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| | | To Stunt or not to stunt! : Preview |  Written: 25/04/2007 : 15:10. Read 26281 times (16/day). | William Shakespeare knew nothing of the art of motorcycle stunting. Neither did Hamlet, but Craig Jones certainly do. I met up with stunt man extraordinaire Craig Jones in the rotten state of Denmark (Shakespeare said it, not I). I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to be or not to be at this rather hurried event, but I wanted to stunt and that prevailed!
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I agreed to fly on short notice after speaking to Craig Jones on the phone where he promised me one-to-one tuition on the art of being a stuntman. Craig was preparing for a big stunt show at a major Harley-Davidson dealership in Denmark and invited the press to a preview and tuition ahead of the event itself. Doing wheelies, stoppies and burnouts all day; how could I refuse!
Craig Jones (38) has been and is one of the worlds leading stuntmen on motorcycles for the last 7 years. His merits include winning the 2002 European stunt championship, being Angelina Jolie’s stunt double in the first film about Lara Croft and two world records for the longest stoppies. At 208km/h Jones squeezed the front brake on his Buell to achieve a 266 metre long rolling stoppie! With partner Wing (Wing Tat Chui) from Hong Kong wrapped around the front wheel Craig did another world record on the front wheel at Donington Park in 2006. This time riding 305 metres on the front wheel on his Buell XB12R Firebolt! Both records are in the Guinness book of world records.
Today the factory sponsored stunt rider travels the world with his Buell Trilogy tour. The tour explains in depth about why Buell motorcycles are perfect stunt bikes and about the stunts themselves. Craig uses the word “stuntology” to describe what he is doing with Buell. You will not find that word in the dictionary. Buell motorcycles feature ideal ergonomics and mass centralisation. Plenty of torque to help hoist those wheelies and a direct throttle control. Oil reservoir in the swinging arm and the compact design prevents the engine from oil starvation when Craig is doing a vertical burnout or wheelie and the 375mm rim mounted six pot front brake makes doing stoppies a breeze.
Craig Jones on Wing Tat Chui: “He is actually crazier than me!” “At Donington park in England I carried 305 metres with Wing on the front” “It’s a long, long way!” -2006 World record.
Craig Jones on Buell motorcycles: “It’s a dry sump system so the oil is in the swinging arm and it doesn’t matter whether the bike is flat or vertical. It always gets a flow of oil around the engine and that means that I can stand the bike up without worrying about oil starvation.” “It looks different; it sounds different and has made me different during the last 7 years” “I love the bikes, they are fantastic!” On instant wheelies: “The beauty of a Buell engine is that the torque enables that to happen”
Craig Jones on the Buell Trilogy Tour: “Being calm and cool and collected on a bike is all part of being able to stay in control” “You will surprise yourself of how far you can push your bike with your existing ability” “Everyone has got it in them, you just have to extract it out of there” “The Trilogy Tour is all about pushing people a little bit further.”
Craig Jones on his stunt shows: “I’m just a showman, perform, perform, perform and you just go into an automatic mode.” Crashing: “A little accident now and again-Don’t I get a round of applause for that?” Stoppies: “By keeping the top part of my body rigid I am making myself part of the bike. I can just do this one handed if I want.”
Craig Jones on Harley-Davidson: “Some of the things that I do on a Harley-Davidson, they were not designed to do that” “The engineers in Milwaukee shook their heads seeing the underside of the Harley stunt bikes and said that they now need to start looking at the styling underneath”
Craig performs stunts on a variety of Buell and Harley-Davidson motorcycles-Standard and modified. Our day together was spent on his modified XB12S Lightning. Modifications include: Wheelie bar, wide motocross handlebar, thumb rear brake, double set of extra foot pegs mounted on the front fork for Wing to stand on, Remus muffler and crash protection on the frame that contains fuel. Lights and mirrors have been removed and pressure in the tyres reduced by a bar or so. That’s your stunt bike!
But to start to Stunt you need to know some basic rules :
Rule number 1: Use all your safety gear. If you are not a professional freestyle madman, there is no reason whatsoever not to wear a helmet, leather suit, gloves with good knuckle and palm protection, boots and very importantly: a back protector!
Rule number 2: Find somewhere safe away from traffic with a lot of space to all sides. Check the tarmac first for oil spills, patches of water, gravel etc.
Rule number 3: Make sure your bike is in top shape, warmed up engine, tyres and suspension. Stunts can and will wear out you bike quicker than thousands of miles of ordinary riding.
Rule number 4: Bring a mate to call for ambulance, get food and drinks etc. No good being injured, hungry or thirsty when you need all your brain capacity to manoeuvre your motorcycle. Leave girlfriend/boyfriend at home.
So you are now ready to stunt, so tomorrow Motorcyclists-online will gives you the first lesson from Craig Jones : The Wheelie.
Words: Tor Sagen/Photography: TBC
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(not translated yet) PARTENARIAT : DU NOUVEAU SUR LE POLE MOTOS à CHALON SUR SAONE
