My First Ride On The Dragon
Author Note: If you haven’t read Part 1 of this article yet, I urge you to take a few minutes to read that first, to give you some context.
My first encounter with the Tail of the Dragon was back in 2007 at a Triumph press launch for the Sprint ST and Daytona 675. We stayed at a beautiful lodge in the mountains above Gatlinburg, TN.
The way these events work is that there are usually 2 or 3 “waves” of journalists who attend in groups of 10 or 12. So the first wave will arrive on a Tuesday and assemble at the hotel throughout the day. Cocktails at 6, and there’s usually a walk around the bikes, with their PR people and engineers giving a talk about the bikes and answer questions, followed by dinner. The ride starts on Wednesday morning, led by a Triumph team member or two, on a prearranged route, and there’s a chase vehicle that follows behind the group. Stops for refreshments and lunch are scheduled in, and the ride returns to the hotel by late afternoon. Again cocktails and conversations about the day’s ride, followed by dinner. By then, the second wave of journalists have flown in during the day on Wednesday and are at the hotel to welcome back the first wave riders, who will leave the next morning and the second group will take the same ride.
I was in the second wave, so I was at the hotel to greet the riders coming back from that day’s ride. And as they came back, the group was all abuzz about the events that took place.
Triumphs lined up at the lodge.
It seems that while riding on the fabulous roads that lead to and from the Dragon, some of the riders in the group got separated from each other, which is not unusual. It was before GPS, but they all had maps, and the route was not very complicated. But one guy (I’ll call him Jack . . . short for Jackass) fell quite a bit behind, whether intentional or accidentally. At some point he decided to catch up to the group. So he began to speed up and got frustrated by the slower moving traffic on the two lane roads. “Jack” began to pass cars and other traffic by crossing the double yellow lines and passing on the left and right at breakneck speeds. Apparently, some of the folks he blew past were startled and other drivers got the crap scared out of them. Someone among them called the police on Jack for riding like a crazy man.
The police dispatched a squad car to find Jack, and shut him down. The squad car was coming from the opposite direction, and as the cop came around a turn he saw Jack cross the double yellow at a speed that far exceeded the posted limit. The cop went past the bike, turned the squad car around and gave chase with his lights and siren blaring. This is where things got interesting. Seems our young journalist decided not to pull over, and that he would try to outrun the cop car and get away from him. But he didn’t realize that there we no side roads or even driveways to pull into to try to hide for miles. While his bike was pretty fast, it couldn’t outrun the cop’s radio. So a few more miles down the road, he came upon two police cars blocking the road with the cops standing behind them, guns drawn.
I guess that was Jack’s first “OH SH*T” moment.
Apparently an officer shouted, “GET OFF THE BIKE, TAKE OFF YOUR HELMET, GET ON YOUR KNEES, AND PUT YOUR HANDS BEHIND YOUR HEAD! SON, YOU’RE GOING TO JAIL!”
“Jack” couldn’t help himself… could he?
Then Jack tried to explain that he’s a journalist with a group from Triumph and he was just trying to catch up to the group of bikes because he got left behind on their way to the Dragon. A few minutes later the Triumph chase truck arrived upon this scene. The driver got out of the truck to find out what’s going on, and the cops yelled to him to stay back. He finally explained who he was, and tried to help the situation. But the cop said he was impounding the motorcycle, and they could pick it up at the police station. The Triumph driver protested and said the bike belonged to Triumph, not Jack, and they needed it. So he was able to load the bike onto the truck, and follow the squad car to the police station.
In the meantime, as soon as Jack told the cops as he was on his knees that the rest of the group he was trying to catch up with was headed to the Dragon, they radioed ahead to alert their pals what was happening. They stationed several cars with radar guns to greet the group. So 4 or 5 other journalists were pulled over and received expensive speeding tickets along the Dragon route. Fortunately for those guys, none were caught crossing the double yellow.
Now, lets get back to our original knucklehead, Jack. He was hauled off to a jail cell, and the Triumph representative followed him. As it turns out, some of the roads to and from the Dragon are in National Parks or National Forests. Therefore crimes committed on them are FEDERAL crimes. And they had a laundry list of charges including excessive speed, crossing the double yellow line, reckless driving, reckless endangerment, fleeing from law enforcement, so on and so on. In order to get him out of jail, he needed $5,000 in cash by midnight, or the next morning he’d be hauled off to a federal prison in Asheville, NC.
The banks were closed, and ATM machines can’t help to assemble that amount of money. Fortunately, the owner of the lodge we were staying at scraped up the cash to bail him out. And when the guys who got the speeding tickets returned to the lodge, they were not too happy to learn that their colleague was the one who spilled the beans about where he was going and who he was trying to catch up to.
It was an interesting dinner that night and drinks afterwards, to say the least.
Sampling the 2007 Triumph Speed Triple. Love that sexy single-sided swingarm.
The pre-ride speech from the Triumph reps the next morning was stern, and went something like this:
“Well folks, you’ve all heard about the events from yesterday. Therefore, it is important to remind you that today, we will be observing ALL traffic laws. There will be NO SPEEDING, NO CROSSING THE DOUBLE YELLOW LINE, NO questionable riding or passing, and NO SPITTING, NO LITTERING, or any other unseemly acts. THEY KNOW WE’RE HERE. THEY WILL BE VIGILANT, AND ALL OF YOU WILL BEHAVE.”
As it turned out I learned that Jack had to stay behind for a couple of days (at his expense), hire a local lawyer at great expense, who got the judge to allow him to return to California, and that the rest of the legal proceedings could occur without Jack having to fly back to appear in court personally. But it cost Jack somewhere near $20,000 for his reckless behavior. I’m quite sure that it was a long time before Triumph invited Jack to another event, if ever again, and I also believe it hurt his career.
Rolling on the Dragon with the 2007 Sprint ST. Fantastic motorcycle.
As for MY ride on the Dragon, I found the Sprint ST to be very enjoyable. A damp drizzle throughout the day helped to keep speeds down, and while I was focused on the road, I couldn’t help wondering how the hell they even built a road like this and I also wondered how far it would be from beginning to end as the crow flies. 5 or 6 miles maybe? But I found all the roads leading to and from the Dragon were much more entertaining with speed limits much higher, and the curves in the road long sweepers, so you could get into a rhythm with the road and really enjoy the ride, and evaluate the bikes.
So if you’re planning a trip to that area, don’t be a jerk. Relax and enjoy the ride. Nobody has ever won a trophy for SLAYING THE DRAGON.
Ken “Hawkeye” Glassman
*Top cover photo: the 2007 Triumph Daytona 675. I didn’t ride this one through Deals Gap, but had to share a photo of it, such a beautiful motorcycle.
Hawkeye, I really enjoyed your article. Having ridden the dragon many times when I was younger. My father lived outside of Asheville in a town called Weaverville 100 miles away from the dragon. And so when I would ride my Buell down to visit him, I would also go to the dragon. I bought the Buell in 98 so it was sometime after then early 2000 on this trip to the dragon. I came upon a Harley Road King that had fallen down through the trees from a road higher up and was engulfed in flames burning on the shoulder of the roadway. A sheriff was directing traffic to go around It. And I took pictures of it which I have somewhere. I will find them and send them to you. The rider was nowhere in the area when I came apon this scene. Using poor judgment on the dragon does have a price. I was able to discern that it was a Road King by the shape of the fiberglass saddle bags. Hope all is well with you, Sincerely Kenny Weinstein
Woodstock Illinois
Hey Ken, THANKS for taking the time to write. I appreciate your kind words. The other time I rode the Dragon was with my Triumph America, which YOU made sure was roadworthy, and running in tip-top shape, when you ran the Service Dept at Woodstock Triumph. Hope life’s good for you, too.
Great example of what not to do on a road like the Dragon, especially when your actions are tied to your future income. I have ridden this road many times and have seen examples of the best and worst riding behaviors. Crazy riding has consequences. If not immediately, in time for sure. Thanks for the article.
Hey Jeff, thanks for writing.. Seems like you have a curse. You live close enough to ride the Dragon often, which is a good thing. BUT it also means you’re on it often enough to endure the many idiots who are attracted to that road like bees to honey. At least you’re hip to being extra vigilant for avoiding their antics. Just be careful out there.