COG CATASTROPHE

How is it that you can park a bike for the winter, go to ride it in the spring, and discover that it has developed a mysterious fault while sitting idly in the garage? When I parked my beloved Moto Guzzi Eldorado at the end of 2017 it was running well. If it seemed a little hesitant to engage first gear occasionally, I put it down to the foibles of respectable old age and hard use. We were closing in on 100,000 miles, 65,000 of which I had personally added since I bought it in 2008. I had no reason to think that I was about to encounter a major issue.

Despite the deep snow in the Ontario bush and the sub-zero temperatures, the 26 of January 2018 brought clear roads – clear enough at least for a quick sixty mile loop to remind me that, after a couple of months of being housebound by the weather, I could still ride. I