Gear With A Story

This entry is part 29 of 24 in the series Adventure Rider Issue #3

A few old dogs let the cat out of the bag. Some of their equipment has a story of its own.

TF’s AXO kneeguards

“I don’t know how it happened,” thesaurused AdvRiderMag’s editor, “but I was given these kneeguards in the mid-1990s sometime. I never liked them. They were never comfortable, they make me sweat like a rapist and most of the elastic straps busted and fell off maybe 15 years ago. I don’t know why, but I’m still wearing them. Any time I’m not wearing my CTi knee braces, I still wear these poxy things. They do offer great protection, and I’m at the point where I just wear them without thinking.”

John Hudson’s camera

The APC Rally’s head honcho has a camera that seems determined to stick around.

“The first time I lost it was on a Simpson crossing,” 1190ed Homer. “I photographed a mate riding up a dune and must’ve dropped the snapper in the dust. Some time later some four-wheel drivers found it and took it back to their home in Hervey Bay. They had a look at the pics and asked a policeman friend to see if he could find the owner of the bike in the images. The copper traced the rego number on my mate’s bike and contacted him in Darwin. The mate told the copper where to find me, and the camera arrived in the mail three months after I lost it.”

If that’s not amazing enough, on the recent Byron BaySteep Point crossing, John snapped a couple of pics of Craig Hartley fuelling up. John put the camera on his rear guard and, caught unawares when Craig roosted off, roosted off after him, once again dumping the Panasonic in the desert dust.

A few kilometres down the trail Hartley realised he’d lost a loose fuel cap and the pair went back looking for it. The cap was found, and lying within a few metres was the forgotten Panasonic.

Craig Hartley’s helmet

“I have a Shoei helmet that near rips my ears off every time I take it off,” explained the Desert Dingo. That’s all Craig told us. He doesn’t say much.

Geoff Ballard’s iPhone-friendly gloves

“All my life I’ve been really fussy about gloves,” says Australia’s ISDE veteran. “In the early days when there weren’t any good gloves I hardly wore them at all, and in fact used to ride most special tests without them.

“Nowadays they’re a lot better of course, and they come with pretty thin palm material on them that I really like, but I still go crazy with my old, worn-out favourites.

“Here’s my current adventure riding gloves and they’re just ‘ripe’ and in their prime! I just love ‘em!

“And bugger me if they don’t work fantastic when I pull up to check out what’s happening on my iPhone.”

What about the chills of winter, we wondered?

“With the double-up ‘softie specials’,” grinned GB, “I use heated grips as well as hand covers. I’m soft, but I can feel everything!”

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