vtec
28th November 2006, 23:05
Race Day
Was really looking forward to getting out on the new half of Taupo again, it's definitely the best half, and the surface is great. I was entered in F1 and F2 on my 2003 CBR600 racebike
Practice
First F1 practice I went out pretty cautiously trying out my new second hand Dunlop Supersport tyres, was going pretty cautious just relearning the race lines, and being careful on cold tyres for the first couple of laps. Pretty uneventful session just behaving myself.
First F2 practice, went out following my mate Gav on his CBR400, and I never passed him for the whole session, damn he's improved heaps, was still rather slow in this session
Second F1 and F2 practices. Made improvements bit by bit, but still knew that I was going to be off the pace.
First F1 race
After talking to Gav about how I was getting left behind at the start of the sessions due to not having tyre warmers, I decided that I could push a little harder during the warm up lap to try to get more heat in the tyres for the start of the races. I went round a bit slower than the guys in front of me, and they opened up a gap, and then as I was leaning into a right hander, I felt the bike start to slide, and then it kept sliding further round, and then it went right round, and I found myself sliding along on the ground backwards with the bike on my leg, and couldn't really seperate from it. Then as I went onto the dirt, the bike bounced up and slid over the top of me, and ended up on its wheels. I was quite surprised to get up uninjured straight away and held the bike up on its wheels as it landed. I was a touch pissed off, cause I was wearing my brand new leathers. At least I've sorted out the new leather curse, just now I had an approx 7cm diameter hole on my arse. Clicked it back to neutral, started it up, and checked that nothing important was broken. Took off round the circuit towards the start line. As I approached the grid, I noticed the guy with the red flag had already gone off the grid, and the green flag dropped while I was still getting up to my spot. Bugger it, I had a roll on, so I took advantage of that and just kept going. I think I ended up near the position I would have been in if I had started on my spot. I think I did alright in that race despite my crash on the start up, I made up a couple of places. Just wish I could have got lap times.
First F2 race
There were tonnes of motards in this class which had me worried, cause they take crazy lines and cut you up as they back it into corners. I was just going to have to get good starts and clear away from the majority of them. Sticking with my ability to get good starts I launched well, but being cautious into the first corner had a few riders get past. Did some very aggressive riding early on, and then in the last few laps I had to take it easier again, cause the arms weren't up to it, and I think Johno came past the bastard.
After this race I noticed that the rear brake lever was sticking a bit, and as well as slowing me down, I think this was a major contributor to my warm up lap crash in the first race. Quickly disassembled greased and reassembled, and it was working ok again, although it's making some clicking noises, and is rough as opposed to smooth operation. Will look at rebuilding the rear brake master cylinder.
Second and third F1 races
In the second race I think I did my best riding of the day, was really aggressive, but as usual my arms packed up after about 3 laps of really aggressive riding. I think I was still in touch with the lead pack near the end of the race, I just couldn't reel them in. I'm seriously going to have to adjust my riding style to take pressure and weight off my arms during braking and corner entry. I'm not weak, and I'm extremely fit, so I'm pretty sure that it's just my riding style causing my arms to pack up. Finished 7th overall in the F1 class which I was mildly satisfied with. I could definitely do better
Second and Third F2 races
Second race and I saw Johno do a big wheely off the start, he dropped it down and popped another one as I flew past heading into the first corner, he well and truly stuffed that one up. Rode hard and aggressive in this race aswell, past a couple of riders, and ended up chasing this motard. But every time I passed him, he'd take tight lines into the corners backing it in and cut off my race lines and push me wide. Made another attempt to pass and get clear on the back of the circuit but left it too late on the brakes, and got air over the bump before the left hander onto the drag strip, and ended up running off the track. Luckily I only lost a couple of places as I got it back on the track.
In the last F2 race, went pretty hard, but my arms really packed up in the last couple of laps, and was trying to force it into the corners with a straight arm pushing with my shoulder, but still didn't get it right. Johno came past on the brakes again. That bastard is getting fast. He quickly got a motard between me and him. The guy kept cutting me up on corner entry. So I decided to leave it to the last corner and get a good run onto the straight, which worked a treat and I got him before the line. Came 7th overall out of about 32 riders so another mildly reasonable performance. Still I'm gaining confidence on the 600 all the time.
I talked to my mate Paul Buckley afterwards, and asked him to have a look at my suspension. He had a bounce on the forks and the seat, and pointed out that I had way too much rebound damping, and the forks were extremely slow to return. Adjusted that back to an acceptable position, a bit late for the racing though.
HRC track day (Monday)
Was really looking forward to getting out onto the track again. The lady in charge came over and made a special point of letting me know that it was not a race day and that cutting people up in corners wouldn't be tolerated, hell I don't even do that on race days. I'm probably the most gentlemanly racer out there at the moment, as I'm not at the pointy end of the field, there's no point in getting ugly.
Anyway went out on the CBR600 to start with, as the GSXR600 that I was supposed to be testing wouldn't start due to a dead battery. Went for a blat following in single file behind Aaron Slight, he was just taking us around easy to let all the road riders learn some lines.
The next session I got the GSXR600 going, damn this was a big improvement in the handling and power departments. The suspension was set up a lot softer than my CBR, and it had way more mid range power for easy corner exiting, but found myself sliding it a bit on the left hand corners. Was definitely the fastest guy on the track apart from Aaron Slight and Hayden Fitzgerald.
The next time, I had a word with Hayden, and asked him to take my CBR out on the track. I went out on the GSXR, he started off pretty slowly getting a feel for the bike, so I went past, and after a while he started chasing me, and went past on the front straight on the brakes after a couple of laps. While he had been following me on the GSXR, I had found it sliding quite a bit through left hand corners which he had definitely noticed and had a bit of a laugh with me about. But anyway, his prognosis was that the rear end was way too hard, he had a bit of a play with the dampener, but we came to the conclusion that the rear spring was just too hard for guys our weight, and the front end was pushing wide in the corners and there was a fair bit of front end vibration, possibly to do with the brakes.
In the next session I asked dad if I could take his Hayabusa out for a blast. Didn't know how he would respond, but he just said "don't crash it". Sweet. I've always wondered what riding one of these hard on a track would be like. It had very new tyres on it (Michelin Pilot Sports) so I had to scrub them in slowly before going hard. After a couple of laps I had got a feel for how well they cornered, and I settled in chasing after a couple of 1 litre sports bikes. I found that they were actually quicker down the short straights of the taupo circuit than the 'busa, but I was settling in, and started getting the pegs scraping and knee sliding it around the corners. And managed to pass the 1 litre bikes eventually. Had an absolute blast taking the 'busa right to the red line. Have to say that they are a very nice tourer, but actually handled similarish to my old CBR250 in the way they wallow around the corners, the main difference is that they are a lot heavier to turn in, but I still kept it up for a whole ten-15 minute session. Absolutely loved it.
Had another couple of sessions on the GSXR600, but the rear tyre was absolutely shagged, and was sliding very badly through all the corners, and I was riding it as hard as I could, and an Aprilia Tuono ahead of me on road tyres was able to get away from me out of all the corners even with me sliding it out of every left hander after him. The left side of the tyre was just completely fried. That Taupo circuit certainly knows how to heat up tyres. After my last session, I noticed that the front was pretty chewed up aswell from some pretty hard trailbraking.
So it was a pretty insane weekend and I'm feeling pretty sore as I sit here and type this. I suppose my highlight was probably taking the Hayabusa around the circuit. For some reason I just love riding bikes with road setup suspensions, because they are usually the most forgiving, and you just don't worry about the suspension, and just ride it. Was pretty cool taking it up to red line, and then outbraking real sportsbikes before the hairpin.
Cheers for reading. I've probably missed some stuff out, but I'm going to post it as is cause it's getting late and time for bed... and I'm still shagged.
Was really looking forward to getting out on the new half of Taupo again, it's definitely the best half, and the surface is great. I was entered in F1 and F2 on my 2003 CBR600 racebike
Practice
First F1 practice I went out pretty cautiously trying out my new second hand Dunlop Supersport tyres, was going pretty cautious just relearning the race lines, and being careful on cold tyres for the first couple of laps. Pretty uneventful session just behaving myself.
First F2 practice, went out following my mate Gav on his CBR400, and I never passed him for the whole session, damn he's improved heaps, was still rather slow in this session
Second F1 and F2 practices. Made improvements bit by bit, but still knew that I was going to be off the pace.
First F1 race
After talking to Gav about how I was getting left behind at the start of the sessions due to not having tyre warmers, I decided that I could push a little harder during the warm up lap to try to get more heat in the tyres for the start of the races. I went round a bit slower than the guys in front of me, and they opened up a gap, and then as I was leaning into a right hander, I felt the bike start to slide, and then it kept sliding further round, and then it went right round, and I found myself sliding along on the ground backwards with the bike on my leg, and couldn't really seperate from it. Then as I went onto the dirt, the bike bounced up and slid over the top of me, and ended up on its wheels. I was quite surprised to get up uninjured straight away and held the bike up on its wheels as it landed. I was a touch pissed off, cause I was wearing my brand new leathers. At least I've sorted out the new leather curse, just now I had an approx 7cm diameter hole on my arse. Clicked it back to neutral, started it up, and checked that nothing important was broken. Took off round the circuit towards the start line. As I approached the grid, I noticed the guy with the red flag had already gone off the grid, and the green flag dropped while I was still getting up to my spot. Bugger it, I had a roll on, so I took advantage of that and just kept going. I think I ended up near the position I would have been in if I had started on my spot. I think I did alright in that race despite my crash on the start up, I made up a couple of places. Just wish I could have got lap times.
First F2 race
There were tonnes of motards in this class which had me worried, cause they take crazy lines and cut you up as they back it into corners. I was just going to have to get good starts and clear away from the majority of them. Sticking with my ability to get good starts I launched well, but being cautious into the first corner had a few riders get past. Did some very aggressive riding early on, and then in the last few laps I had to take it easier again, cause the arms weren't up to it, and I think Johno came past the bastard.
After this race I noticed that the rear brake lever was sticking a bit, and as well as slowing me down, I think this was a major contributor to my warm up lap crash in the first race. Quickly disassembled greased and reassembled, and it was working ok again, although it's making some clicking noises, and is rough as opposed to smooth operation. Will look at rebuilding the rear brake master cylinder.
Second and third F1 races
In the second race I think I did my best riding of the day, was really aggressive, but as usual my arms packed up after about 3 laps of really aggressive riding. I think I was still in touch with the lead pack near the end of the race, I just couldn't reel them in. I'm seriously going to have to adjust my riding style to take pressure and weight off my arms during braking and corner entry. I'm not weak, and I'm extremely fit, so I'm pretty sure that it's just my riding style causing my arms to pack up. Finished 7th overall in the F1 class which I was mildly satisfied with. I could definitely do better
Second and Third F2 races
Second race and I saw Johno do a big wheely off the start, he dropped it down and popped another one as I flew past heading into the first corner, he well and truly stuffed that one up. Rode hard and aggressive in this race aswell, past a couple of riders, and ended up chasing this motard. But every time I passed him, he'd take tight lines into the corners backing it in and cut off my race lines and push me wide. Made another attempt to pass and get clear on the back of the circuit but left it too late on the brakes, and got air over the bump before the left hander onto the drag strip, and ended up running off the track. Luckily I only lost a couple of places as I got it back on the track.
In the last F2 race, went pretty hard, but my arms really packed up in the last couple of laps, and was trying to force it into the corners with a straight arm pushing with my shoulder, but still didn't get it right. Johno came past on the brakes again. That bastard is getting fast. He quickly got a motard between me and him. The guy kept cutting me up on corner entry. So I decided to leave it to the last corner and get a good run onto the straight, which worked a treat and I got him before the line. Came 7th overall out of about 32 riders so another mildly reasonable performance. Still I'm gaining confidence on the 600 all the time.
I talked to my mate Paul Buckley afterwards, and asked him to have a look at my suspension. He had a bounce on the forks and the seat, and pointed out that I had way too much rebound damping, and the forks were extremely slow to return. Adjusted that back to an acceptable position, a bit late for the racing though.
HRC track day (Monday)
Was really looking forward to getting out onto the track again. The lady in charge came over and made a special point of letting me know that it was not a race day and that cutting people up in corners wouldn't be tolerated, hell I don't even do that on race days. I'm probably the most gentlemanly racer out there at the moment, as I'm not at the pointy end of the field, there's no point in getting ugly.
Anyway went out on the CBR600 to start with, as the GSXR600 that I was supposed to be testing wouldn't start due to a dead battery. Went for a blat following in single file behind Aaron Slight, he was just taking us around easy to let all the road riders learn some lines.
The next session I got the GSXR600 going, damn this was a big improvement in the handling and power departments. The suspension was set up a lot softer than my CBR, and it had way more mid range power for easy corner exiting, but found myself sliding it a bit on the left hand corners. Was definitely the fastest guy on the track apart from Aaron Slight and Hayden Fitzgerald.
The next time, I had a word with Hayden, and asked him to take my CBR out on the track. I went out on the GSXR, he started off pretty slowly getting a feel for the bike, so I went past, and after a while he started chasing me, and went past on the front straight on the brakes after a couple of laps. While he had been following me on the GSXR, I had found it sliding quite a bit through left hand corners which he had definitely noticed and had a bit of a laugh with me about. But anyway, his prognosis was that the rear end was way too hard, he had a bit of a play with the dampener, but we came to the conclusion that the rear spring was just too hard for guys our weight, and the front end was pushing wide in the corners and there was a fair bit of front end vibration, possibly to do with the brakes.
In the next session I asked dad if I could take his Hayabusa out for a blast. Didn't know how he would respond, but he just said "don't crash it". Sweet. I've always wondered what riding one of these hard on a track would be like. It had very new tyres on it (Michelin Pilot Sports) so I had to scrub them in slowly before going hard. After a couple of laps I had got a feel for how well they cornered, and I settled in chasing after a couple of 1 litre sports bikes. I found that they were actually quicker down the short straights of the taupo circuit than the 'busa, but I was settling in, and started getting the pegs scraping and knee sliding it around the corners. And managed to pass the 1 litre bikes eventually. Had an absolute blast taking the 'busa right to the red line. Have to say that they are a very nice tourer, but actually handled similarish to my old CBR250 in the way they wallow around the corners, the main difference is that they are a lot heavier to turn in, but I still kept it up for a whole ten-15 minute session. Absolutely loved it.
Had another couple of sessions on the GSXR600, but the rear tyre was absolutely shagged, and was sliding very badly through all the corners, and I was riding it as hard as I could, and an Aprilia Tuono ahead of me on road tyres was able to get away from me out of all the corners even with me sliding it out of every left hander after him. The left side of the tyre was just completely fried. That Taupo circuit certainly knows how to heat up tyres. After my last session, I noticed that the front was pretty chewed up aswell from some pretty hard trailbraking.
So it was a pretty insane weekend and I'm feeling pretty sore as I sit here and type this. I suppose my highlight was probably taking the Hayabusa around the circuit. For some reason I just love riding bikes with road setup suspensions, because they are usually the most forgiving, and you just don't worry about the suspension, and just ride it. Was pretty cool taking it up to red line, and then outbraking real sportsbikes before the hairpin.
Cheers for reading. I've probably missed some stuff out, but I'm going to post it as is cause it's getting late and time for bed... and I'm still shagged.