"Houston We Have a Problem!!"

Well it had to happen eventually. I was riding along Rte 40 west of Steamboat Springs, CO slightly after I took this picture. Life was good and I was enjoying the dry cool temperatures that roughly 7,000 feet of elevation provide. My favorite tune "My Girl: by the Temptations was playing on the XM radio and I was just singing along enjoying the scenery! On one of the few upgrades, I went to pass a tractor trailer that was in an added slow vehicle lane and I goosed the gas a little to complete the pass before his lane went away. The engine revs went up, but the bike speed did not... NOT GOOD. The clutch is slipping. This is not the place to have an equipment failure as the closest BMW dealer is in Salt Lake City which is almost 350 miles away. ARGH! At times like these all sorts of things start going through your head. I had serviced my bike before I left on the trip and put in all new fluids. Including the hydrolic clutch. My bike has almost 63K miles on it and I woncer how many miles a clutch is supposed to last? When the bike was new a rear main seal had failed and oiled down the clutch. The dealer replaced the seal but did not replace the clutch, as they said a good cleaning is all that was needed. Could that oil have caused an earlier than normal failure? Did I do something wrong when changing fluids? Will this thing hold out until can get it to Salt Lake? The clutch had felt a little wierd for that last 1,000 miles, but everything seemed to work fine??? My mind was spinning. Well I knew one thing, this was no place to have to call a tow truck and I sure as heck was not going to try to continue to my destination of Delta Utah and poise to cross Rte 50 named "The loneliest road in America". Pure desert and me as buzzard bait! Not this dude... No decision to make, call ahead to BMW of Salt Lake and try to limp this thing in for service. I called the dealer while stopped for lunch and talked first to Mindi. WOW are these people friendly. She transferred me to service and I spoke to Josh. He quickly checked to see if they had the expected parts and if anything needed to be ordered to be able to do the service. They all could not have been nicer and my blood pressure went down about 30 points. A man and his wife sitting at the table next to me said they had overheard my conversation (do I REALLY talk that loud? :-) )They asked what route I planned to take to Salt Lake. My answer was "the one my GPS says is the shortest. They cautioned me that if I took 40 up to I-80 I would have several pretty good climbs to the ski resort area of Park City before descending into Salt Lake. They suggested that I divert at Heber and take 183 down to Provo, UT and then take I-15 up to Salt Lake. It would be all down hill or level with no climbs to contend with. At the time I was debating adding the few extra miles vs the GPS route. I decided to take their advice ad boy did I appreciate it later. I never would have made it to the dealership had I attempted any kind of a climb at all. The clutch was getting worse by the mile. I hunkered down behind the windshield to reduce wind resistence, turned off the tunes and shifted and played the throttle like I was juggling a crystal vase. My eyes were almost always on the tach to see the slightest little sign of slippage and I tried to manage momentum to use down hills to almost coast up little inclines. All designed to keep the clutch locked up to the engine speed and minimize any slipping. Riding this way with total concentration for 350 miles was as hard as anything I have ever done on a bike.