Kaiapoi to Auckland on a bucket!

[DELLORTO]

ive been coming front pack in b-grade lately so it sholdnt be too hard, my partner raced buckets 10 years ago and hes reasonably fit so we should qualify.

Im fit and young so the 2 hour should be my specialty, some of the royshill riders are coming up so it will be a great weekend.

Do they still do the "runnning" start? that looks great

[Damien_Toman]

And I'll have time to either get my bike going properly or upgrade.
Looking forward to next weekend already, not sure about the 2 hour in November though, doubt I'll manage to qualify somehow.

Henk, with your existing cornering skills (shown in my photos like this one http://www.flickr.com/photos/dty1/39...7622284290869/ ) and a faster bike, it would be no trouble. My FXR will be road production standard with electric start etc. I'll still have a go. I'll do 2 hours myself if I qualify. I did a long race in England over 20 years ago - was a fantastic learning experience. This should all be easy after my 1200 km trip from Christchurch (Kaiapoi) last weekend through the Napier-Taupo road wintery conditions. I was on the red line most of the way with a 12-tooth on the front. The race track will be much easier with all the traffic going in the same direction!

[Henk]

The two hour itself doesn't bother me, have done plenty of 3 hour hare scrambles and enduros and rode no mates at Raglan Rocks 4 hour at one stage. Not sure what the format is for the 2 hour though? Can you no mates it?
Thing will be to get on the grid. Time will tell.

[bucketracer]

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Yep they do the Le Mans start and one of the rules for the 2-hour is that there is two riders and no one rider can do more than 65min total. There must be at least one rider change, personally when I tried it I lasted about 20mins (or less) before succumbing to sea sickness.

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[Henk]

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Yep they do the Le Mans start

Have to buy a friend then by the looks. It'll have to be someone fitter than me too, I'm only going to run if someone is chasing me and waving a stick in the air.

[Damien_Toman]

Well, Henk, if my bike is still intact by then, we could enter as a team! Do you have to use one bike? If so, we could use my FXR150 if you like.

[Henk]

Will see how it goes. I suspect the manouvering in the pits is going to put the MotoGp silly season to shame. I've got a mate sort of lined up to ride my bike if he's keen, I've also vaguely committed to someone else if that falls through. Still have to figure out how the qualifying is going to work.
Done two man races off road before, somelet you use two bikes some don't. Mate I have lined up has done those with me in the past, a 4 hour relay wasn't the ideal time to find he hated my TM the first time he rode it.

[Damien_Toman]

Ah.. no probs ... sounded like you were desperate! I might just take some photos.

[Henk]

Nah not desperate. Might drag the old 300D out next weekend and see if I can get a few snaps myself. I have serious camera envy of your kit.

[Damien_Toman]

The 300D is a good camera. You just need a good 200mm lens for Mt Wellington. L-series f2.8 is best with good Ultrasonic motor for fast servo focus. The lens will cost much more than the camera but will last for a long time as you upgrade camera bodies. With my full-frame body, I often use the Canon x1.4 converter with the 200mm f2.8L prime at Mt Wellington. You won't need the converter with the smaller sensor on the 300D. I'd like the 300mm f2.8L but at $7500 it is a bit expensive. I do have the 400mm f5.6L but it is too long for most of Mt W. even on the 5DMkII full frame body.

[Damien_Toman]

Nah not desperate. Might drag the old 300D out next weekend and see if I can get a few snaps myself. I have serious camera envy of your kit.

How about a few snaps of your new FXR150 and all the cool mods?

[Henk]

There aren't that many cool mods at the moment. It resembles a collection of neglected bits at the moment. I've been busy taking things away. Exhaust is in 4 pieces right now, 5 if you count the bit that was floating around in the mufler that I'm not going to put back.

[Damien_Toman]

There aren't that many cool mods at the moment. It resembles a collection of neglected bits at the moment. I've been busy taking things away. Exhaust is in 4 pieces right now, 5 if you count the bit that was floating around in the mufler that I'm not going to put back.

Sounds like major surgery.

[Henk]

Going to hang it under the bike to get it out of the way. Since the electric start didn't work anyway I took that away which gave me some more room for a catch bottle, got rid of the dash and then got stuck into the wiring loom and took awa all but the about 5 wires that you need to make the bike run. Most of the loom feeds into the dash for uneccesary things like the speedo and gear position indicator. Hopefully I didn't take away anything critical in my enthusiasm. got a number board and tailpiece coming from Hazzard so when that turns up I'll get the hack saw out again.
Figured the bike was never going back on the road so I might as well do things properly, besides, I like playing around in the garage.
Tempted to butcher the gas cap and take the ignition away so I don't have a key to lose. I think a mate of mine might have a pre butchered cap of a GSXR400 in his shed, if it fits I'll swap it out and just run a kill switch.

[Damien_Toman]

Sounds comprehensive. I'll be keen to check it over at the next meeting. I still haven't made the one-way decision to make mine purely a racer. It is still road registered and all the bits can be put back on at this stage. I'll see how things go. I still have not had a race yet.