were further back I might not have even heard the tires squeal which first alerted me something went wrong, and could have possible ran right into him as he skidded across the lane before running off to the side.  The only way to prevent my tumble in this situation would have been to lean over further and into the oncoming lane, which wasn't a risk I was going to take on a blind turn. As far as my buddies point of view, he just needed to slow down.


ScottRNelson: From your description I'd imagine that's the turn that got him.  His bike made a nice gash in the asphalt before the asphalt wont and ripped it off, lol.  As for the road itself, ya it's fun. I live in Hayward, but store my bike in Union City so I take it quite often w/o incident, and yes, the stuff that gets kicked up on the road gets bad.

Belle was that you earlier in the day (Yesterday) traveling around in Castro Valley on the back of a Scooter?

I like to keep the throttle on a tiny bit through all turns and that one requires slowing down an extra 5 mph or so to be able to get through it safely.  So I'll brake right as the turn starts, just before the dirt road that splits off, then I can comfortably take the rest of the turn.

If you're near your limit at the entrance, you'll hit the slight dip right at the tightest spot.  If you're near your cornering limits when that happens, that's enough to push you over the limit.

Here's the curve on a map: http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Castro+Valley,+CA&sll=37.694097,-122.086352&sspn=0.341484,0.2108&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Castro+Valley,+Alameda,+California&ll=37.63816,-121.968477&spn=0.021359,0.013175&z=16 (http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Castro+Valley,+CA&sll=37.694097,-122.086352&sspn=0.341484,0.2108&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Castro+Valley,+Alameda,+California&ll=37.63816,-121.968477&spn=0.021359,0.013175&z=16)

You can kind of see how the southbound left turn tightens up a little at the end.

Glad you guys are OK.

Welcome to the club.  Glad you're alright.  Putting it down always sucks, but it's as long as you're not injured, you can write it off as a learning experience (albeit an expensive and scary one), figure out how to avoid the same thing next time, and move on.  IIRC, you've only been riding for less than 6 months and from what I've seen you've already been going at a fast clip.  This is probably a good wake-up call.


By entering the turn at slower speed. By choosing different riding partners.  By talking to your riding partner about pace.  By doing a host of things differently. 

Or by giving more than 2 seconds to follow.  Most bikes will crash and slide off your line if you give them enough time.  I can't say how your buddy ended up, but it's unusual for the bike and the rider to still be in the middle of the road if they lose it while cranked over.  One of the first things you learn from racing is if someone goes down in front of you, you just hold your line and they'll clear outta there pretty fast.  And then the next thing you learn is how to run over someone.   ;D  (f'n buells)

Glad you're okay and the bike is only cosmetic damage!

I understand what I did wrong full well, that phrase was merely speaking about what i did after I saw my riding partner flying through the air.  [laugh]


Trust me, I won't be making the same mistake twice.   [bang]

Glad you're OK...take it as a lesson, a chance to bling out the bike, and a reason to go to the track!