F1
Ducati 998
I owe Motomart this round.
I went down to the garage to kick the tyres and have a look at the bike Friday morning and found a pool of fork oil on the floor. I called Pat at Motomart and he said to bring the forks in and they'll fix them for Saturday's race. A few hours later they called back and said forks were ready to be picked up again. Champs!
Qualifying
I had really been looking forward to ride the long track again. It's so much more fun with the fast corners all the other challenges it presents.
I had dropped the front 4mm to get the thing to turn better, but to be honest I couldn't tell the difference. It wasn't worse anyway so I'll try another 2mm for the next round.
Qualified 13th, 4th row, so I knew I better get good starts to get into top 10 again.
Race 1 - F1
I lined up on 4th row on the inside. Spud right infront of me, slightly to the left. Lights goes off and I'm leaning as far forward as I can to keep the front down. I see Spud bouncing a bit and hope he'll hold his line and pass him and the rest of the 3rd row accelerating through the first four gears. The acceleration is such a rush and the tunnel vision at the end of the straight is pretty sweet too. For once I didn't break too early but staid close to the guys in front of me. I managed to get out of turn 1 in 7th position I think. Craigh Frethey is right in front of me which was great I thought, because he's always quicker than me and now I could try to keep up with him.
It was working pretty well until I tried to break later but struggled to stop the thing. Damn breaks are useless, made for posing outside Starbucks, not for stoppies after the front straight. I have to sort that out.
I run wide in Higgins after a late break attempt and Sandra get a great drive out of the corner into the extension. I closed in on her trough the fast corners and as we enter the long left sweeper, over the new seal and bumps, we're right leaned over at the outside of the track, you have to very gentle here and wait before you can get on the gas again, the rear tends to step out I've noticed. Sandra getting on the gas a wee bit too much and the rear comes right around and she's sliding on the ground and I fear I'll run into them. Fortunately they drift to the outside of the track and I make it through.
Craig is now long gone and I finish the race 7th. My best F1 result to date!
Race 2 - F1
Not so good start this time, probably around 10th into turn one and I ride quite slowly in general. I get passed by 4-5 bikes in the first lap before I manage to get up to speed. I pass a 2-3 bikes in the extension and the long sweeper coming into Dunlop and are now behind Spud and Sandra. There's nothing much I can do but having a ball riding with them. I try one last desperate attempt to pass Spud in the last lap, last corner but I over cook it a loose all momentum coming out of the last corner and Spud walks away from me, I finished 11th.
LG superbike race.
I almost missed this race for whatever reason. I was on my way but the bike didn't sound right, very noisy!? Ahh, I forgot the earplugs. By the time I was sorted the dummy grid had left but the officials let me out to join the warm up lap.
Spud decided to do a LeMans start but the rest of us took off by the lights.
A few laps into the race I was trying to keep up with Sandra again. She's very quick around the short track but I catched up again around the extension.
With only a few laps left Sandra miss the turn a goes straight out over the grass.
The only guy in sight now is Adrian Cox but he's far ahead. Even though I rev the poor twin untill the trellis frame glows red, Adrian casually wheelies away from me on the strights
I think quite a few riders went down in this race, I end up finishing 4th.
Another great VMCC meeting. Even though a few hickups in the morning, VMCC improvises and keeps every thing smooth and flowing.
Catch ya'all at round 5!
cheers
johan
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Originally Posted by Clivoris
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