vtec
31st December 2008, 17:14
Hi all,
Well I had quite a weekend. So much I could write about. My mate "Paully 3 fingers" picked me up on the Friday afternoon so we could journey down to Taupo. Loaded up all the crap. And got on our way. Met up with Glen at Reids Farm, a free council owned camping spot. He looked highly strung and panicky. Obviously had too much on his plate recently, and had just got news that his brother had been in a pretty bad motorcycle accident where he'd run into the back of a car changing lanes. Hope he's all good. Anyway, while manoeuvring his car around the very bumpy/hilly camp site he reversed it over a rather large drop and bent the exhaust up so it was rubbing on the driveshaft, was funny at the time. I tried to calm him down a bit. He's putting far too much pressure on himself with this racing business. Set up camp and hit the sack.
About 5 in the morning some knobs in a tent next to us were busy talking away. I managed to stay half asleep while they bantered at each other. Once it got to about 6.30am I decided it was time to rise from my slumber and get ready for some serious track time. Got to the track by about 7.30am. Took the bike through scrutineering, that flew through, they hassled the damage to my gloves and leathers but begrudgingly let me pass.
Nerves were starting to set in, I hadn't ridden a 600 on a track in over a year. And had only been dabbling/playing games on a very average condition CBR250RR that I could afford to crash over in Australia, had only done 4 meetings in the whole year with NO practice days. And only had my bicycle for the road, so I was well out of practice. The bike we had got hold of cost us a mere $7000 from Shaun Harris, which is dirt cheap. It's a 2005 Suzuki GSXR600 with a 2006 front end on it, made up from lots of crashed and blown up bikes. Standard suspension, and the mods consisted only of a Leo Vince exhaust system and a Yoshimura computer.
This was just a practice day before the road race spectacular the next day, so I'll keep it short and sweet. Just before going out Glen said, "you do realise it's race shift". Argh, I'd never been on a bike with reverse shift before, and it was going to take up tonnes of my concentration. Oh well, just do my best. Went out on some very well worn Continental Race Attack tyres. Felt like a GP rider because they gave so much feedback, you could really keep them right on the edge of traction out of most of the corners. Glen got really excited and said we were really in with a chance for the endurance race if I could comfortably keep a bike crabbing around corners like that on the power. This pumped up my ego a bit. I think I initially was doing about 1.19 laps, but by the end of the day I got down to 1.16's. The front guys would have been about 1.11's by now. In my last practice stint I also noticed the front end slipping out while on the brakes into turn one. Turns out that I was too heavy for the standard suspension that had also only been set up for Glen and while leaning in on the brakes I had bottomed out the front forks which had caused shearing on the left hand side of the front tyre. Fun at the end of the day, I was happy with having learnt race shift reasonably well, and was impressed by how much quicker it was on the upshift and that you could safely upshift going through highspeed left handers. All positive really.
We were in with the motoacademy lads, who are pretty much teenagers, Luke and Kyle, riding their 125 GP bikes like animals. A couple of brilliant young characters. At the end of the day we went to the AC baths to loosen up our muscles and hopefully spy some young local talent. Good fun, got repeatedly told off by the lifeguards because although you were allowed to bomb, you weren't allowed to do flips or anything else that involved fun. Luke set about practicing his amazing womanising skills on one of the fine young local lasses. I'm way older but that boy could teach me a thing or two. I swear he must have never encountered rejection. Can't believe the ear rings, tattoo, and emo do work so well. From there we went into town for dinner and a beer. Downed some particularly average k fry. Was kind of funny they didn't have any chicken to sell at the local KFC, only had burgers. Then we went for a brew at a local establishment, Glen like's his bourbon and cokes... in the words of Captain Rum from Blackadder "...you have a WOMANS [drink]". Didn't try our luck with any of the local beauties, was very quiet in Taupo for a Saturday so close to New Years. Went back to the track to get some sleep in our rather cosy pitshed. Someone in the group snored rather loudly, my money was on Steve B.
Day 2 of the TRRS
Sunday, Road Race Spectacular Race Day. Qualifying was taken from the practicing the previous day, so to get used to the $100 second hand Metzeler Slicks that we'd chucked on I went out to blast around a few laps to get a feel for them. Sprint races don't give you any time to get good on a set up. I like to feel how my bike is responding and gradually increase pace on corners if I get the chance. I suppose if I had lots of track time like the top guys I could go out and blast it straight away.
First race, I didn't even realise that it was a Superbike race, thought it was just supersport. I kind of get in my own little world of deep thought about the handling of the bike and I can't really focus on anything else. I really need a pit crew to do my organising for me, cause I'd rather not think about that stuff when I'm getting in race mode. I get quite withdrawn. So went out and out of the 20 something bikes in the field I was pretty far down maybe 18th. I'm really good off the mark but at soon as riders start cramping my space I let them through, I'm not allowed to crash Glens bike, and having worked as a bicycle courier you learn to picture how all the possible crashes are likely to happen around you, and allow for them. Unfortunately this just makes for a slow and steady racer, suitable for endurance racing but not so much sprint racing. Once the field spread out a bit, I was able to pick up the pace and mow down a few of the other 600's. There were some guys on K6 GSXR's that looked pretty close to standard but were hauling arse, and I was really having to push my K5 pretty hard, found myself powersliding out of corners again, and getting the odd front end dive when tipping in. Still in some of the corners with reseal on them, I was behaving such as the entry to the chicane before the front straight, I take a lovely straight line into there, not very fast, but safe. In the days since, I have worked out how I could go a lot faster on the circuit. But part of the problem was that the standard suspension is too light for me, cause with all my gear on I weighed about 80-85kg. Every single lap in this race apart from the first one I did 1.15, how's that for consistency. Happy about my progress. Target still 1.13's for the day and looking viable.
Next race was just the supersport one. Had Glen in front of me on the grid on his RS250 two stroke Grand Prix bike. At the flag drop I fired passed him hoping to take advantage of being on the outside when Hayden Fitzgerald and that Japanese guy Kashimoto or something bailed it into the first corner so I pretty much had to stop to find a path through the carnage, was nearly at the back of the field, but at least it was already spread out so I could get down to business. Glen was still behind me, but made short work of me through the infield section, the corner speed advantage of the 250 was greatest there and Glen really knows how to keep corner speed on it. Still I caught up to the other 250 GP bike followed him for a lap or two, couldn't believe how fast he was down the straight, my 600 was only getting a marginally higher top speed, eventually got close enough to pass him on the brakes into the super tight left hander over the back of the circuit, and hold him out through that super high speed left hander, through the cone chicane and onto the back straight where I made maximum advantage of my speed and made myself super wide into the left right left onto the front straight. Think he followed me around for the rest of the 6 laps. I think I managed to catch another k6 GSXR with standard fairings. I was always tussling with him. By the end of the race the bike was squirming all over the place, apparently that was probably the rear shock overheating, and causing the rear tyre to squirm. At least the front end felt rock steady. After upping the preload and compression damping, it was behaving a treat, and I had no stability issues on it whatsoever on the brakes. Was getting heaps of rear end chatter into turn one and the back was still lifting off the ground into the tight right hander after the midfield and the tight lefthander at the bottom of the downhill segment. Think I kicked the gear lever the wrong way once and saw the rev's spike hardcore and the rear end fishtail a bit, pulled the clutch in as quick as i could which settled the bike down, and then had to consciously think which way I needed to push the gear lever again. Haha, would have lost about 2 seconds right there. I did 3 of my laps in 1.14 in this race, Gareth Jones was down to a freakish 1.09 on his 08 Yamaha.
continued...
Well I had quite a weekend. So much I could write about. My mate "Paully 3 fingers" picked me up on the Friday afternoon so we could journey down to Taupo. Loaded up all the crap. And got on our way. Met up with Glen at Reids Farm, a free council owned camping spot. He looked highly strung and panicky. Obviously had too much on his plate recently, and had just got news that his brother had been in a pretty bad motorcycle accident where he'd run into the back of a car changing lanes. Hope he's all good. Anyway, while manoeuvring his car around the very bumpy/hilly camp site he reversed it over a rather large drop and bent the exhaust up so it was rubbing on the driveshaft, was funny at the time. I tried to calm him down a bit. He's putting far too much pressure on himself with this racing business. Set up camp and hit the sack.
About 5 in the morning some knobs in a tent next to us were busy talking away. I managed to stay half asleep while they bantered at each other. Once it got to about 6.30am I decided it was time to rise from my slumber and get ready for some serious track time. Got to the track by about 7.30am. Took the bike through scrutineering, that flew through, they hassled the damage to my gloves and leathers but begrudgingly let me pass.
Nerves were starting to set in, I hadn't ridden a 600 on a track in over a year. And had only been dabbling/playing games on a very average condition CBR250RR that I could afford to crash over in Australia, had only done 4 meetings in the whole year with NO practice days. And only had my bicycle for the road, so I was well out of practice. The bike we had got hold of cost us a mere $7000 from Shaun Harris, which is dirt cheap. It's a 2005 Suzuki GSXR600 with a 2006 front end on it, made up from lots of crashed and blown up bikes. Standard suspension, and the mods consisted only of a Leo Vince exhaust system and a Yoshimura computer.
This was just a practice day before the road race spectacular the next day, so I'll keep it short and sweet. Just before going out Glen said, "you do realise it's race shift". Argh, I'd never been on a bike with reverse shift before, and it was going to take up tonnes of my concentration. Oh well, just do my best. Went out on some very well worn Continental Race Attack tyres. Felt like a GP rider because they gave so much feedback, you could really keep them right on the edge of traction out of most of the corners. Glen got really excited and said we were really in with a chance for the endurance race if I could comfortably keep a bike crabbing around corners like that on the power. This pumped up my ego a bit. I think I initially was doing about 1.19 laps, but by the end of the day I got down to 1.16's. The front guys would have been about 1.11's by now. In my last practice stint I also noticed the front end slipping out while on the brakes into turn one. Turns out that I was too heavy for the standard suspension that had also only been set up for Glen and while leaning in on the brakes I had bottomed out the front forks which had caused shearing on the left hand side of the front tyre. Fun at the end of the day, I was happy with having learnt race shift reasonably well, and was impressed by how much quicker it was on the upshift and that you could safely upshift going through highspeed left handers. All positive really.
We were in with the motoacademy lads, who are pretty much teenagers, Luke and Kyle, riding their 125 GP bikes like animals. A couple of brilliant young characters. At the end of the day we went to the AC baths to loosen up our muscles and hopefully spy some young local talent. Good fun, got repeatedly told off by the lifeguards because although you were allowed to bomb, you weren't allowed to do flips or anything else that involved fun. Luke set about practicing his amazing womanising skills on one of the fine young local lasses. I'm way older but that boy could teach me a thing or two. I swear he must have never encountered rejection. Can't believe the ear rings, tattoo, and emo do work so well. From there we went into town for dinner and a beer. Downed some particularly average k fry. Was kind of funny they didn't have any chicken to sell at the local KFC, only had burgers. Then we went for a brew at a local establishment, Glen like's his bourbon and cokes... in the words of Captain Rum from Blackadder "...you have a WOMANS [drink]". Didn't try our luck with any of the local beauties, was very quiet in Taupo for a Saturday so close to New Years. Went back to the track to get some sleep in our rather cosy pitshed. Someone in the group snored rather loudly, my money was on Steve B.
Day 2 of the TRRS
Sunday, Road Race Spectacular Race Day. Qualifying was taken from the practicing the previous day, so to get used to the $100 second hand Metzeler Slicks that we'd chucked on I went out to blast around a few laps to get a feel for them. Sprint races don't give you any time to get good on a set up. I like to feel how my bike is responding and gradually increase pace on corners if I get the chance. I suppose if I had lots of track time like the top guys I could go out and blast it straight away.
First race, I didn't even realise that it was a Superbike race, thought it was just supersport. I kind of get in my own little world of deep thought about the handling of the bike and I can't really focus on anything else. I really need a pit crew to do my organising for me, cause I'd rather not think about that stuff when I'm getting in race mode. I get quite withdrawn. So went out and out of the 20 something bikes in the field I was pretty far down maybe 18th. I'm really good off the mark but at soon as riders start cramping my space I let them through, I'm not allowed to crash Glens bike, and having worked as a bicycle courier you learn to picture how all the possible crashes are likely to happen around you, and allow for them. Unfortunately this just makes for a slow and steady racer, suitable for endurance racing but not so much sprint racing. Once the field spread out a bit, I was able to pick up the pace and mow down a few of the other 600's. There were some guys on K6 GSXR's that looked pretty close to standard but were hauling arse, and I was really having to push my K5 pretty hard, found myself powersliding out of corners again, and getting the odd front end dive when tipping in. Still in some of the corners with reseal on them, I was behaving such as the entry to the chicane before the front straight, I take a lovely straight line into there, not very fast, but safe. In the days since, I have worked out how I could go a lot faster on the circuit. But part of the problem was that the standard suspension is too light for me, cause with all my gear on I weighed about 80-85kg. Every single lap in this race apart from the first one I did 1.15, how's that for consistency. Happy about my progress. Target still 1.13's for the day and looking viable.
Next race was just the supersport one. Had Glen in front of me on the grid on his RS250 two stroke Grand Prix bike. At the flag drop I fired passed him hoping to take advantage of being on the outside when Hayden Fitzgerald and that Japanese guy Kashimoto or something bailed it into the first corner so I pretty much had to stop to find a path through the carnage, was nearly at the back of the field, but at least it was already spread out so I could get down to business. Glen was still behind me, but made short work of me through the infield section, the corner speed advantage of the 250 was greatest there and Glen really knows how to keep corner speed on it. Still I caught up to the other 250 GP bike followed him for a lap or two, couldn't believe how fast he was down the straight, my 600 was only getting a marginally higher top speed, eventually got close enough to pass him on the brakes into the super tight left hander over the back of the circuit, and hold him out through that super high speed left hander, through the cone chicane and onto the back straight where I made maximum advantage of my speed and made myself super wide into the left right left onto the front straight. Think he followed me around for the rest of the 6 laps. I think I managed to catch another k6 GSXR with standard fairings. I was always tussling with him. By the end of the race the bike was squirming all over the place, apparently that was probably the rear shock overheating, and causing the rear tyre to squirm. At least the front end felt rock steady. After upping the preload and compression damping, it was behaving a treat, and I had no stability issues on it whatsoever on the brakes. Was getting heaps of rear end chatter into turn one and the back was still lifting off the ground into the tight right hander after the midfield and the tight lefthander at the bottom of the downhill segment. Think I kicked the gear lever the wrong way once and saw the rev's spike hardcore and the rear end fishtail a bit, pulled the clutch in as quick as i could which settled the bike down, and then had to consciously think which way I needed to push the gear lever again. Haha, would have lost about 2 seconds right there. I did 3 of my laps in 1.14 in this race, Gareth Jones was down to a freakish 1.09 on his 08 Yamaha.
continued...