Half Throttle Racing

I arrived at the track about 6:15 to find the gates closed and a couple of transports ahead of me in line. Turns out these days the gate does not open till 7:00 on practice days as well as race days. Once in, I found a spot in the back of the pro pits against the tree line and grass and started setting up my pit area. It was raining and everything was muddy and dirty, I hate dirt.

Everything is setup so I took my fairing lower off to get the bike ready for tech inspection. Before I headed off for bike tech I ran my gear over to gear inspection to get it certified. Everything checked out OK except I  was alone so I had to be adopted by a volunteer worker, this is in case of a accident someone needs to handle things for me if I am hurt bad. Wish I had help its a lot of work getting everything done by my self. So now it time to take my bike over to tech inspection , there are a lot of bikes in line so while I make it through the line I chat with a guy running a Ducati 1098R a very similar bike as I am running.

Turns out the same guy that used to tech my bike back in the old days is still doing it so I pretty much just got waved through, he knows my stuff is setup very well. There were a few things he wanted me to safety wire but certified me and sent me on my way.

Now I am on my way over to GP suspensions to have me bike sag set, I had no one to help me at my shop and its really a 2 man job and Dave is a friend of mine so he was happy to help out. We ran into a problem in the rear suspension we were not able to get enough sag which meant I lost to much weight and my calculations were off slightly. No big deal I will work that out later its only 3mm off.

Ok, finally back my pit and its time to fire up the generator and get the tire warmers on so I can heat my tires to 175 degrees so they are nice and sticky as I hit the track. All done with that and they are heating up so now I am headed over to get fuel for my bike, Competition Motor-sports has fuel set aside for me VP M109 its about a 103 octane unleaded fuel and good for about 13:1 compression so its perfect for my bike. The fuel runs about $15 a gallon.

Back again and filling my tank with fuel, I hear a call for the riders meeting so off again. Cant miss the riders meeting or that can be big trouble. Nothing to exciting but lots of caution about a slick track for two reasons one its wet out and two its very dirty from being unused all winter.

Meeting over and time to warm up my motor and do I finally check of the bike and reinstall the lower fairing. I check the tire pressures at 175 degrees and reset to dunlops spec 23 psi rear and 33 psi front. Its about 8:45am and fifteen minutes till first practice session opens up. Its a rotation of slow, med, med fast and fast, they are twenty minute sessions each. I am going out in med fast this morning to see how things look time wise for my self.

The track is still wet and my session is up but I am not going out, no real purpose, track condition are very poor and I have never ridden this bike so too much can go wrong not worth throwing my $30K bike down the road first thing this morning. I am staying out the second session as well still not looking to good out there but there are signs of a dry line starting to appear, so next session should be a go.

I hear second call for Medium Fast practice so here I go engine is warming up and I am removing the tire warmers and throwing a leg over this beast for the first time ever, kind of scary and exciting at the same time. I turn on traction control to level three, turn on video camera and turn on the on board lap timer and start to make my way to the track entrance and away I go.

Track is still wet and standing water in places but there is a narrow dry line but dirt and cold track temperatures make for a uneasy feeling. After a couple laps I start to pick up the pace and the bike seems really good, the power is unreal wants to wheelie every where. Clicking off 21's ( that's slow ) track record is 6 or 7s. so I am 14 seconds off that pace. After about 6 laps I head in to assess everything and process all the data in my mind and check over the bike.

I am not to unhappy with my first session so I am optimistic things will go well today.

The second session went better got into the 19s and the bike is starting to tell me it wants a different setup. It is steering to quick into turns and not holding its line under power I am also not getting a ton a feed back from the front tire. I think I know what changes are needed but I am going to wait and run a few more session before I make any changes.

Alan Schmidt (#1 rider at PIR) went down in turn three and messed his bike up and a guy pitted a couple pits down went off in 7 and looks like he totaled his bike its twisted up real good. As well as many others by 1:00pm

The next 3 or so session for me did not go well I unable to go faster and actually slowed down even clicking off some 22s. The bike is hard to ride and my mind is not very clear and I am getting too tired too quickly only getting in 5 and 6 laps at a time. At this point I am extremely concerned I am not capable of doing this any more, I am scared and about to tear up because of heart break over everything I have put into this and here I am finishing the day running 21s and 22s. I thought I would easily be in the high 14s today.

Its time to call it a day and pack up all my gear and load the bike.

In case anyone was wondering the video footage turned out terrible, it is plenty good enough for me to learn from and that was its purpose but I wanted it presentable as well, it is not. I am working on solutions. The vibration was to great.

Needless to say but I will not be racing Saturday the 11th tomorrow just not fast enough yet. But I am not giving up and I will be back at the track on the April 27th for a track day and hopefully some changes in the bike and me will make a huge difference, see you then.

If you cant tell I was not an English major hell I didn't even take the class. so I apologize for the poorly written words...