I hitched a lift with Malcolm and Hel's this round, as they had some spare room in their van for me and my gear. Last round I travelled by myself and it was very boooooring.
The only down side was the depart time of 5.00am so they could both get a good stable in the pits. This was an hour earlier than I normally leave so was bit of a struggle.
Malcolm was racing a mate's SV this round so we had a good chin wag discussing the finer points of pro twin racing.
We arrived at the track just after 7am to find quite a few early birds already there setting up.
The weather was looking great and I had new front brake pads, new chain and shorter gearing since Round 3 - I was hoping that this was going to give me a bit more of an edge as I needed to keep Ash Payne at bay, and really wanted to stick with Geoff Booth as well.
Qualifying Pro Twins
I found the track a little slippery exiting splash where oil had been dropped by a car on Friday's test day. A postie then dumped some oil at the haipin, although there was still a good line between that and the berm.
I felt pretty good about the session, and found that I had qualified on pole.
Race 1
I was determined not to feel any pressure about starting from pole this round. (After I stuffed my starts from pole at Rd 2). I was just going to put my head down and aim to be at turn 1 first.
Geoff Booth however had other ideas and despite getting a good start myself, he romped past me off the line and into turn 1 just in front of me.
I chased pretty hard and managed to stick with him for a couple of laps, then Nick Longstaff on his F3 SV came past on the front straight. They didn't really pull away so I kept pushing hard to try and stick with them.
I had been trying different lines through the left hander after the far hairpin (the one with the horrible surface), and had heard that if you apex really close to the berm, the surface is a bit smoother.
So I tried this and promptly smashed my knee slider into the blue and white curbing. My slider was flapping about and I tried to restick the velcro while keeping up the pace. Coming onto the front straight I looked down to see why it was not resticking - the velcro stitching had ripped off, leaving only a few threads holding it on.
With another lap to go I thought this is not good, it could come off under my rear wheel or another bike could run it over so as I crossed the start/finish line I reached down and ripped it off.
So here I am with a slider in my left hand thinking, now what. I couldn't biff it over the pit wall in case I hit someone so waited till I was just past the end of the wall then threw it onto the grass......then hard on the brakes before turn 1. Phew !!
Geoff and Nick had pulled a way a bit but fortunately no one had caught me during this mishap.
Finished 2nd in class and very happy that I had finished ahead of Ash - he did however set a faster lap time, and unfortunately for him did not qualify well so had started 16th.
Race 2
Thanks to Celtic Leathers, my knee slider had been sewn back on, and for a very reasonable fee too.
I got a good start, but Geoff again launched ahead. I stuck with him a lot better this race and was faster in quite a few places, mostly under braking and mid corner speed. As soon as we hit the straights he would pull away though. A few people watching said to me later that his bike was obviously quicker - I was pleased that it was not just me thinking it.
The white flag came out and then Paul and Ash came past just as we braked into turn 1. I didn't realise but they had been right behind me for the last lap and charging hard. As much as I tried, I could not get back past them and was a bit disappointed that Ash had gotten past. Thinking back, if I had known how close they were I should have taken the inside line into turn 1 and made them both go around me. It could have bought me some time but its too late now so I will have to remember this for next time.
Big thanks to Malcolm and Hel's for the lift, VMCC and marshals for all their hard work, my sponsors, my wife and my Dad for supporting me, and the crew helping out in our pit.
Congrats to Alan for 3rd place in streetstock 250 on his first outing since his big off. Big ups to Luke for his efforts on Scracha's SS bike and Drew, who was really flying before his bike decided it had had enough of racing and decided to try hurdles instead, with some success I might add.
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SENSEI PERFORMANCE TUNING 
Originally Posted by roadracingoldfart
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