Here's something that tells you exactly how loved this road is: the curves have names. Not numbers on a sign — names, handed down by riders, for the corners with character, or teeth, or a habit of biting. Roll through here and you'll meet a whole cast of them. There's Crud Corner, and Gravity Cavity, where the pavement seems to drop out from under you. There's Copperhead, and Beginner's End — and you can guess what tends to happen to beginners right about there. There's one called Brakes Are For Losers, which is either a joke or a dare depending on your good sense; read it as a joke.
Wheelie Hell, Hog Pen, Shady Lane, Sunset Corner — dozens of them, each one earned. And that's the thing about naming a curve: you only do it for a road you love and ride again and again, until you know it the way you know an old friend's moods. Nobody names the corners on the interstate. But out here, riders have run these same turns so many thousands of times that the good ones and the mean ones all got christened, like landmarks in a country you can only see at speed. You won't spot the names on any sign — but now you're in on them.
Photo: llahbocaj from nyc · CC BY 2.0
