[Dry Ice]

Originally Posted by Rajeevraj

Don't see the point of these record breaking attempts. You have a good bike, you have the passion to ride, you are young, you have the time- then make the trip about the journey and not about the destination.

You are forgetting an important variable in that equation - social media . It is indeed turning out to be a double edged sword. One such ride by a responsible rider will trigger 10 others to copy him/her. What they get inspired by is the 10-15 mins of fame (via video) or the ride pics shared on social media. What they miss to understand is everyone may not have the same level of preparedness or temperament to carry it through.

[SmartCat]

Originally Posted by Rajeevraj

On a side note: Why carry fuel? Since it is GQ run, I assume fuel stations would be a plenty and it will be faster to tank up from a pump as opposed to manually doing it. Not to mention the extra weight to carry which could have pulled down average speed?

Carrying fuel saves time. You can ride till you are almost empty, stop anywhere and fill up fuel. It probably takes 2 or 3 minutes max. But if you depend on petrol pumps -

1) You have to slow down and look for petrol pumps as you get low on fuel. This could drastically cut down average speed.
2) Once you identify a petrol pump, you might have to wait for 2 to 10 minutes because there might others in queue.

[jetsetgo08]

Glad that he could cheat death this time.

But, even if he was successful to break the record, there is a very high probability that someone else would try to break that with an even more powerful bike with an even higher chance of ending six feet under.

There was a similar instance of another biker doing K2K (Kashmir to Kanyakumari ) in a record time, but in the 2nd/3rd attempt and not before he learnt it the hard way.

I hope the media also mentions the attempt failures to increase awareness among the biker circuits.

P.S. : I do not discourage setting up of record timings, but neither do I encourage the need for speed in an open world. Timings are better left to WRC's, other rally's and racing circuits.

[Red Liner]

I dont really care who sets what records.

Can they please leave the rest of us out of the equation on the roads please?

Every single damn riding group in India have a few imbeciles who do these kind of things, and are egged on by the rest of the people there. Odo readings are compared akin to mine is bigger than yours.

All these record attempts sound like Blue Whale Challenges to me. Whatever happened to enjoying the scenery.

And for the record, it has nothing to do with age. There are many 40+ year old's who seem to be re-claiming their lost youth by doing antics like these on much bigger and more power motorcycles. And all night sometimes, to get back to work on Monday.

All these record breakers on public roads need to be put behind bars as non bailable offences.

[AMG Power]

Originally Posted by smartcat

Carrying fuel saves time. You can ride till you are almost empty, stop anywhere and fill up fuel. It probably takes 2 or 3 minutes max. But if you depend on petrol pumps -

1) You have to slow down and look for petrol pumps as you get low on fuel. This could drastically cut down average speed.
2) Once you identify a petrol pump, you might have to wait for 2 to 10 minutes because there might others in queue.

Points 1 and 2 will still apply when you run out of the extra fuel in the Jerry can.

[anachronix]

Brave kid, unfortunate for him that his expedition ended prematurely. I can only envy that I couldn't do these when I was a kid

Thumbs up to the kid to make another attempt for the record and be successful!

[humyum]

I am okay with anyone doing the Golden Quadrilateral for the fun or the record of completing it, but I think its foolish to attempt a time run with the intent of completing it in the least time possible on public roads.

Even if he would have managed to finish this, I would call him a fool and advertising something like this with posters/newspapers and websites by him should get him tried for breaking laws of the land and put in jail just because average speeds itself for such high speed runs would be much higher than the speed limits of the land.

Records should be best left to tracks or organised events like Raid De Himalaya etc

[chaudh2s]

Just about anything goes these days in the name of being an enthusiast.

[Turbanator]

Glad that he came out alive, perhaps he should have done this with an open timeframe in mind, targetting distances day vise, it may be now considered as a race and most likely he will lose Insurance claim.

[abhishek46]

Originally Posted by Turbanator

Glad that he came out alive, perhaps he should have done this with an open timeframe in mind, targetting distances day vise, it may be now considered as a race and most likely he will lose Insurance claim.

Well, he was carrying externally mounted fuel cans as well.
That alone is enough for the insurance company to reject the claim.

[camitesh]

I glanced through the posts so far but did not see any mention of the young person already completing one such endurance ride and getting himself a place in Limca Book of Records for the fastest ride to Char Dham on bikes. So kudos to him for one feat well achieved at this young age. However, I guess he was motivated by the laurels of past and attempted this one high on confidence but fate had other things in mind.

Nevertheless, it's good to know the young rider lives to tell the story. While I do feel sad for the total loss of wonderful machine he owned, I hope people of all ages learn from this experience one way or another.

I remember back in the day around 2010-2012 period, Iron Butt Associations (IBA's) saddle sore and Bun Burner (BB) rides were such a rage. Every now and then I used to look in awe at my FB feeds with the proud posts from my rider friends completing one of these rides and contemplate of undertaking one of such daring rides myself. Not just me, I know countless such friends who dreamt of these enduro rides. Alas, most of these plans never materialized.

Social media and news have been very successful in glorifying these speed runs and the recognition/praises that come with it if you are successful. I know some mature riders who abandoned their attempts due to potentially dangerous issues rather than to continue the record attempt and risk it. However, these stories of smart, if not brave decision making in such critical times probably never get any momentum besides the usual banter in limited participation forums such as this one. How I wish, these unsuccessful stories get equal, if not more traction for educational purposes to the budding riders.

[audioholic]

What a stupid way to burn down a bike. I wonder what people gain by attempting such feats - Just some attention on Social media. If I said that you covered the golden quadilateral in XX hrs on your bike, my aunts and uncles will regard me as a mad guy. It is only some friends and some following in social media that will understand what this was all about.

Covering the GQ is ok for a record, since the distance itself is a big figure. But trying to set a speed record is absurd. And on a bike, the risks involved is far higher compared to doing the same on a car, which also offsets the actual reward.

Originally Posted by smartcat

Carrying fuel saves time. You can ride till you are almost empty, stop anywhere and fill up fuel. It probably takes 2 or 3 minutes max. But if you depend on petrol pumps -

1) You have to slow down and look for petrol pumps as you get low on fuel. This could drastically cut down average speed.
2) Once you identify a petrol pump, you might have to wait for 2 to 10 minutes because there might others in queue.

Not all highway petrol pumps are crowded, especially the two wheeler lines. I at least have not seen such a place which would require waiting in a line or so. Also, 2 or 3 minutes for refilling from a can isnt realistic. One has to get down from the bike, unsecure the can, fill it, secure it and then leave. It will at least take five minutes unless that guy wanted to set a record here too. And end of the day, he has to fill up both the can and the bike petrol tank, which is again the same time, unless someone switched jerry cans for him on the fly.

Instead, if one does not run till the last drop, they can choose a relatively empty fuel bunk and fill it within less than 5 minutes. Not even in the fuel bunk I go in Bangalore, I need so much time that too for my bike.

And look at those tyres. Who on earth uses them for the highway and to set a speed record?

[amitoj]

Yeah I tried to feel sorry for this young enthusiast ever since I read the news but I failed.
My moral compass refuses to bend that way somehow.
You want to test your limits of endurance? Get on a treadmill or a cycle and see how far you can push yourself.

[basuroy]

Is it even legal to ferry petrol in jerry cans like that ?

I ask because more than once , petrol pumps have flat out refused petrol to me in bottles/jerry can when I ran out of petrol in my duke 390 ( the duke fuel gauge can be very misleading and there is always the risk you don't even have enough for a 5 km ride to the petrol pump ) . I was in car in every instance as well .

[pixantz]

First of all I'm glad that the lad is out of this alive.

Secondly, I'm at at loss to understand as to why most members are left-right-and-center condemning this guy for his "speed" run. Though it's not mentioned anywhere what speeds he was doing, and still it could be assumed that he was above the "legal speed limit", still, how many people here are so sure that other Normal riders/drivers, on highways are all angels and strictly stick to the "speed limit"? Who can vouch for all of the others? Including yourselves? What do you guys think others are riding at, 40kmph? And still thus guy is wrong just because he was attempting something else? That's unfair.

This accident can happen to anybody in India at almost anytime what with cattle, other animals and people who think they're invincible, using the road like a garden. So I don't know why only this kid is so wrong. Okay, even I don't support "racing" on public roads, but give him a break guys.

The only bad move I think this guy made was to carry fuel with him. If he didn't do that, he just might have completed what he started and we would all have been on another thread instead of this one. AMGPower made a good point about the fuel some posts above.

He apparently skipped a major point while planning this ride. Jotting down planned fuel stops! If he did that, I think his Duke would have been alive today. Or maybe he had some other idea about it....