Competition Riding

The lead up to the 2017 Paeroa Battle of the Streets was frantic, with lots of work being done on the bike.

On the 10th February I did a track day with MotoTT to test out a couple of things. I finally had a steering damper mounted on the bike and I’d also gotten hold of a gyroscopic mount for the camera, a couple of things I’d been wanting to get sorted for quite a while.

The steering damper had been quite a challenge. ...

Last race day I was having problems with handling after changing the bike’s geometry while, ironically, chasing improved handling. I’d been getting the opposite of what I was expecting; dropping the front made the steering heavier instead of lighter, the back end was coming up under brakes as if the front was sitting up higher, a neutral throttle through corners was pushing me wide instead of bringing the front in.

Figuring out ...

Racing motorbikes you get to learn a lot about yourself. Things you didn't think you could do you find are possible. Fears you thought were you couldn't beat are overcome. Often we overcome physical, emotional and financial problems to do things we never thought we could do. Equally as important is recognising when you shouldn't be riding.

The weather forecast for the day wasn't looking good. It was going to be wet all day with little chance of drying out. However, the forecast for ...

Usually over winter I’ve tended to ride the odd track day and do the occasional race day. However, after the operation to remove the plate on my clavicle I’d missed everything at the start of winter. Also, with all the changes at Hampton Downs, the Winter Series has moved to Taupo and Play Day are no longer able to run there. The MotoHD days aren’t too badly priced but with the amount of rain we had over winter I had little motivation to get ...

I’d never done an endurance race before but I decided I’d enter the first ever Motul 6 Hour at Hampton Downs with Steve Jones and Matt Reichenbach and see what it was all about. What I hadn’t realized when we’d decided to enter was the date; they finally settled on the same day as my wedding anniversary, November 8th!!

Seeing as I was going to be racing that day both my ...

Last time out didn’t go well so this time I was looking to have a much better day. I’d identified the problems and had come up with a solution, namely lowering the footpegs and putting a seat on the bike to give me a lot more room for my legs.

Making the bike more comfortable means less effort to move around so I’d use less energy and wouldn’t get worn out, both of which will be very important for the upcoming 6 hour endurance ...

The AMCC Round 1 at Hampton Downs is the proper start of the summer racing season. I’d been hanging out for it as I’d had almost 15 months of recovering from the broken collarbone and very little racing.

Packing the car was a new adventure as we’d replaced the Golf with an Audi A3 this was it’s first time as a race wagon. It’s about 60mm longer but it’s not as tall as the Golf. It does, however, seem to have considerably more ...

It's been so long since I raced at Taupo I was really looking forward to it. Chances are it was going to be cold (cos it's Taupo) and wet (cos it's not Summer yet) and I felt like I was totally unprepared but I was still looking forward to it. I really like riding at Taupo because it's so different to Hampton Downs. At HD it's all straights connected by corners except for turn 2 into 3. Even turns 3 to 4 and 4 to 5 they're far enough apart ...