Robin: In this episode, money, money, money, money.

Brian: Opening announcements, news, corrections, banter. Robin, where are you? What are you doing?

Robin: Close to you, my friend, by choice and by decision and by a lot of effort. I'm in Leavenworth, Indiana, literally living in a van down by the river. And it is beautiful. The load-in ramp for our rig becomes a back patio on this thing. And it is directly over the water. If I look directly into my... You can't see this in your camera, but directly to my left is the Ohio River. Fantastic.

Brian: So the barge has ever, you know, honked their horn or whatever they call it?

Robin: Not yet, but even if they did, it's not that loud. So remember when I went to school in Cincinnati and my apartment was right next to the rail yard, which was right next to the shipping yard for all reasons, common sense. And I never slept more peacefully than that. That sound in the backdrop of just the squeaking rails and the horns of the boats oh man oh yeah i truly it feels very very good to be here let's see real quick random song in the minute this round if you're interested in listening to our random songs of the minute go to radio.tro.bike in your web browser which will take you to our youtube playlist this one it's not new but it is fantastic it's new-ish in the past five, ten years or so. The song is by the Fearless Flyers titled Introducing the Fearless Flyers. Check that out. And if you can get the live version, oh my God, is that ever laying it down. So, random song in the minute, Introducing the Fearless Flyers, radio.tro.bike.

Brian: Nice.

Robin: Other activities, I need to get a new torque wrench. I had bought a Craftsman torque wrench. Boy, was Lowe's or Ace Hardware or wherever I bought it. They sure were excited to inform me when I bought it that this universally permanent product, if I ever had any problems with it, I just walk into any store that holds it and I hand them the old one, they hand me the new one, and I don't have to answer any questions. I just leave. Little did I know, they no longer make the freaking wrench, so the craftsman warranty is now craps, man. So I have to go buy a new, I'm looking at CDI, and I'm going to want to ask you some questions about that.

Brian: Yeah.

Robin: How are you doing?

Brian: So we just had a successful Brown County GS rally. This is a Suzuki GS rally. I still have a Suzuki GS. I still ride it regularly. This year I rode my Yamaha. In some years, this rally starts to kind of turn into like a Triumph or Yamaha rally. It kind of bounces around. But I had lots of old bikes show up. And it's really more about the hang and the vibe and the people than it is the bikes anymore. You know, we all know each other. We've had this rally in the same location since 2008. And before that, it was in a different spot. So we call it the Brown County Rally, but it's based in Lawrence County, Indiana, which is two counties away. And there are good reasons for that, but never mind all that. It's one of those where I learned a long time ago, the secret is to just not organize it. Is to really say, I set a date, I tell people the date, and they either show up or they don't. I also, I manage a room list, who's going to be where and sleeping with whom, because otherwise it really gets into chaos and it makes a pain in the butt for Jay. Other than that, it's like people show up, they're self-starters, you guys all know what you're doing, nobody has starved yet, so food gets figured out, people hang out, it's great, and we do a lot of writing.

Robin: Agreed. I've been to many of these events and they go differently every time, but it's always a positive for the, for the most part, it's always a positive experience with incredible human beings. And I always come away reflecting on any number of things that can improve my psyche or riding ability. It's just a great hang in general.

Brian: Yeah.

Robin: This one was harder for me. It wasn't a natural ebb and flow of social interactions. It was imperfect from my vantage point. And I think that your purchase of a baby bottle for me to drink beer from was very reflective of that. You know, the subliminal messages you send, they're not so subliminal. They're very clear. You'd be like, and now I'm going to speak like a normal businessman over top of this instance. But the fact is, you should probably drink your beer out of a baby bottle, boy. It was just a hell of a time. Like I said, it's always a new experience. I remember last year I felt like a rock star, and this year I felt like everybody was uncertain, but we all had fun.

Brian: We all had a good time. Fun was had, great writing was had. And if you're listening, if you've never been to southern Indiana, the roads here are really good. Robin is living right on one of the great roads of Indiana. It's Highway 62.

Robin: I didn't even mean to do that. I did not mean to land on this road. I just was like, oh, it's a good park. Like, it's two hours from Maggie's parents. We're kind of, you know, checking on family this round. We're about two hours from every single family member, yourself included. So I can check on any family member and have them check on me with the exact distance that says nobody's just dropping in.

Brian: That's true, yeah. Downhill and in a van near the river. Yeah, you have to very deliberately find it. You know, speaking of which, we had two tire punctures on day one.

Robin: I think you do this. I think you're the one responsible. I think you puncture tires so that you can fix them for people.

Brian: Yeah, I'm dropping nails and stuff off the bike.

Robin: Just throwing thumbtacks right out.

Brian: You caught me. Yeah, Robin pulled up with a warning from his TPMS. That was in Salem, and soon enough, in about 30 seconds, I had a plug in it, and we're pumping it back up.

Robin: How calm were you and I despite the preparations that everybody else began to make

Brian: Yeah everybody was pulling stuff out yeah and we're like no we got it.

Robin: I went to get my sticky string and the bike was all of a sudden already up in the air and Brian and he's like fixed like okay that's cool thanks man high five want to get a snack and then we're gonna ride and it was like no big deal there was a little bit of not really but just a little bit of that notion of like oh man are we going to be a oh man from everybody else like no no no

Brian: This is not a.

Robin: Problem i know what i'm doing our flow

Brian: Is not interrupted.

Robin: I know that brian knows exactly what he's doing now it's just a matter of whose level of calm beats the other to the punch to fix the situation the one thing i will say the one thing you have that kicks so much ass is you have the i mean it does measure in ryobis but you have the air compressor it's like that always is not i've i've i've reduced my packing to a hand pump which i believe would take me 60 pumps

Brian: Yeah only an hour or so yeah.

Robin: I don't think it would take that long because the more pressure you get the more effective every pump

Brian: Is well we yeah and and we had that thing plugged before it lost much air dale had the uh ryobi maker.

Robin: Oh that was dale yeah

Brian: See, I've got one identical to that, and I brought it with me to a past event, and Dale saw that and thought, hmm, that looks interesting. So he pulled one out. I pulled out my air pump. Neil had an air pump. So air pumps appeared, and we picked a winner. And yeah, we're back on the way. So that was no big deal. Later on, you started to think about this. It was starting to weigh on your mind. And so we made a decision in New Albany, Indiana, for Robin to go directly to his hut by the river. And swap out the rear tire.

Robin: The tire plug is no big deal. I'm not worried about the tire plug at all. I was worried about my tread depth. It was going fast.

Brian: That tire was thin.

Robin: That plus the plug, I was like, let's just get it. I'm right here. I'll go do it. Come say hey to Maggie, everybody. And everybody wants to say hey to Maggie.

Brian: Then Neil had a front tire that had a flat. And that's actually, I think that may be just about the first time I've seen a flat front tire. And again, it had a puncture. We didn't know what the object was. The object wasn't there anymore. So whatever it was, I made a little puncture and a little circle. So we plugged and we pumped and Neil was back on the road. And then I texted Robin's like, if you haven't put that front tire on, I've got a customer for you. It's one of those things that's really strange how it all just like click, click, click, click. Everything slid together and everybody's got a safe tire on. We're all happy. You know, I really felt a lot better with the way I put it was I feel a lot better. Neil has a good front tire on. But if we hadn't had one available, I would, yeah, you'd be fine. You know, it's okay. Yeah, just keep riding. It's fine.

Robin: Ride the way you do.

Brian: Do that voodoo you do. Yeah, and there was some issue, like they had weird french fries somewhere, but that's neither here nor there. So, we don't have an official Tiny Tasty Tooltips. I will say one word to you about torque wrenches. Tecton. Yeah, I've got one and it's sweet.

Robin: That's what I'm getting next. And it's the same rebadged version of what I have, only they are now the keeper of that torch.

Brian: Yeah, I got one from Tecton and it's a clicker. It's not the digital one. And mine's like a quarter inch one. You know, I've got the other sizes from different brands. But yeah, it is very nice. Tecton really does stand behind their stuff. Not a sponsor. Maybe they should be.

Robin: Hey, what else you got?

Brian: Neither here nor there. But I went to see the Doobie Brothers and Carlos Santana on Monday.

Robin: And I'm sorry I wasn't there. I'm sorry I didn't make it. You know, that would have been great. And I wish I had done it. I will say that the whole process of getting into that venue. I'm picturing Ravinia in Chicago, which is like, where are we? I don't know. This is a beautiful garden. Oh, look, the Doobie brothers are on stage and we're going to sit and watch them. I'm just going to sit in this. Oh, this nice person has offered me a chair. Yeah. Okay. Okay. I'm going to have a glass. Oh, you got wine. This is randomly open. And the place where you invited me to go, which I'm grateful for. Don't stop doing that. I really appreciate that you invited me to go to a show. I'm going to return in kind. The same kind of vibe. Let's go see some good music together and hang out. But I will say the venue was like, okay, we're going to need everyone to strip.

Brian: Well, we need an orifice check.

Robin: They are stringent. This sounds like a good, if this is a good band, that means... Them there types of people are going to be here and we need to really give them the full stink fist on investigating whether or not they have a knife up their ass.

Brian: It's not quite that bad, no, but there are a few rules and once you know them, it's no big deal and the staff are super friendly.

Robin: Okay.

Brian: My left leg has an entire erector set of titanium, very expensive, and I always set off metal detectors, so I had to go talk to a lady for a bit. No, basically you have to put all your stuff in a clear bag and you can't have aerosols and you can't bring it you can only bring in a sealed bottle of water, you know let's face it a doobie brothers santana show is, full of like i was bringing the average age way down oh wow it is not what you'd call a rowdy crowd now they are partied out but it was excellent music the doobie brothers sounded wonderful.

Robin: Mcdonald i thought you were taking me to

Brian: Mcdonald's taking it to the streets yeah michael mcdonald was there he sounded wonderful now carlos santana i believe is 78 years old he didn't stand up much or do much, it's more about what he has put together his band was astonishing the amount of energy and the constant and i've i've never i don't think i've ever seen an eight-piece band be that tight it is incredible.

Robin: This i believe

Brian: He just kind of went dude you know like he didn't make any mistakes, but he also, you know, he was doing a 78-year-old version of the fiery 22-year-old that played at Woodstock. So he was there. He was doing his thing. He wasn't making mistakes. You know, he was playing and he talked a little bit. The band was amazing, and the drummer is actually his wife. I've never seen a drummer of any age put out that much energy and precision in my entire life.

Robin: Oh, Cindy Blackman?

Brian: Yeah, they're married. They've been married for 10 years.

Robin: I didn't know that. You know where I discovered her? Lenny Kravitz. That's when I saw her for the first time was she was playing with Lenny Kravitz and just killing it.

Brian: Yeah she's 66 and i've never seen.

Robin: Any maybe 40

Brian: Yeah everybody else got a break and and she was constant through the whole thing it was amazing it was really impressive just calling her out and yeah, everybody in that band though was incredibly knew exactly what they're doing very tight band you know they had a couple of vocalists you know and everything so yeah it was a great show you know there's some old guys out there touring who are old people out there touring who are doing a great job with it. So get out there, see a show, people. It was a fun time.

Robin: Let's try and make sure we do that.

Brian: Like on Sunday, it got rained out. They actually postponed the show by a day. So I went on Monday.

Robin: Oh, that would have been the night that there was a tornado, the second tornado that we experienced in our home at this park. So I had to tell everybody here that we'd gotten to know that, look, we'll give you, I mean, okay, let's be fair. We'll give you nine tornadoes, but then we have to leave. That's how much we like this park. Nine tornadoes, so they've had two now.

Brian: Nice. Are you ready for a really, really, really dumb question of the week?

Robin: You lead the way and I will follow you down this rabbit hole.

Brian: Question from the wild. And I'll just preface this. I'll say the pants. The answer is pants. Some somebody named CE asked, this is a dumb idea. It is, yes. But I want to carry an extra 100 liters of fuel on my bike so I never have to stop. I am well-versed at long-distance riding, so disregard how sore my ass will get.

Robin: That's 26.417

Brian: Gallons 26 gallons of petrol it's really stupid but it's a fun question, so my engineering brain kicked in and i started to really consider this as if it were a real question and and also you know like the people who do the iron butt, they will do things like they'll add on to their gas tank they'll have auxiliary gas tanks but, normally it's more on the order of seven gallons something like that i don't know if they have a rule about it or not But it's not, yeah, you just, you do need to get off the bike or you're going to damage yourself. But anyway, so this is a dumb premise in the first place. So anyway, we look at the weight of this, 100 liters, 26.4 gallons. What we're talking about in American terms is about 165 pounds of gas. You think about what it would take to add a tank and pumps and typing and all that stuff. So let's say you're at about, let's say you end up with about 200 to 220 pounds of gasoline and container. That is doable on a lot of motorcycles, not like a small one, but. People commonly carry passengers at or above that weight. So where my brain went with this was you would need to fabricate a kind of a U-shaped tank. So it's got like these two legs that go down each side and actually rest or they're bolted to the passenger pegs. And then the back part of it sits kind of where the seat would be. So you actually have basically a torso and a couple of legs and it's all a 25-gallon tank.

Robin: This is very much like what Moscow Modo did, except they didn't do the torso part. They had the legs with the knees filled up with fuel. Now, what did John Ryan do? The man who would stop at nothing. Melissa Holbrook Pearson, an amazing book. But John Ryan did something completely bombastic involving what I believe was a propane tank. He sliced and diced and then heavily modified and even got a tank cover for on his Yamaha FJR.

Brian: Oh, that's right. Yeah.

Robin: I'm not sure how much propane is inserted. Like our propane tank of the very same size, I believe that's a five, maybe a 10 gallon. They don't brim it to the top of propane. There has to be air in there to pressurize. So the amount of propane you get is divided by like, it's like two thirds compression, one third the actual product. And maybe I've got that backwards.

Brian: Yeah. If you turn that into a gas tank, you're probably talking about 10 gallons.

Robin: And I'm looking at the picture here.

Brian: Yeah. Yeah, he basically, yeah, kind of looked like a giant, kind of looked like he had a giant tank bag if you're going fast. So something like that is kind of like the outer limits of what actual iron butt people do. You don't, nobody needs to carry that much gasoline in a tank with you. So, or...

Robin: Nobody needs that many clots.

Brian: Yeah, don't do that. That engineering brain doesn't know whether we should do something, but it's more like, can we do something? And I think what you could do is basically you could create something that looks like a robot legs and torso, chuck the passenger seat and bolt it all to the bike. So you've got what looks like a headless passenger sitting behind you, and you've got like pickups and pumps or tubing in the toes. So then what you have is a passenger that starts out around 220 pounds and then slowly gets lighter from the top down.

Robin: Low center of gravity, easier maneuvering.

Brian: Yeah, I've ridden with passengers much, much bigger than that, to be blunt. I shan't elaborate. It's possible. It's doable. So, yeah, this is just barely doable from an engineering standpoint, from a medical standpoint. For God's sake, don't do this. Oh, and the other thing, you could take your, like, robot passenger tank and you could paint it like R2-D2 or make it like a rubber sheep.

Robin: Dude, you're missing a huge opportunity here. You get yourself a fuel-rated, industrial-grade, anatomically correct blow-up doll.

Brian: Perfect, yeah.

Robin: Then you not only have extra fuel, but when you're spending the night somewhere, you've got some company.

Brian: Yeah. You don't get as lonely.

Robin: Take her out, buy her a gallon of fuel. Maybe she's in the mood. Maybe she's not. You know, I'm just saying it's not weird. People do this all the time. And you shouldn't be ashamed, whoever you are. Can we be done with this?

Brian: We're done. And yes, you should be ashamed. Yeah, if you have a titanium ass, that's your own. But yeah, this is dumb. Don't do this. Just make sure your brakes are up to snuff so you don't molotov yourself. If you'd like us to field your intelligent questions.

Robin: Please, love of God,

Brian: Visit email.tro.bike in your web browser and send us a message.

Robin: You ready for segment one?

Brian: Let's do it.

Robin: I'm calling this Sky's the Limit and appending Brian's significant description, which is the Dream Garage. You've won the lottery. Money is not an obstacle. What bikes are you buying? Why? These are our choices. Be them sensible or less than such. Funds are unlimited, but your time is finite. What are the 10 bikes or top 10 in your garage? Now, I see your notes here. I see what you've done to my opportunity to free fall. I've got my list too. They're in my sandbox, Brian, because I'm considerate. However, yours are all spelled out all right there on your sleeve. Let's talk about it. But we have to find a way. I think we both have a lot to say about this. Should we do this as you, then me, or you and we? How do we want to make this work?

Brian: I don't know if you have yours categorized. I haven't looked. I haven't done anything. What's your first category or what's your first bike?

Robin: I'm organized on this. I can give you the smack down really quick about it, or I guess I can slap down my cards on the table real fast here. Now I've got basically 20 bikes, but there's a theme involved here and it'll go faster than you think. So I would first track down every bike I ever owned by cereal and reacquire all of them.

Brian: Nice.

Robin: I want my 1976 Honda CB500T. I want my 1982 Yamaha XS400 RJ Seika. I want my 2003 Suzuki GSF 1200 S Bandit. Epic bike. So much of this website that we run is based on that machine. I definitely want, and I would totally track this machine, my 1988 Honda Hawk GT. With rear sets, I would ditch the headlight. I would put on the clip-ons oh yeah track sexy that thing

Brian: I think you know where that is too yeah.

Robin: I would absolutely retrieve the flagship that expanded this site to new dimensions the 2016 bmw r1200 rs however the leader of the pack would remain i would of course keep my beloved jigsader that would be bike number one in any given writing decision nice Now, hear me out. My typical picks, prospectively predictable. Robin has money. You know I'm probably going to do this. I would have both a Yamaha R6 and R1.

Brian: Matching colors, or would they both? Anyway, go on.

Robin: I have to know which one was which, so probably one would be silver, and the other one would be light silver.

Brian: All right.

Robin: A BMW M1000RR. That is the track-specific version of their S1000RR. And it's super high tier price, you know, I'd probably get a MotoGP exhaust for this thing. So it would just sound wrong. I also have a strange infatuation with the KTM RC 990. I wouldn't really want to work on it, but if I had the money, I would. And then I'd probably screw it up over and over again and just never get to ride it, but always be trying to figure it out. Just keep my brain fresh, you know? And then for you and you specifically, and also this is homage to my friend Mike and certainly Travitron, the 2026 DRZ4S Plus as my dual sport and ADV bike.

Brian: One of us, one of us.

Robin: I would customize it. I would get like really great luggage, bolster the frame and just enjoy that bike to death. I know I would. Now there's some iffiness about it because I don't know how popular that is. I've never really seen them. So maybe I would do the Honda CRF or the Kawasaki KLR or the Yamaha XT but I think the DRZ it was the first one that came to mind is like I can ride over what? curbs with this thing?

Brian: Okay, yeah.

Robin: Now let's have some real fun and I'm telling you the baton's heading back your way.

Brian: All right.

Robin: Like go to Google and click on images. Be ready to have some fun. Here we go. I've got the money. I want to be obscure. First on my list is the MV Augusta F3 Competizione.

Brian: All right. So there's only $300 worldwide. You're going to have to pay up.

Robin: I've got the money. Let's do this. Next on my list, the Lightfighter EV track bike.

Brian: Yeah, I've seen those.

Robin: Definitely you and I have this in common. I saw on your list. You can't just put it out there and not have me cite that you're about to say the same thing. The Norton Manx. Absolutely. The 1961, I want the first year, Honda CB77 Superhawk. It's a toaster tank.

Brian: Nice, yeah.

Robin: The Zero SR-S, which is the most fun I've ever had on a motorcycle. Bar none. I would definitely give it all up to own the Analog Motorcycles 1949 Indian Scout Custom, which I met him. It was his first huge opportunity as a custom motorcycle builder, Tony Proust, when he was building that bike and managed to shake his hand at the International Motorcycle Show when that was still a thing. That bike was so exquisite. So the entire bike is a custom tin steampunk before steampunk was steampunk bike with one true-to-form patinaed engine from 1949. Wow.

Brian: Gorgeous, yeah.

Robin: One thing that inspired this next choice was the loudest motorcycle I heard at a track day with you when I volunteered to ride in yellow group. We were sitting in the classroom, and when Mr. Jason Herheim would do what he does for the novice group, there would be this one bike where we all had to stop and wait in the main street because it was so loud that it actually cracked the mortar in the building, and that was a Ducati. So I looked up, what would I be getting into here? I would love to have the Ducati Desmo Sedici Double R. This is a hate machine with a non-exhaust that is basically a vacuum pipe that's been reversed into a blow pipe. It's a trombone played by an atomic bomb.

Brian: Nice.

Robin: Next up, the EBR 1190RS. This is a strange machine.

Brian: I remember those, yeah. Very rare. Yeah. This is like about the only time Eric Buell put it all into one bike. Yeah, the EBR, Eric Buell Racing, 1190 RS. This was the one time he was let loose to do his thing. And it's glorious.

Robin: Spoke volumes. All of these make the Modus, which is in my list, seem a little bit meh. But it's a V4 and it's transverse. So it's set up like a Guzzi.

Brian: Yeah.

Robin: It's so visceral. Those are Eric Shropshire's words from Quadrant Motors. Look up our episode with Eric. It's fantastic. Last is just comical because sport touring for me started out as a high horsepower machine that can really corner and you can take a briefcase to work. Like the mullet is business in the front party in the back.

Brian: Right.

Robin: This is the Tony Hawk. It's the reversal. This is the party in the front, business in the back. I always wanted a Honda Pacific Coast, but I wanted to insist wearing this white suit with the handkerchief in the pocket, white fedora with a half tilt and the banner around the brim of it, full-on class act. If I could get the DOT fully armored version of that, I would ride around with a cigarette extender speaking like Hunter S. Thompson. Hey, how you doing? It's great to see you. All right. Got my Pacific Coast. I'm going to ride Highway 1 out of California all the way up to Washington. Got to do it. All right. The Tupperware made me think that it could also be a boat. Too much ridiculous in one machine. That's my list, Brian. And now it's your turn. Where are we going with this?

Brian: There there's some interesting parallels and digressions and diversions here i think it's pretty cool, my first three bikes are the what i'm calling i've categorized these i'm calling these the keepers so three positions on this list are taken up by the bikes i currently own and that's because i've i've literally bled on them i know every last nut and bolt they're just the way i want them, and so other than perhaps like i would i may you know upgrade to suspension or or something like that but yeah other than that i'm going to keep these three and those are the first one is you, know it's the classic i've had this bike for nearly 30 years it's a 1983 suzuki gs850g cosmos blue actually is the color.

Robin: I have been left in the dust by that machine countless times

Brian: Second one is a 2005 Kawasaki KLR650. It's wearing a 685 big bore kit, which really perfects that engine. It really makes that bike, wakes it up quite a bit. I hit a deer with it in 2013 and brought it back from the dead with eBay parts. It was moving around on its own power before I was. New wiring harness, whole new front end. The front plastics are all gone, so it's naked. It's got like a headlight that a friend of mine donated you know it's a bit's uh it's beat up it's been everywhere it's been upside down in creeks it's been, through a lot with me and i'm keeping it like i would take it anywhere it runs great it's reliable i could, i could just beat the hell out of it and you know it's just so that's staying with me last one is the most recent arrival is the 2015 yamaha fj09 in fire red i think is the color, but yeah the yamaha has really that was my first step into a modern bike with abs and all that i just love that engine love the cp3 engine, it's everything it's cracked up to be as far as that goes i don't think you've ridden this one robin i we need to fix that at some point.

Robin: I would love that

Brian: Yeah suspensions upgraded it's been flashed it's got it's just the way i want it's got all the luggage i want really love that bike really happy with it it was everything i hoped it would be, so yeah we're keeping those so next up i've got three bikes that i think are really interesting and I would like to try owning them.

Robin: Right to weird.

Brian: Right to weird.

Robin: Right to weird.

Brian: I probably would not end up keeping them for very long. Or maybe I would. I don't know. I'd have to try it and see. But, you know, that's what rich guys can do.

Robin: You know what you could do? You could rent them out on Twisted Road.

Brian: There's a guy who had a Panigale on Twisted Road. I don't know what kind of stones this person's carrying around. But anyway, category is really, really, really, really stupid. And that's got to be the Triumph Rocket 3 Storm R. R is the one with the pegs back where they're supposed to be, not with the cruiser, your boot soles in the wind.

Robin: Birth giver.

Brian: That's the only, yeah, the birth giver. I rode one at the demo days. I cannot believe they just throw the keys to anybody who shows up. It's a ridiculous machine.

Robin: Do you have your permit or did you complete the MSF course in a parking lot? You should try this.

Brian: Yeah, here's 800 pound or 700 pounds, whatever it is. It's really heavy. It's really big. It's got 200 and some horsepower it'll scare the poop out of you and it's kind of awesome, and really the the did i thought about the ducati diavel but it's not really stupid enough because it can actually, be a motorcycle the rocket three is like a like an engine with some wheels on it it's just totally ignorant i love it second one is maybe a little surprising long i call it long legs a honda gold wing, and i'd add specifically the one with a one with a manual transmission I'm not interested in the auto shift stuff Right, yeah, And I get the one with the tour model with the trunk So it's the classic gold wing, The new model, you know, the new one and handles and all that stuff.

Robin: So not the ST, which I know is defunct and not the FJR. I feel like the FJR is a good looking bike. Like that's just a downright sexy machine that is the visually, it's the hotter sister.

Brian: I think when Yamaha finally updates the FJR, it would be definitely in the running.

Robin: As long as they don't ruin it.

Brian: As long as they don't ruin it. As long as they don't make it like automatic only or something. So when I was looking this up, the brand new Goldwing, I looked at this model. It's only available in this absolutely god-awful reddish-maroon color with like these 1970s, drug van wood-look panels. Yeah, it's awful. So I would either need to have it repainted or I'd buy a previous year model in something like blue or something. I'm serious. The current one is just offensive-looking. And the category of strange, I think I'd have to get as strange as I could, would be the Norton Manx R. Yeah. The one with the fairing, normally I like the naked bikes or semi-naked, but the Manx that's the naked version just looks mistaken. Something's wrong with that. And the other thing, I don't even know if this is a real bike yet. Can you actually buy these? Are people riding these? Are people putting them in their living rooms? It's unknown. Is it vapor? So next, okay, so those are all kind of like, yeah, I'll see what they're like and see what happens. The next three are absolute locks. I will go to the dealer, respective dealers, the very next day. And write big checks. Okay, round and round. Now, here's the thing. I've got a lot of damage in one knee and so forth. So the true, really, really, really dedicated sport bikes are kind of off the list for me. You know, maybe as a rich guy, I can get some good physical therapy, get that taken care of, but whatever. First choice here is the Yamaha YZF-R9 in blue for a track bike. So make a dedicated track bike out of a brand new YZF-R9. That's the same engine I really love in my FJ09. It's the same three-cylinder. I think I could make the ergonomics work for 20 minutes at a time, possibly. Not five-year-proven, yeah. And also, you know, the toy hauler and everything to haul it around in. I think I could do that. Next one is a hooligan bike. And again, I rode this at the Triumph Demo Day. And it's a Triumph Scrambler 1200. And here's the important part, XE. XE stands for the upgraded Olin suspension and Brembo brakes. The engine is the same. You know, it's 1,200cc parallel twin. You know, it's got some stoke to it. It's fine. But the suspension on this thing is just magical, and you can just ride over stuff, and you can just be a complete dick.

Robin: I was going to say, this looks like it'll just turn you into an asshole.

Brian: Yeah, but, you know, I'm a rich guy. I've got lawyers for that, right? Yeah, right. So that one there is an absolute lock. One of the things, though, is the color schemes that are available in 2026. I don't like them at all. last year they had like a really cool orange you've got money what i would either do is is make a range of swap with somebody i'll pay you a whole bunch of money you poor person, to swap your orange tank and body work with this, crappy khaki whatever it is you know they have this year that's a lock going to the dealer writing a check, riding home on that with the front wheel in the air and my ass on fire and the last one for and these this is this is a lock a yamaha tenera 700 in blue, you know dual sport bike and it's about the size and weight of a klr with about double or triple the horsepower and really good suspension and then i would also order up a set of wheels from woody's wheel works i'd order up a set of the tubeless spoked wheels, because the one mistake yamaha made on this bike is they gave it tubes and, tires i'm not having it anymore i'm over it Like I would probably even put tubeless wheels on the KLR.

Robin: There are things worth reminiscing of, you know, moment to moment. But when they pick the worst, be like, remember when this was a total pain in the ass? Wasn't that? No.

Brian: I'm not scared of tubes. I know tubes. I've been among them. I've changed, I don't know how many at the side of the road. Pinched one or two. I hate them. It comes from a place of knowledge, it's hatred. Anyway, number 10 on my list was the Modus MSTR. You don't say. This is the one with the bags and the color I want is super blue. Modus had this really just, kick-ass obnoxious blue.

Robin: Oh yeah it is saccharine blue

Brian: I'd basically have to scour the internet find the best modus mstr in blue that i want yeah along the way i'll buy up a bunch of a bunch of other bikes for parts or whatever i don't know.

Robin: Just to complement your concept here i will say that since they only really delorean one thing i don't see any modus without the luggage including a top case if you wanted one it's like i see it as that was part of the package that just didn't have enough momentum

Brian: Yeah and it's it's a that's what it was made for sport touring that's what we're all about and so yeah i want to see what all the fuss is about yeah man, and that was on your list too so i'm glad to create my sink alike so i've got a number 11 on my top 10 because i'm rich and i can do what i want rude rude well you had like 20 i did, so and and also the manx i I don't know if that's real or not yet. We don't know.

Robin: It is coming soon, according to their website.

Brian: Yeah, it's a vapor. If they show up, whatever. So I put this into something red, but it's not really that red. It's the Ducati Desert X Discovery. So this is a dual sport bike with the luggage. And I believe this is the one with the V2 engine. It's not the big engine. So this is a little lighter, a little more nimble. I'm really not interested in riding a moose off-road yeah let's see what this uh euro bike stuff is all about and go places far away i know it's the time we're gonna be done, the issues there are the windscreen if i can't do something about that i don't like windscreens if it doesn't work the way i want or if it buffets me then i'm gonna punt it to just do something else and, The styling, I mean, Ducatis are usually red and gorgeous and sexy. This one has got like this busy sticker white paint with red stickers. It looks absolutely awful. It looks like a seed corn ad.

Robin: I've never really seen an ADV bike that didn't look like a bottle opener.

Brian: Yeah, kind of.

Robin: Swiss Army something, two wheels.

Brian: Yeah, and if I really can't stand it, then the street version, which is a Multistrada V2, and again not the one with the big big engine not the 200 horsepower, nuts on fire one but the the v2 engine might be the move there we're just speculating right.

Robin: Yes part of me is hoping that you have some secret and that i don't know it and that you're just gonna like all of a sudden be like look robin i haven't told you this but i won the lottery 20 years ago here are all of your bikes

Brian: Here they are.

Robin: In a solid gold rocket car. Yeah.

Brian: I had a guy track down the VINs of all these other, yeah.

Robin: Before this whole idea started, which I blame Travis for.

Brian: Yeah, the idea did come from Travis. So yeah, we do have to give credit.

Robin: It was a Travis plan. When I started thinking about who I am, my type, it's like every bike that I had chosen To date. I chose for a reason and maybe not the first two, but after that I was like, no, no, no. I need to get what I'm really all about here. You start figuring out who you are. And that sort of sculpted my approach. I was like, you know, I knew that I was going to want some things that were just like impossibly obscure because I wouldn't have to give a shit. I could start tinkering, not understand, fumble over my approach to the factory service manual and then and be like, hey, personal mechanic, Jay Leno this shit for me. Back to snuff. I want to write it. You know, and there's also, oh, I love a committee. So the flip side of this mindset is my actual struggle, which is that motorcycling as a profession is a Borderline impossibility if you don't have some kind of mogul level investments elsewhere. And I don't. So everything we do on this show, everything we do for the website, which is, if I'm being bossy about it, it's my bitch. My website, the podcast, anybody who's ever been an anchor on this show, it's theirs as well, yourself included. If I reel this back in, let me think here. I'm trying to say that with limited resources and high aspirations, you actually kind of behave in a similar fashion when it comes to the word committee. If I'm going to work on my bike, the risk of not having a bike, if it's enough to Give me the shakes and shimmies about doing the work, which Brian knows, the listenership knows, my bikes don't go to dealerships for service. I service them or a friend helps me service them so that I then understand. That's always been the case. Well, If you're rich and have reckless abandon, you could probably order two of every bike. That way, basically, you have one to ride after you bust another that you hand to your mechanic to fix it. But the committee is everything. Committee, it is a staple in the mechanically snug mindset of I can do this myself. Checking with the support tree of people like, hey, man, I know how to change a damn tire. I don't know why I'm freaking out right now, but right now I'm freaking out and I got to change this tire. It's because you think you've forgotten something. That's me in this world. But the rich me is like, I don't even care if I forgot anything. And then somebody says, hey, by the way, your bike no longer has an engine. You're going to need to fix that. You're going to have to take it out.

Brian: You're going to have to put that back. Yeah.

Robin: Yeah.

Brian: You're touching on something where, so we talked about bikes and we can also talk about things like what experiences would you have? And a lot of the experiences are the ones that didn't take much money. The best experiences are the ones where you and I have gotten together, where I've gotten together with friends where we have this, like this rally in Brown County is a peak experience every year and it's really, really cheap. Yeah. That's the thing. You'd still need to have those. You'd need to, you know, you, your friends would need to be part of your life. That's a big part of it too. I definitely do things like a lot more track days, a lot more education, learning, things like that. I'd get a lot more instruction. Okay. So you've got your dream garage. What are your dream experiences now that you're a rich guy what are your peak experiences.

Robin: You want to have that conversation

Brian: Yeah like my bucket list is edelweiss tour in europe okay, God, what are they up to now? $15,000, something like that? It's a lot of money. It's not like unattainable money, but it's a lot. Brett DeCax runs these tours in Nepal and India. I mean, you know, there's all kinds of experiences out there that take either someone working hard and saving up or someone just has a lot of money.

Robin: I want to ride the route that I designed for Spain. The customer hired TRO to develop the route for them and it went through Spain and bridged into various portions of Europe. They had everything they needed to do it. That's the one where we found the tennis court. So there's this amazing mountain road with nothing for 100 miles, but 50 miles in at the actual dividing point of that section is a random dirt pull-off and a tennis court. There's nothing else in the whole mountain. But okay, so here's my concept is money's no object. I wouldn't name any brands. I would start with just, who needs this? I will employ you to exist. You know, come up with a carefully thought out list of friends and say like, look, you're going to take some personal time and you might get fired. And if you do get fired, you're going to work for me because I'm not going to let that happen. But we're going to get on motorcycles and we're going to begin traveling. And there is nothing that we can't buy our way out of less a tragedy on the road in some obscure location. The point is, you know, if we do all the United States just because that's the United States. Just going to go to everywhere and pay our way through it. But we're going to try to do everything ourselves, except for when we absolutely cannot.

Brian: Well, and that's kind of exactly what Neil Peart did in Rush. Yeah, well, yeah. They had a pair of BMWs on the truck, and he employed a friend of his to keep those bikes ready at all times. And if it wasn't snowing too hard, they would ride to the next city when they were on tour. And his only job was to keep those bikes ready to go wherever the next stop was off they'd go that's the life that would be cool.

Robin: You know what there's a great quote by jimmy carr somebody asked him how much money do you have he kind of paused he says i have a hundred money but then he makes the point ask yourself and i've answered this several times i've answered this on days that have been absolutely terrifying for the life I'm living. The constant cliff's edge that I stand on that seems to move forward every time I take a step forward. This constant nervous danger of what does the future really have in store for me? I have some skill, I have some smarts, and I have some ideas, but the question becomes, if I had millions, is there anything truly obvious that I would change about how I am doing life? If the answer is no, I am rich. And it's because of Regular access to happiness maybe it's not like i'm not empowered to select the exact kind of happiness i want at any given point money can't solve all your problems there's this great instagram post where the dude's like literally every problem i have could be solved with money it's true you know this is this is a reality of the thing where you get steered by your own life's narrative but your decisions they landed you where you are are you still making decisions that reflect who you are. If you are, you're probably doing better than most. Chris Cornell, if you've got a plate of food in front of you, you've got a roof over your head, maybe you have a vehicle, you have people that care about you, you're probably doing better than most, but maybe not as good as some. Those are genuinely the lyrics from his last album before he decided to leave. I'm trying to hold on to that. We all want success.

Brian: What you're saying in a nutshell is for us, anyway, motorcycles are happiness.

Robin: Yeah.

Brian: Basically, I do what I'm doing, except more is about the only, you know what I mean? That's about it. Yeah.

Robin: I would do exactly what I'm doing with a bit more of a perhaps selfish approach to charitable acts. Somebody's going to get the benefit of my existence or like somebody's going to reap the rewards of me being able to help. But it's going to take a long ass time for me to get there because I'm going to do it on my damn terms on my two-wheel machine. I'm going to take the worst route to wherever the problem is and just absolutely forget about the problem until I get there. And they'll be like, oh, yeah. All right, let's set up some housing. Let's get some education going. Pass out some good books. You know, let's change the world. But I think about that now and then. It's like, maybe that's something I'd like to get into more.

Brian: It's not just happiness. It's about having meaning.

Robin: But think about this. You've been excessively good, humble, kind, ego-free. Well, except for your subconscious. I think your subconscious has an ego that absolutely wrecks me on the regular. Like he said some shit under his breath that absolutely destroyed, derailed my entire perspective of myself let me say this opposite your goodness to people in general no matter the mindset i've definitely hurt people i didn't want to i'm clumsy i'm slow i'm reactionary but the older we get the wiser we get we can actually start self-awareness authenticity motorcycling actually is what brought these words to the table right now where you and I have this conversation. I might be able to come up with a way where, despite my efforts to boast being some kind of motorcycling professional, which I am not, I might actually still be able to go out and do something that is actually beneficial to the world around me. Where is the problem? How can I help? Why not get into some of that? What harm is there? Why not abandon us versus them?

Brian: Nice. Musings on living a life well. I was thinking, boy, this would be fun. You went beyond that to having a sense of purpose, which that's important. I have a lot of that. I get a lot of that through my career and what I do. I've only managed to tie it with together with motorcycles tangentially a few times, but it has happened. And it's very cool. All right.

Robin: Let's Brian, you want to say the words?

Brian: Let's get out of here.