morbidelli17
Sun 6/17/07, 10:37PM
When I left the track on Saturday night, I was not happy. We'd spent a lot of time and effort on Silver in the past month, and I felt like I'd taken a HUGE step backward.
Lemme 'splain.
After the WERA round at Cal Speedway, I took the bike to West Coast GP Cycles, and Andy had patted me on the head and said, "Come back in a while, don't worry, you'll love it." So I come back and he says, "Well, the carbs didn't exactly fit, so I had to take a hammer to the bottom of your tank."
"Uh," I said, laughing my ass off. "What did that thing" - I pointed at a fitting on the radiator - "used to go to?"
"The fan," Andy said.
"What happened to the fan?" I said.
"You know how much that weighs?" he said. "It's gone!"
You get the idea.
Long story short, Andy relocated my fuel injection system to a cardboard box, installed 39mm flat-slides, and got us more horsepower and eliminated the throttle hesitation. The bike sounds harsh and nasty now, harder, ready to bite. I figured it would pull a higher gear, so I geared it up.
Then, when we got to Willow, a friend had some Pirelli slicks that he wanted me to try out. They were old-style construction, but hey, free, unused slicks, I'm all over that.
So: Rule number one in developing a bike is change only one thing at a time. I hit the track for the Solo 20-lapper with THREE major changes to the bike. Shandra is giving me shit for only making two laps last month, "Remember, it's 20, not 2," she says. Funny.
I make it 10 laps - 10 of the scariest laps of my life. The Pirellis were made to generate heat and grip through sidewall flexing, but at my pace, the bike just wobbled and bucked. This caused me to slow down, and with the higher gearing, I was no longer in the powerband anywhere - and flat slides, I learned, do not suffer fools lightly. Oh yeah, the breeze was blowing hard enough to pull the front tire off the ground coming over Turn Six. I pulled in at halfway, thinking I'd forgotten to put the nut on the rear axle, just scaring myself to death in every turn, bogging the motor coming out.
I went over to Andy, and he took it for a spin. He came back, looked me in the eye, and said, "It's you. You're not revving it high enough. You've gotta bounce it off the rev limiter."
On the bright side, we brought a cake for ZenSandy to the track for her birthday (29th). I had them make an announcement over the PA, and the echoes had barely died down when two track workers peeled to a halt in front of the garage. Free food; they were all over that. It was hilarious. I halfway expected them to red-flag the practice so the corner workers could storm our garage.
And we had dinner with some very nice racers, Guzzigirl from this board, and Brian from Cali Photography. It was a very nice experience, and a lot of fun. We got a good night sleep, and got up early and hit the track.
OK. Back to square one.
Sunday morning, I put the Dunlops back on. I put the regular gearing back on. I did exactly what Andy told me to do - and I went five to seven seconds a lap faster, and with no drama whatsoever. "It feels like a motorcycle again. I can race this," I told him.
Second session, 1:35.1, within a second of my best time ever. Andy was elated. I started feeling racy again.
I hung with Pete Ellis at the rider's meeting, when they announced that there were going to be new rules for jump-starts. "Oh great," Pete says. "I jump the start all the time. This sucks." ZS and I cracked up.
First race up was 500 ModProd. With the throttle hitch fixed, I got a decent start and led for a bit before Pete Ellis came by on his SV500 and one of the Aprilias came past. Then two people crashed in Three and they red-flagged the race.
But I'd noticed that Ellis wasn't getting away.
On the restart, JC Gibbs had gotten his bike working, and he led onto the back straight, where Ellis and the guy on the Aprilia came past again. But I'd learned that I was quicker than Pete and JC in turns Two and Three. So when Pete went past JC, I sucked it up and went past, too. And I glued myself to Ellis' rear wheel for the rest of the race. I tried to pass a couple times, but couldn't quite pull it off. I had a huge, ugly front-rear-front slide in Nine, but I still kept it going. Traffic right in the last corner thwarted my last-lap draft at the line move, and Pete beat me by .5 seconds.
When I came past the Turn One grandstands, I saw Andy with both fists in the air, so I thought I'd done well. And I had. I turned a new personal best of 1:34.2, one of two laps that was under my previous best ever. It was also under the BOTT Light lap record, but since it wasn't done it that race, it doesn't count.(Just to put this in perspective, this was 10 SECONDS a lap faster than I was going the night before, and this wasn't nearly as scary.) And taking third meant a trophy, a small check from a Century 21 broker who's the class sponsor, and contingency money from Dunlop.
Sweet.
"Last night, I swear, I never thought we'd be able to do this," I told ZenSandy.
I'd like to say that I found that half-second in BOTT Light and put Ellis in his place. And we ran nose-to-tail for a bit.
But he got through the Vintage Heavyweight traffic a bit better, and he cleared off. I wound up fighting with a friend on an RZ350 (a gorgeous Dave Gardner bike, yellow and black and white in Kenny Roberts-era Yamaha colors) and another guy, Chuck Burnett, on a Honda Hawk 650. I kept thinking that if I ever got around them, I'd be able to close up on Pete. But I tried on one lap to go under Jim Dobson on the RZ in Turn One, only to find Chuck on the Hawk trying to outbrake us both, and I panicked and shut off, avoided a crash but lost any chance of winning. Fighting with those guys cost me two-three seconds a lap. Still, I got a solid second place.
So all in all: One very happy ZenSandy, who was wished Happy Birthday by many people far and wide. Two trophies. The biggest contingency check from Dunlop that I've gotten to date. Cash from a class sponsor.
And most importantly, a complete turnaround in my confidence. From the disaster that was Saturday, I left the track on Sunday with the fastest lap of anyone in any race on a BOTT Light-legal bike. On this day, even though I didn't win, I got a very nice consolation price.
I was the Fast Guy, and I've got the lap times to prove it.
Thanks to Sideshow, Chris, Pete and Alex at West Coast GP Cycles, Zoran at TwinWorks for his help (Hey Zoran, if Amy winds up buying a bike from you, I get a cut!), Racinteach, Dunlop, and everyone else who helped out at the track.
p.s. Congrats to Shandra and Monsterdood for the excellent lap times they threw down on Sunday.
Lemme 'splain.
After the WERA round at Cal Speedway, I took the bike to West Coast GP Cycles, and Andy had patted me on the head and said, "Come back in a while, don't worry, you'll love it." So I come back and he says, "Well, the carbs didn't exactly fit, so I had to take a hammer to the bottom of your tank."
"Uh," I said, laughing my ass off. "What did that thing" - I pointed at a fitting on the radiator - "used to go to?"
"The fan," Andy said.
"What happened to the fan?" I said.
"You know how much that weighs?" he said. "It's gone!"
You get the idea.
Long story short, Andy relocated my fuel injection system to a cardboard box, installed 39mm flat-slides, and got us more horsepower and eliminated the throttle hesitation. The bike sounds harsh and nasty now, harder, ready to bite. I figured it would pull a higher gear, so I geared it up.
Then, when we got to Willow, a friend had some Pirelli slicks that he wanted me to try out. They were old-style construction, but hey, free, unused slicks, I'm all over that.
So: Rule number one in developing a bike is change only one thing at a time. I hit the track for the Solo 20-lapper with THREE major changes to the bike. Shandra is giving me shit for only making two laps last month, "Remember, it's 20, not 2," she says. Funny.
I make it 10 laps - 10 of the scariest laps of my life. The Pirellis were made to generate heat and grip through sidewall flexing, but at my pace, the bike just wobbled and bucked. This caused me to slow down, and with the higher gearing, I was no longer in the powerband anywhere - and flat slides, I learned, do not suffer fools lightly. Oh yeah, the breeze was blowing hard enough to pull the front tire off the ground coming over Turn Six. I pulled in at halfway, thinking I'd forgotten to put the nut on the rear axle, just scaring myself to death in every turn, bogging the motor coming out.
I went over to Andy, and he took it for a spin. He came back, looked me in the eye, and said, "It's you. You're not revving it high enough. You've gotta bounce it off the rev limiter."
On the bright side, we brought a cake for ZenSandy to the track for her birthday (29th). I had them make an announcement over the PA, and the echoes had barely died down when two track workers peeled to a halt in front of the garage. Free food; they were all over that. It was hilarious. I halfway expected them to red-flag the practice so the corner workers could storm our garage.
And we had dinner with some very nice racers, Guzzigirl from this board, and Brian from Cali Photography. It was a very nice experience, and a lot of fun. We got a good night sleep, and got up early and hit the track.
OK. Back to square one.
Sunday morning, I put the Dunlops back on. I put the regular gearing back on. I did exactly what Andy told me to do - and I went five to seven seconds a lap faster, and with no drama whatsoever. "It feels like a motorcycle again. I can race this," I told him.
Second session, 1:35.1, within a second of my best time ever. Andy was elated. I started feeling racy again.
I hung with Pete Ellis at the rider's meeting, when they announced that there were going to be new rules for jump-starts. "Oh great," Pete says. "I jump the start all the time. This sucks." ZS and I cracked up.
First race up was 500 ModProd. With the throttle hitch fixed, I got a decent start and led for a bit before Pete Ellis came by on his SV500 and one of the Aprilias came past. Then two people crashed in Three and they red-flagged the race.
But I'd noticed that Ellis wasn't getting away.
On the restart, JC Gibbs had gotten his bike working, and he led onto the back straight, where Ellis and the guy on the Aprilia came past again. But I'd learned that I was quicker than Pete and JC in turns Two and Three. So when Pete went past JC, I sucked it up and went past, too. And I glued myself to Ellis' rear wheel for the rest of the race. I tried to pass a couple times, but couldn't quite pull it off. I had a huge, ugly front-rear-front slide in Nine, but I still kept it going. Traffic right in the last corner thwarted my last-lap draft at the line move, and Pete beat me by .5 seconds.
When I came past the Turn One grandstands, I saw Andy with both fists in the air, so I thought I'd done well. And I had. I turned a new personal best of 1:34.2, one of two laps that was under my previous best ever. It was also under the BOTT Light lap record, but since it wasn't done it that race, it doesn't count.(Just to put this in perspective, this was 10 SECONDS a lap faster than I was going the night before, and this wasn't nearly as scary.) And taking third meant a trophy, a small check from a Century 21 broker who's the class sponsor, and contingency money from Dunlop.
Sweet.
"Last night, I swear, I never thought we'd be able to do this," I told ZenSandy.
I'd like to say that I found that half-second in BOTT Light and put Ellis in his place. And we ran nose-to-tail for a bit.
But he got through the Vintage Heavyweight traffic a bit better, and he cleared off. I wound up fighting with a friend on an RZ350 (a gorgeous Dave Gardner bike, yellow and black and white in Kenny Roberts-era Yamaha colors) and another guy, Chuck Burnett, on a Honda Hawk 650. I kept thinking that if I ever got around them, I'd be able to close up on Pete. But I tried on one lap to go under Jim Dobson on the RZ in Turn One, only to find Chuck on the Hawk trying to outbrake us both, and I panicked and shut off, avoided a crash but lost any chance of winning. Fighting with those guys cost me two-three seconds a lap. Still, I got a solid second place.
So all in all: One very happy ZenSandy, who was wished Happy Birthday by many people far and wide. Two trophies. The biggest contingency check from Dunlop that I've gotten to date. Cash from a class sponsor.
And most importantly, a complete turnaround in my confidence. From the disaster that was Saturday, I left the track on Sunday with the fastest lap of anyone in any race on a BOTT Light-legal bike. On this day, even though I didn't win, I got a very nice consolation price.
I was the Fast Guy, and I've got the lap times to prove it.
Thanks to Sideshow, Chris, Pete and Alex at West Coast GP Cycles, Zoran at TwinWorks for his help (Hey Zoran, if Amy winds up buying a bike from you, I get a cut!), Racinteach, Dunlop, and everyone else who helped out at the track.
p.s. Congrats to Shandra and Monsterdood for the excellent lap times they threw down on Sunday.