anyone have a friend who crashed one of these?

[Stig / Major Tom]

In Texas I watched a friend put one on the hood of a car.*
His first attempt at doing a wheely.

Story goes - Kawasaki learned that they needed to have the dealers give new owners a safety class on this bike.

Stig

* he wasn't injured. by the time the bike came back to earth he was long dismounted!

[Neil955i]

Not that one Stig, but I did low side a ZXR750 on a roundabout trying to get my knee down. Only damage was to my street cred and a scrape on the Kawa’s fairing! 

I did later master dragging the knee, but stiff arthritic joints mean it’s been a good few years since I tried such heroics! (My old leathers with well worn knee sliders are still in the garage, just in case.)

[Stig / Major Tom]

It has been more than half a century... but if I  correctly recall the conversation - these 3's had something like 60 hp...and the bike was light. Maybe too light?
Not familiar with the power curve of a 500 2-stroke..... it apparently startled new riders🙃
Stig

[Iahawk]

bad brakes, bad handling and peaky power that comes on all at once...a challenging combination! (but one I'd love to try...)

[randyo]

I recall a story of a friend's brother that had a Kawi 750 triple  wheelied up on the trunk of the car in front of him when the light turned green, tried driving right over the roof

lot of helium in that front tire

[Neil955i]

Not familiar with the power curve of a 500 2-stroke..... it apparently startled new riders🙃
Stig

Me neither as the only 2T I ever owned was a BSA Bantam and it didn't have a power band so much as a rubber band!

[Stig / Major Tom]

BTW, were they all of them white that first year?
I seem to remember it as a white blurrrr as my buddy tried to ride it.
Heading off to S.E.Asia soon - few of us were particularly careful with our bikes.
My teen wife crashed my first one - fortunately it was stolen soon after - so, as a mature teen myself - I bought a bigger one.
Stig