I don't know why but there always seems to be something that goes wrong with my bike prior to a race meet. Maybe it's just because I am a slack arse and leave everything till the last moment. Well from next time things are going to be different because I will start to prepare my bike from now for next month.
Long story short, my sump plug was wrecked yet again. I think I have an over tightening problem with my bolts. I immidietly realised that I was in danger of running late yet again so I rang up some shops and luckily Squid and his mate at the workshop came to my rescue and did the helicoiling for me. Some other things went wrong but in the end we had it sorted. So me Twosmoker and his g/f headed off to Manfield at about 7PM and reached Hook's place in Palmy at about 1:30AM.
Next morning it was a beautiful day and Hooks kindly made us some coffee and after a shower and a breakfast, we were all set for racing!
Time came for the qualifying for F2/SS (Supersports). I was pretty excited since this was my first time around the full circuit around Manfield and I didn't know how I'd do against some pretty tough competition that surrounded me. I went around turn one then through the eses and around the hairpin and my clutch stoped working! Crap! I tried re-adjusting the cable but that was no good. So I pushed the bike and wacked it into 1st and rode around the track just to get an idea of what it looked like and to run the brand new tires in. I don't use clutch while shifting up anyway but shifting down was a slow process since I wanted to be as gentle on the gearbox as possible. After about 10mins of practice/qualifying, I came in and I knew this was no way to start a chapionship in which I wanted to do well. I knew I would have qulifyed last because of the lack of clutch. Sure enough I qualifyed 23rd out of 32 people with a high 2:18.
Now was not the time to weep about the problem but it was time to fix the problem at hand as soon as possible to get ready for qualifying for F1/SB (Superbikes). Me and a pit crew from an opposing team who's name was Thomas who was from Austria, worked on the bike like crazy! We took the clutch cable assembly off and couldn't really find an obvious problem. It was taking too much time to pull the bike appart and put it back together so I decided to do the Qualifying for SB without the clutch again and then try to fix it before race 1. Now I knew that I had no clutch but I had to do what I could to qualify towards the front of the grid as best as I could. I went as fast as I could and then tried to use the gears as less as possible for another 10mins of SB qualifying. I came back into the pits and found out that this time, my efforts were a bit better. I qualifyed 13th out of 21 people on the track with a high 2.09.
Back at the pits, me and Thomas opened up the bike again and scratched our scalps to try and figure out the problem. The clutch lever was not even going in when pulled and people around us were saying things like, the gear box must have shat itself or the clutch housing is stuffed, and all this really wasn't helping. I went around to try and seek for some good advise but I couldn't really find an expert mechanic. Then someone said, the return spring was missing. Then I went around again to try and find a spring to modify into a return spring. Then Thomas got a exhaust spring from a 2 stroke and bent it into shape which was a perfect fit. Great! This was surely the end of my worries. But sadly it wasn't. The clutch still wasn't working. Now I was really worried. I could see the hopes of me doing well in this championship dissapearing rather quickly. Then Nick Odermatt, sujested to play with a little adjuster on the side which was hidden under a rubber seal. Surely this had to be it. There was nothing else that could have gone wrong other than something major. I adjusted the screws and Wallla! She worked!!!! A big *sigh* of relife later and only a couple of mins to spare for race one, I was all sorted again! Man, if I have many more of these moments in the future, I'm gunna go bald rather soon!
So it was time for race one. We all lined up after the warmup lap and I was really far back in the field. Mental note, never ever have problems for qualifying in the future, cause it'll be a major disadvantage for the whole round. Anyway, we got the race start with the green flag and as always I had a great start. I overtook about 5-6 bikes down the straight and went into turn one. I followed the quick guys around the track for about half a lap then as soon as we got to the new section that I had never done before, I was over cautious and lost a bit of ground. This was the first time I was able to ride properly around the track so I was still getting used to what lines to take around the tricky full circuit. I came away with a high 2:06 in the end and finished 12th out of 25 riders. Just as a comparison Craig Shirriffs was going around the track nearly 10 secs faster than me a lap!
Then I had the SB race and then I talked about the times with people, including Twosmoker because I was interested to know what he was doing on the 400 since it was his first time around the track as well. He said he got a 2.07! I was like WTF?? That's the same as me or only a mear 1 second away from my time!
I thought, right, that's it. I have to push harder. Then for the next SB race I really concentrated on the lines and tried to carry more corner speed. However a major let down for myslef is the lack of my upper body strenght. Half way through the race I was already getting knackared from riding through the twisty turns at race pace. I then concentrated on being smooth as much as possible. I felt like I was going slower cause I was more tired and just was concentrating on saving energy. On that race I found out that I got a high 2:04 which was a bit better. I finished 8th out of 15 riders on the track in Superbikes that time round.
The other races that day were more of the same. I didn't have any battles with anyone because the faster guys were far up ahead and I never saw guys behind me trying to make a passing manuver.
Overall I finished 15th out of 28 people in F2/SS and 8th out of 18 people in F1/SB. SB results http://www.mylaps.com/results/newResults.jsp?id=142109 and SS results http://www.mylaps.com/results/newResults.jsp?id=142114
A huge thanks to Squid and his mate for fixing the bike for me, Hooks for letting us stay the night and for the breakfast, Thomas from Gordan Pullen's Team for helping me fix the bike. Twosmoker for comming down and helping with the fuel costs etc.
Hopefully, I'll be able to do shit loads better for the next round, cant wait!
P.S. Sorry about the half arsed race report, I have been really busy and I had to do a rush job.
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Originally Posted by Mitch
What was your number on the weekend?? Looking forward to racing you UMMM if I haven't already hehe
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