Some of the whiners (whingers?) need to just accept the fact that there are serious bikers who still ride all they can, despite physical ailments and handicaps, but are limited in how much they can manage in a day. Just knock off the "real men ride their bikes everywhere" crap. At 78 years of age I still love riding my Nortons, even if I can't manage more than a couple hundred miles in a day, and that's on a good day. I really admire folks like Jim who regularly ride over a 1,000miles to get to a rally, and the same to return. And I have met guys my age who still ride cross country to get to a Norton rally. But we can't all do that, and I"m talking can't, not won't. I'm enjoying all the bike rides and rallies I can as I get more feeble, but if I want to be able to attend the rallies that aren't in my area, I have to trailer my bike. It's not a character defect, just a fact of getting older (and wiser and more mature, of course). When I was first road racing there was a racer with only one hand ( and a stub on the other side) who had his bike set up so he could still race. We need to celebrate folks who keep riding in the face of adversity, not piss and moan because they aren't doing the iron butt thing.
You might conclude that I'm a bit touchy about this subject, and you'd be right. I'm hoping to keep riding my Nortons well past 80, god willing and the creed don't rise, and it really annoys me when I trailer my bike so I can do an event, and get snarky comments about it from some .... (fill in your favorite pejorative here).
Wow. I feel much better now.
Ken