This is where the action happened all those years ago. Where the road seems to dive about three-quarters of the way down, it actually turns to the right, into a valley behind the hill, for a mile or two, before turning back left and joining up with the bottom section just before the end.
What you say, mate? Sorry, my hearing is really bad - too many drugs and loud motorcycles. Nah, only joking about the drugs - just too many loud motorcycles. And a rock 'n roll band. Actually, one of the best times I ever had was with really quiet motorcycles. In fact you couldn’t hear them at all. Got a minute? I’ll tell you about it.
I was on a ride with some blokes, can’t remember how many – too many drugs … nah, just joking. OK … three or four bikes, good friends, serious riders. One of them had his girlfriend on the back. SusanJane, hell of a nice girl. Fancied her, myself. We were all on the same bikes – it doesn’t matter what they were, as you’ll see.
We stopped at the top of the Paekakariki Hill, where you could see way up the coast, a hundred miles on a clear day, to Mount Taranaki. And in the other direction, on almost any day, 30 miles across the sea to the South Island. You could also see the road we were on winding on down the side of the hill from where we were, to the bottom of the hill where it joined the highway on the coast. The road was not steep, but definitely downhill all the way down. It was only about twenty feet wide, with a good hard tar surface, and very twisty. I’d say there were fifty or more corners between us and the bottom, over a distance of two to three miles. Almost no traffic on that day.
After admiring the view for a bit, one of the blokes said that what they usually did from here was to take off without starting the motors, and see who could get to the bottom first.
The first thing that flashed through my mind was, OK – can I paddle my legs faster than these guys. Within two seconds, I realised that we’d be going much too fast for that. The road wasn’t steep, but it was steep enough so that had it been straight instead of a twisty ribbon, one would easily reach 70 or 80 miles an hour, maybe even more, by the bottom, without the engine. Even with the braking we’d need to do to get around the corners, we would be going fast enough on this little run, that any attempt to gain propulsion by putting a foot down would risk a catastrophic loss of control. An amusing picture formed in my mind of legs going in all directions, and an irretrievable speed wobble.
There was probably a brief discussion about the proceedings, but not much. It was a pretty simple concept, and I figured it would take us long enough to get to the bottom for me to have time to work out what was going on. Off we went.
As far as I remember the start was a leisurely affair, without a line-up or frantic foot-paddling. It was a lovely day, and as we quietly picked up speed, I started to think about what lay ahead. The first thing that came to me was that all the action was likely to be at the bottom, probably at the last corner. It also occurred to me that these guys would probably be trying to go as fast as they could all the way. That is, after all, more or less the way one approaches things in a normal race on a more or less flat surface. But that might not necessarily be the best approach here.
So I hung back. I relaxed, doing just enough to keep in touch. I watched the others running ahead. I saw them using up their energy. I watched them breaking late and hard for each corner, loosing speed every time. I started to practise my braking, learning how much lever pressure cost how much speed. I saw that one needed to be very precise with the lever, for good results, without the engine. By half way down, I had my cornering just about right, and I realised that I could probably catch the leader then, if I wanted to. By now I was clearly going faster than they were, because I was concentrating only on corner speed. My braking was getting better all the time. I was coming out of the corners much quicker than they were, because I was going in quicker, and I had to slow down on the straights not to overtake them. I realised that being at the back, seeing and knowing what the others were doing, with them having no idea what I was up to, was an advantage to be given up only once.
So I just swung easily along behind them, building my confidence, practising my braking. This was all about breaking.
I figured I could win, but I would need a bit of luck. If I could get a view of the last few corners as we approached them, I might be able to use my honed braking skills, and my position of advantage at the back, to time my run and take the last few corners as fast as they could possibly be taken, which would hopefully be faster than the others were travelling, and go past them.
Near the bottom, we were flying. There was a straight, a corner, another short straight, a corner, and another short straight to the bottom. I dropped back even further, to give me distance over which to build speed.
Then I let her go, and I don't remember touching the brakes again.
The only corner I actually remember was the last one. I slowly went past the leader on the inside. There was nothing he could do - he was already going as fast as he could - but watch me go by.
I’ll never forget his open-mouthed stare, and that sweet smile on SusanJane’s face.
Excellant story Skins, were you on the Paso?
