quickbuck
20th December 2011, 14:02
Back when the dates for the 1 Hour and 3 hour enduro was announced, I thought that would be an event I would love to enter. The Dates are very close to the 6 hour Mopedathon that I am organising, so it would be a good practice. There are 2 Enduro Races. One for F3 bikes or smaller, over an hour, and a 3 hour Enduro for bikes of F1/F2 calibre. I was thinking I could enter the Ninja 250 in the 1 Hour, and do the “Ironman”, and then ride a 600 (either Josh Walby’s or Lee Bradford’s) in the 3 hour. The thing is, I don’t own either 600, so really it was only a dream…. This does carry a huge element of risk for the bikes owner. So, Josh and I decided to just enter the 1 hour this year, and see what happens.
Leading up to the race Josh was quizzing me about the Ninja 250R, as he had never ridden one before. He was asking me where the braking point was for turn 1, and the speed it goes at “Red line” in top gear. After a minute or two we came to the conclusion that we would be well into the red line for an excessive amount of time every two minutes for an hour! So I quickly jumped on the phone to Marcus at City Honda, and he sorted me out with a 15 tooth Front Sprocket. This should do the trick I thought. I picked up the sprocket on Friday, and got my new tyre put on the spare rim. I then load the ute, and put the bike on the new motorcycle trailer I got from Base Welfare Hire Pool.
Saturday Morning I got up at 4am to make the 2 ½ hour trip to Taupo. It all went without a hitch, except as I saw the lovely sun rise I realised I had left my sun glasses at home!! Not to worry, I picked some up when I got my fuel at Taupo…. At least the sun was nice and bright, and it looked like it would be a great day.
I arrived at the track at 0745, and parked up beside Josh and David (our pit crew for the day). I knew they were at the rack, as he passed me on the Desert Road. We then took the bike to Scrutineering, and signed in for our first enduro. The schedule gave us a 20 minute practice, and a 20 minute qualifying, followed by the 1 hour race. I told Josh to hog the practice, and I would call him in to give myself a couple of laps at the end. I felt I knew most of the technical parts of Taupo as I had raced there 2 weeks before. I just needed to find the difference in the gearing.
Practice:
Josh was first out on the track, and managed to get into a reasonable pace straight up. After he had done 7 laps or David called him in to give me a go. As he came in the white flag came out to signify the last lap of practice. I jumped on the bike, and immediately experienced something very new. This was the first time I had ever gotten on my bike when it was completely warm. I turn into turn 2, and it went straight to the peg, same with turn 3, and then 4! Wow, this is great I thought. I flew around the track, and noticed how tall the gearing was. The tall sprocket was making a real difference. I found we just make the red line down the long straight if you get the top sweeper right. This was perfect. I took the chequered flag, and used the cool down lap to work on a few reference points.
We discussed how the bike felt, and Josh reckoned there was a little too much air in the front tyre. I reckoned there was too little (As I had the gauge, and measured the rise in pressure from cold to hot), so I made the decision to put in another PSI, and see how it went.
Qualifying:
This time I took the bike out first up to get a position for the Le Mans Start. I was going to do 3 laps and come in, and then let Josh have a little more practice to improve on his lap times. I managed a 2:05.***, and Josh was set a 2:08. Another Ninja250R in the field was piloted by the Hassan brothers. Jaden (18) managed a 1:53!!! But Aaron (13) was sitting at 2:14. We found out Aaron was going to do 40 minutes of the riding to gain experience, so after doing some maths I came to the conclusion that this was going to be close.
Josh and I had agreed to do 15 minute stints each. I though this was fair, and will keep us fresh, as 2 x 30 minute stints would give us only one ride each. I also gave Josh the honour of riding first. After all, his legs are younger than mine for the Le Mans start.
I checked the bike over, and refuelled it with 7 litres of fuel. I figured as we are averaging 100km/hr, then we would do 100km in the race. If I burn 7 litres on the little 250 in that time, then I will eat my hat…..
Race:
Josh ran to the bike and jumped on. He circulated with a steady consistent pace. Jaden Hassen was flying though, and half way up the F3 Field! We called Josh in after 7 laps (15 minutes) for the rider change. Jadens dad brought him in to hand over to Aaron. Race on, I thought. Josh brought the bike in undamaged, so first part of the job was done.
I got on the bike, and got settled into a rhythm. I was trying to get a draft from the F3 bikes where ever I could, but I found some would actually slow me in the corners, so I had to be careful. I managed a 2:03.865 in that stint, with all my laps quite consistent. I tried to gain on Aaron Hassen, but it seems he had picked up the pace from his 2:14’s…. He was running closer to 2:03’s as well! Man this kid learns quick!! After the 15 minutes David brings me in to hand over to Josh.
Josh heads out and circulates at a consistent pace. Aaron Hassen manages to get past him. I try to do the maths, and am trying to work out if we were now down 1 lap or 2? After Josh’s stint David called him in, and he hands it back to me.
I head out and try to put in some really fast laps. I was also mindful that if I crash the bike, there will be no racing tomorrow, and I will let everybody down. Alex Hockley went past me on an SV650. We had some real battles when he was on his 250 in the winter series, but having 400cc on me meant I was no match for him this time. He told me later he resisted waving at me. He should of.., I would have just laughed it off. At one point near the end of the stint I find myself running out of road in turn 4. Darn that was close, I thought…. Not often you come out of there okay. The next time around I made the same mistake… That’s 2 strikes. So I had a thing about it when I got to the straight (plenty of time then). I had to turn later in the corner than I was… Do I remember where I was turning? Not really, I was using instinct (I later found out it was a blue marker pole out the corner of my left eye)… Next time I got to turn 4 when I went to turn, I said to myself, “NO! Now!” This gave me enough of a delay to turn later in the corner, and make it. Before long, the chequered flag came out. We managed 2nd in class, and a Top 10 finish….. Okay, there were only 2 bikes in our class, and 10 in the field, but we finished our first enduro without any damage to the bike. It was enough to get a trophy for our efforts.
What impressed me most was that I was consistently putting in 2:02’s all session, with a best of 2:02.488.
So a huge thanks to David for keeping us on schedule with the pit stops.
Thanks to Dunlop, and Andrew from Forbes and Davis. I didn’t actually use the new rubber, because the old rear tyre had heaps on the left to use up.
Thanks to Marcus at City Honda for the prompt service on the sprocket
Thanks to Sam form Celtic Leathers, they are still comfortable after racing an hour in the sun
And the biggest thanks go to my Team Air Force Racing Team mate, Josh Walby for circulating the bike at pace, and keeping it upright all day.
Leading up to the race Josh was quizzing me about the Ninja 250R, as he had never ridden one before. He was asking me where the braking point was for turn 1, and the speed it goes at “Red line” in top gear. After a minute or two we came to the conclusion that we would be well into the red line for an excessive amount of time every two minutes for an hour! So I quickly jumped on the phone to Marcus at City Honda, and he sorted me out with a 15 tooth Front Sprocket. This should do the trick I thought. I picked up the sprocket on Friday, and got my new tyre put on the spare rim. I then load the ute, and put the bike on the new motorcycle trailer I got from Base Welfare Hire Pool.
Saturday Morning I got up at 4am to make the 2 ½ hour trip to Taupo. It all went without a hitch, except as I saw the lovely sun rise I realised I had left my sun glasses at home!! Not to worry, I picked some up when I got my fuel at Taupo…. At least the sun was nice and bright, and it looked like it would be a great day.
I arrived at the track at 0745, and parked up beside Josh and David (our pit crew for the day). I knew they were at the rack, as he passed me on the Desert Road. We then took the bike to Scrutineering, and signed in for our first enduro. The schedule gave us a 20 minute practice, and a 20 minute qualifying, followed by the 1 hour race. I told Josh to hog the practice, and I would call him in to give myself a couple of laps at the end. I felt I knew most of the technical parts of Taupo as I had raced there 2 weeks before. I just needed to find the difference in the gearing.
Practice:
Josh was first out on the track, and managed to get into a reasonable pace straight up. After he had done 7 laps or David called him in to give me a go. As he came in the white flag came out to signify the last lap of practice. I jumped on the bike, and immediately experienced something very new. This was the first time I had ever gotten on my bike when it was completely warm. I turn into turn 2, and it went straight to the peg, same with turn 3, and then 4! Wow, this is great I thought. I flew around the track, and noticed how tall the gearing was. The tall sprocket was making a real difference. I found we just make the red line down the long straight if you get the top sweeper right. This was perfect. I took the chequered flag, and used the cool down lap to work on a few reference points.
We discussed how the bike felt, and Josh reckoned there was a little too much air in the front tyre. I reckoned there was too little (As I had the gauge, and measured the rise in pressure from cold to hot), so I made the decision to put in another PSI, and see how it went.
Qualifying:
This time I took the bike out first up to get a position for the Le Mans Start. I was going to do 3 laps and come in, and then let Josh have a little more practice to improve on his lap times. I managed a 2:05.***, and Josh was set a 2:08. Another Ninja250R in the field was piloted by the Hassan brothers. Jaden (18) managed a 1:53!!! But Aaron (13) was sitting at 2:14. We found out Aaron was going to do 40 minutes of the riding to gain experience, so after doing some maths I came to the conclusion that this was going to be close.
Josh and I had agreed to do 15 minute stints each. I though this was fair, and will keep us fresh, as 2 x 30 minute stints would give us only one ride each. I also gave Josh the honour of riding first. After all, his legs are younger than mine for the Le Mans start.
I checked the bike over, and refuelled it with 7 litres of fuel. I figured as we are averaging 100km/hr, then we would do 100km in the race. If I burn 7 litres on the little 250 in that time, then I will eat my hat…..
Race:
Josh ran to the bike and jumped on. He circulated with a steady consistent pace. Jaden Hassen was flying though, and half way up the F3 Field! We called Josh in after 7 laps (15 minutes) for the rider change. Jadens dad brought him in to hand over to Aaron. Race on, I thought. Josh brought the bike in undamaged, so first part of the job was done.
I got on the bike, and got settled into a rhythm. I was trying to get a draft from the F3 bikes where ever I could, but I found some would actually slow me in the corners, so I had to be careful. I managed a 2:03.865 in that stint, with all my laps quite consistent. I tried to gain on Aaron Hassen, but it seems he had picked up the pace from his 2:14’s…. He was running closer to 2:03’s as well! Man this kid learns quick!! After the 15 minutes David brings me in to hand over to Josh.
Josh heads out and circulates at a consistent pace. Aaron Hassen manages to get past him. I try to do the maths, and am trying to work out if we were now down 1 lap or 2? After Josh’s stint David called him in, and he hands it back to me.
I head out and try to put in some really fast laps. I was also mindful that if I crash the bike, there will be no racing tomorrow, and I will let everybody down. Alex Hockley went past me on an SV650. We had some real battles when he was on his 250 in the winter series, but having 400cc on me meant I was no match for him this time. He told me later he resisted waving at me. He should of.., I would have just laughed it off. At one point near the end of the stint I find myself running out of road in turn 4. Darn that was close, I thought…. Not often you come out of there okay. The next time around I made the same mistake… That’s 2 strikes. So I had a thing about it when I got to the straight (plenty of time then). I had to turn later in the corner than I was… Do I remember where I was turning? Not really, I was using instinct (I later found out it was a blue marker pole out the corner of my left eye)… Next time I got to turn 4 when I went to turn, I said to myself, “NO! Now!” This gave me enough of a delay to turn later in the corner, and make it. Before long, the chequered flag came out. We managed 2nd in class, and a Top 10 finish….. Okay, there were only 2 bikes in our class, and 10 in the field, but we finished our first enduro without any damage to the bike. It was enough to get a trophy for our efforts.
What impressed me most was that I was consistently putting in 2:02’s all session, with a best of 2:02.488.
So a huge thanks to David for keeping us on schedule with the pit stops.
Thanks to Dunlop, and Andrew from Forbes and Davis. I didn’t actually use the new rubber, because the old rear tyre had heaps on the left to use up.
Thanks to Marcus at City Honda for the prompt service on the sprocket
Thanks to Sam form Celtic Leathers, they are still comfortable after racing an hour in the sun
And the biggest thanks go to my Team Air Force Racing Team mate, Josh Walby for circulating the bike at pace, and keeping it upright all day.