No Clive, I have not been getting tips from Ron Jeremy !!
Round one of the Tri-Series
I took Thursday and Friday as annual leave and was all set by Wednesday evening fro the trip to HD. The trusty HiAce had new tyres and even a trip through the car wash.
Katie had to work but my daughter Elizabeth had finished uni for the year and was keen to come and support the old man and visit some of the whanau in the Waikato.
The trip to Hamilton (or TRON as Elizabeth likes to call it) on Thursday was pretty good, light traffic great weather, a bit of wandering down memory lane as we passed familiar landmarks (nostalgia is not what it used to be though).
We stayed the night in TRON with my sister and had an uneventful drive to HD (via the back road from Ngaruawahia to Rangarari so I could check out the old farm at Huntly West )
We got a spot on the skid pad next to the Moto Academy and were set up in no time (not much to set up – generator, tyre warmers an ezey-up or canopy for the van is on the wish list)
Practice
Elizabeth and I walked the track before the practice and I was VERY impressed with the layout, only six corners but all of them interesting, turn one hidden by the impressive drop from the main straight, turn two heading up to the crest of a rise just where you flick into turn three, tight turn four up another hill to a blind, downhill decreasing radius turn five and a never ending sweeper in turn six, up the hill to the now infamous bump and “kink” onto the start/finish.
As I said I had no tips from Ron Jeremy but I asked sketchy how he reckoned the downhill decreasing radius turn five should be done, “stay out wide apex at the very end of the ripple strip take it easy to start with, a hard corner to get right, easy to get wrong, you probably aren't going to win a race there but could easily loose one”
Sounded good to me.
I watched a few riders take that corner (it's handy for viewing from where we were pitted) and the line sketchy recommended seemed to work for those that used it.
So my first few laps where VERY cautious, those blind downhill turns are VERY intimidating to start with, but once familiar were actually a lot of fun. The turn that I thought would be easiest and most fun, the never ending turn six turned out to be more difficult than it looked (but was indeed great fun – on the edge of the tyre for ages)
Because I never got turn six right my speed up the hill to the bump and kink was not enough to make either of them an issue – in fact they were pretty cool at the paltry speed I was doing.
So after a couple of practice sessions I was starting to feel reasonably comfortable with the track and my first impression that it was shit hot was supported – even though once on the bike it didn't seem nearly as huge as it did walking it
My mission for the weekend was to have fun and not crash so I wasn't to worried that I was probably going to be last in f2/600.
Race Day !
Qualifying
BEAR's and F2 qualifying were back to back and I thought that might give me a slight advantage, coming back from BEAR's and straight out onto the dummy grid for F2. Sounded good in theory but in practice it didn't work out that way and my time was better for BEAR's at 1.20 than F2 at 1.21. Still starting from the back of the grid was OK I had no clue how fast I would be going by the time I got to turn one and not much of a clue as to how fast I could take it so I would be happy to follow the crowd initially.
BEAR's Race 1
The entry list for the BEAR's class was pretty impressive Sloan Frost, John Woodly, Joel Read, Peter Tanner to name just a few, so my main objective was to finish without getting in anyone's way. The first 4 qualifiers were 10's a lap or more faster than me so I knew I'd be lapped on about lap 6 or 7 but was pretty sure that if I held my line they would have no problems getting past.
Still I was plenty nervous waiting for the flag to drop and when it did I got a pretty good clean start and charged down the main straight with the rest of the pack I had a strange moment of thinking lemming as the bikes in front dropped from view over the crest into turn one and it was with some relief that when I too went “over the edge” things seemed OK.
A couple of people made excursions into the dirt so I was content to take it easy and see if I could get a bit smoother and a bit faster and not push and end up getting out of shape.
Finished 9th with a small improvement in lap times from practice and qualifying no “moments” and fresh scuff marks on both knee sliders
F2 Race 1
Again starting from the back of the grid I got a clean start and followed the pack into turn one I managed to get “towed along” for a bit in the first laps and managed to improve my time even more to a day's best of 1.17 in lap two, after loosing touch my times slipped a bit as I circulated by myself until sketchy and John Ross blew past me followed by another half dozen riders.
I was pretty happy with the improvement in lap times and the fact that I had managed to do that without getting myself (or anybody else) into any sort of bother at all.
BEAR's Race 2
Again my start was OK I had and enjoyable race even had a bit of “racing” for a few laps before settling into my own little practice until getting lapped by almost the entire field again.
My times were not as good as the previous race but were fairly consistent high teens.
Due to a few DNF's and a DNS I finished in 10th spot
F2 Race 2
My starts were going OK and this one was no exception, I was really starting to enjoy myself and especially turn one and the turn two and three combination, maybe I was enjoying myself too much as my lap times were not quite as good this race back up to 1.20's.
\I was pretty happy with finishing in 15th place again due to attrition not anything I did (well except stay upright
So a bloody great weekend, it was good to catch up with some familiar faces, it seems like ages since the end of the winter series. I look forward to returning to HD and shaving a few more seconds from my times. I head to Manfeild with some points in both BEAR's and F2
F2 11 points 16th place BEAR's 23 points 8th place and no repair bills
Hampton Downs is a great track and this event was damn good thanks to all those that made it happen.
Bring on round 2 !! (follow this link to Biggles Racing there is even a photo of me that looks good !! )
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pi...id=93676549725
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Originally Posted by scracha
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