Sunday ride meet. A couple of guys we know from Kent arrived and there was a third rider with them on a Blue ZX9R. Whilst this chap was parking his bike I heard him shout (to no one in particular) “I’ve just got me licence back, ha ha ha”. 'Oh dear', I thought, this does not look good. Before we set off, one of the regulars said to me, “Tet, watch that bloke on the ZX9, he’s dangerous”. Anything I’m told by someone I respect totally I take on board.

Off we went, I was not in the leading pack and was following Blue ZX9 man. At the first roundabout he nearly oversteered into the kerb ... I was surprised but put it down to possible cold tyres. We carried on in position, him being right behind Transit Ken, but taking some very interesting lines and with a lot of brake use too. I was a little unnerved by this and gave him a good 15 to 20 yards. What I couldn’t work out was why he obviously liked going wide everywhere, but I don’t mean going wide into a bend, I mean going wide coming out. I can’t honestly say he got one corner correct. When approaching a left hander, he would be in the middle of the lane or to the extreme left and vice versa for a right hander, yet all those in front that he could see (if he were paying attention) were taking good lines giving maximum visibility and maximum use of the lane they were in.

After about 7 miles, I was gesticulating to Keith that this guy was gonna crash before breakfast, but Keith obviously thought I was conducting a band by my arm movements and did not get the message.

Ken had dropped off the leading pack and at this point I was starting to think I’ll overtake ZX9 man when I get an opportunity, but certainly won’t push the issue - he was starting to put me off too and I didn’t like it. We came to one part of the road I knew well so I took my opportunity, accelerated hard to pass him, got alongside and he gassed the ZX ... we were heading up this hill neck and neck towards a bend, when I realised he obviously thought this was a race, not a clean overtaking manoeuvre. After seeing the way he had ridden all morning I thought it best to back off or he would have me off through the approaching left hander, me being on the outside. So I did.

The next two bends he got completely wrong and the leading guys had started to clear off, totally unaware of the lack of riding ability and general machine control that this bloke possessed. A long straight loomed and he took this as his opportunity to play catch up, dangerous if you are not good at it and he wasn’t. He made up enough ground down the straight to be dangerously close to the guys at the front through the next set of bends.

The first is a downhill left-hander. Tony, who was now just ahead of ZX9 buffoon, moved out the crown of the road to peel in left, but oh no, this was clearly not the correct line and ZX twat was tight to the left kerb for the left hander. Run wide?? Oh yes, very wide, so wide in fact that there was absolutely no way he was going to make the next tight right hander and I think this suddenly dawned on him ... all the very near misses earlier were obviously not near enough for Superman here? The brake light came on, his rear wheel started to lift, the bike was flapping and he didn’t know what to do, he was CRASHING without a doubt. Tony peeled into the right hander on exactly the right line (unaware all this going on directly behind him) and BANG!! This complete and utter tosser t-boned Tony.

He hit just behind Tony's right hand footpeg, luckily missing his calf and foot. Tony’s bike was wiped out from under him and he did a nice pirouette through the air landing on his head and right shoulder in the grass. Tosser's bike went end over end and landed 8 feet up on top of a bank. I stopped and ran back to Tony, he was very still, but eyes and visor open. He said he felt something when he moved his arm and this later turned out to be a broken collarbone.

Mr. Twat Tosser who couldn’t ride a bike was unscathed. Typical. Anyway, the police will deal with him and his insurance company has a very big bill to pay out, then it’s us poor bastards that have higher premiums to pay, because of these sort of C***S. It should have been him in the ambulance not Tony, there is no justice.

Lesson to be learned: Don’t ride with complete Tossers who think they are fast, when it is clear they are totally incompetent and should not be anywhere near a two wheeled vehicle. This could have been avoided if we had been strict enough to start with - apologies to John here, who did try and ban the guy from riding with us but no-one backed him up.

After this was cleared up we went off for breakfast and then decided to go and see Tony in hospital. Six of us went to see him, poor fellow, he looked pissed off big time and why not, but other than that he was at least in one piece.

We were on an A road heading north, steady pace, and had passed several cars and we met a motorcycle - a ZZR600

As we came up behind him he moved left and let us through with a cheery wave. We returned the wave and carried on up the road for a few more miles. Half way along a straight was the turning we were taking, so we indicated, slowed down for oncoming traffic and then the first few guys turned off.

Just as the fourth rider turned in there was an almighty explosion of metal and plastic behind. I turned my head to see absolute mayhem, bikes and riders going in all directions. I stopped and ran back to hear Mark screaming at the top of his voice (that’s loud!!) about his leg, clearly broken, and he was in extreme pain.

David was lying face down motionless in the middle of the road with his SP-1 beside him. I honestly thought he was dead. As I went to Dave I could see his back rising and falling so knew he was breathing. We undid his helmet strap as his lid had been pulled up and appeared to be restricting his airflow.

The ZZR rider came over ....oh yes, he had a twisted ankle. Turned out that he had come up the outside of the cars behind us, playing catch up, throttle wide open, did not see we were turning right because he wasn’t concentrating, had got past Ian (luckily missing him) but hit Dave, sending him flying and knocking him unconscious on impact with the road. He bounced off Dave's SP1 and t-boned Mark as he was halfway across the offside lane, actually making his turn.“What the fucking Hell do you think you were doing” I demanded of him. The reply I got from the ZZR tosser was “I didn’t see you turning right ... I'm so sorry ... " Dave's SP-1 still had the right hand indicator flashing as it lay on the floor, what he was thinking I do not know and never will.

The same ambulance and police teams arrived on the scene as had been at the one earlier in the day. They couldn’t believe it and neither could we, all this in one day. After stabilising the injured at the roadside Mark was airlifted to hospital and Dave went in an ambulance - fortunately he was now conscious, but clearly in the land of repetitiveness and kept asking us the same thing over and over again .... "What happened?"

Later on when the accident investigation team arrived, doing their bit, one of them said to the 4 of us that were left standing, “Have you seen the rear tyre on this Kawasaki?”, It was through to the canvass for 50% of it circumference!!!!! Unbelievable, the rider was prepared to come chasing after us on a machine that had a totally unroadworthy tyre, no wonder he couldn’t stop, he had no grip!!

Dave had concussion and was kept in overnight. Mark has a broken femur 4 inches below his right hip, which has to be pinned, and a broken heel. His calf was squashed in the impact and the skin did split, but he had no broken bones there.

Hopefully there are some things we can do to reduce the chances of these incidents happening again. You have to make hard and fast rules and stick to them. We certainly are. We'll have to be much more careful who rides with us as a guest rider and not be afraid to refuse to ride with anyone we think is not up to it.. Riding in a group of guys with similar abilities has to be safer - we used to do this and we didn’t have problems.

Oh, and don't ride with bloody Kawasakis!!! They are obviously ridden by complete wankers who live life with their head up their arse. (We've been asked by Peter Foley to point out that this comment does not of course apply to riders of ZX-7Rs, which are jolly nice 750s ridden by the most decent of chaps).

Mark has had his femur pinned now, after a week in traction which is bloody painful - although you do get to administer your own morphine supply. He has to have some surgery on his lower leg and foot and hopefully he'll be out of hospital in another week or so.

He might look cheerful but you don't want to go through this, you really don't.	... especially when your leg looks like this

Ouch ... the pin and screws holding Mark's leg together. He's gotta go back into hospital soon to have the lower screws removed as they're stopping the break healing properly.

Mark has now left the bastions of the delightful St. Richard's Hospital and has returned home to meditate and wait for his leg to repair itself.

I am sure you will all join with me in wishing Mark a strange kind of happiness. To ease the pain, one has tried shoving pillows under his leg but to no avail. He is able to hop about by using a small boy as a mobile rest, but he must at all times keep his leg at an angle of 57° to the horizontal and thus locomotion is somewhat impaired if the small boy wanders off without due warning.

Luckily Mark has the benefit of the ministrations of two doctors, Dr. Dr. Reiner Protsch von Zieten, 61, from Frankfurt University. Although not ideally located to offer minute by minute care, Dr. Dr. Protsch von Zieten specialises in Anthropology and Human Genetics and is a respected figure in many parts of the world, apart from Frankfurt Volkscourthausen where he was fined £6,000 for using his second doctor title before the doctorate was officially awarded to him. He is appealing, but not to me.

David is also recovering from his sudden ejection from his much loved and very new and shiny SP1. We were concerned that he could not concentrate on one subject for more than 2 minutes, and that he kept launching into extraordinary monologues on just about any topic imaginable without warning. However, we are assured that he has always done this and his behaviour in no way reflects his recent misfortune.

Tony has turned his back on his recent past and gone off to the Moldavian Peninsula to get married ... so he is obviously suffering from severe brain disorder, doubtless as a consequence of his accident.

Six months laters:

Well, Mark is now wobbling about unaided, but with the most peculiar gait ... a pronounced limp, in fact. The specialist doctor has just given him a good tugging about and told him he can't return to work for at least a year! Dunno why he told the doc he was a professional trapeze artiste.

David is on his third SP1, but otherwise relatively normal .... or not.

Tony is rebuilding his Gixer to track-day specification, which involves the fitment of numerous aftermarket goodies including Akrapovic exhaust, twiddly rearsets, leather braiding .... doubtless a full article will appear one day.

Meanwhile, 9 months later matey on the Kwacker gets nicked ....