Sweaty leather & hot metal
Friday the 18th 06:00, the Hi-Ace was humming along nicely as Katie and I headed for the Coromandel, Paeroa 2011 here we come!
A couple of weeks earlier it been looking perilous as the van had been leaking water and I eventually tracked it down to the rear of the head. Checking the head bolts I discovered one at the rear was broken and had been for some time, bugger !
I took it in to Bowler Motors in Porirua where Pete (who is a biker with a collection of Z1000's that Croz wanted to buy ) was quietly confident he could fix it in time for Paeroa. True to his word it was ready with a week to spare.
I still had no confirmation of my entry, a quick poll on KiwiBiker showed I was not alone so I relaxed (a bit). However as riders started posting “mine has arrived” messages I got a bit concerned and emailed the organizers. Sure enough they had my money but no entry form ! I re-sent it and was assured my entry would be OK but not in the programme. Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on your point of view) I have no sponsors to apologise or explain to so I was quite happy to be the mystery rider on the black and yellow 675 at the rear of the field.
The drive to Paeroa was pretty good, warm weather, light traffic and great company. The lovely Katie O'Donnell is always up for a bit of an adventure and a road trip.
We arrived in Paeroa early afternoon and stopped at the scrutineers shed so I could get my paperwork sorted (the passes for the pits mainly) a local Triumph fan stopped to check out the 675 and offered us a share of the pit he was setting up for a “House of Custom” rider which was the other end of the scrutineers shed.
With the paperwork sorted we headed to Whiritoa beach (about halfway between Waihi and Whangamata) where my sister lives to bludge shamelessly food and shelter (she has a fantastic place right on the beach). One of the many advantages of being the youngest sibling is that the older ones still think you need to be looked after so dinner and cold beer where waiting when we arrived. It had been a pretty big day and after dinner a quiet walk on the beach watching the enormous moon rise was enough to ensure a great nights sleep.
Awaking to the sound of surf and cicadas is not unusual for me, I am pretty deaf and have tinnitus (ringing in the ears) which in my case sounds like cicadas and surf (it's always summer in wharfy's head). This time it was real and it looked like being a great day, a bit of cloud to keep things cool (maybe).
I checked the fluids in the van and we packed the lunch my sister had made and headed for Paeroa to set up and get scrutineers to check me out. We had only got about 5 km's when the van started to get hot halfway up the steep winding road from Whiritoa to Waihi !!!
I stopped immediately, waited a short time then with a small amount of cloth and a large amount of caution cracked the radiator cap. The usual hissing and bubbling, started the motor up and added about 1.5 litres of our drinking water to the cooling system. I was really pissed off, I had checked the oil and water but only the overflow tank not the radiator itself, having just spent $1800 on the head I was really worried that I might have fucked it. The addition of water quickly got the temperature back to normal and we continued, watching the temperature gauge like a hawk all the way to Paeroa.
We arrived in plenty of time with no further drama and decided that as our spot from last year was free we would use it again. It is close to the dummy grid, the generator can be tucked round the corner and this year we had an ezee-up. I went and spoke to Walter and thanked him for the offer of pit space then set about getting ready for scrutineering.
Sign on and bike and gear check all went without a hitch and we were soon in the hurry up and wait mode, lounging around in our brand new ezee-up drinking lots of water and doing chatting with some of the familiar faces that wandered past. Paul Duncan was in the spot next door same as last year with Deano and Paul Taylor.
Katie and I slept in the van as we usually do and managed to ignore the noise and had a good night.
Checked the fluid levels in the 675 put the tyre warmers on and headed to the riders breif. On returning to the pits Katie said “something's burning” a quick scan around showed smoke coming from under the front tyre warmer, shit ! Pulled the plug ripped it of and doused the smouldering tyre warmer with water. It was knackered but the tyre was OK, What to do ? Put rear warmer on the front, if “there can be only one” it better be the front. Daniel Kempthorn happened by and saw our predicament and went off to see if he could find a spare somewhere and soon returned with one. Awesome !!
I managed to convince the organizers that because I didn't actually “race” last year I could go out with the virgins, it was well worth it to ease myself back into it – especially the kink where I crashed in 2010 !
F2 & F Paeroa practice
Even though I am only 100 meters from dummy grid I managed to miss it %^& !!!
BEARS practice.
Went OK trying very hard not to repeat last years fiasco, 55.447 put me 10th on the grid – about 8 seconds behind Choppa – about the same as everywhere else
F2 & F Paeroa practice 2
DID NOT miss this one ! - 55.200 – and 22nd on grid
BEARS practice 2
Managed to knock a couple of seconds of my times, but so did everyone else 53.598 10th
F2 & F Paeroa Race 1
Bit of a blur really, average start, felt pretty good, being conservative had a couple of issues with selecting 3rd gear going up the main straight had trouble getting a decent line through the hairpin, managed to fluke it a couple of times to get a nice tight one and good drive, the first time it happened it took me a bit by surprise and it felt kind of like coming of a berm and I nearly clipped the barrier on the inside of the straight !
Got lapped of course but managed fairly consistent times with a best of 53.852 which combined with a few DNS and DNF put me in 19th over the line and 7th in F2
I was very HOT and SWEATY with a satisfying adrenaline tremor when I returned to the pit with a big grin on my face. I had completed a race at Paeroa !
BEARS race 1
It looked like the gear shift was fouling on the frame – the 675 has the adjusting arm from the rear set to the selector shaft running through a hole in the frame and it appeared that when up shifting it was touching.
I didn't have long to wait for this one so decided against dicking with the gear shift as I didn't want to miss the start !!!
I managed a decent start which put me ahead of the carnage.
On the restart I managed to get away OK and had a bit of a battle with a speed triple and even slipped up the inside going into the kink that was my undoing last year
I had a decent amount of time until the next race so adjusted the gear lever to give a bit more clearance on the up-shift and tried to take on as much water as possible. I even managed to watch a bit of racing and took advantage of the $2 cooling mist and watermelon that some enterprising local had set up.
F2 & F Paeroa Race 2
On the out lap the rear of the bike felt weird and I wondered if my rear tyre warmer was not doing its job and the tyre was cold or something. After 4 very scary laps and being lapped !! I retired to see if I could figure out what was wrong.
The tyre was hot enough but only had 10 psi !!! Careful examination revealed no foreign object or holes so I cracked the valve then returned it to the usual pressure put the warmer on and monitored it closely until the call for my final race, it maintained the pressure so out I went.
BEARS Race 2
Pretty ordinary start and again duelled with the speed triple managed to get ahead of him in lap 3 and build up a bit of a buffer, and in doing so lowered my lap time to 52.757 and again finished in 10th place. I really enjoyed the race and was a very happy camper when I returned to the pit again VERY HOT and SWEATY, this time however I could “hydrate” with a nice cold beer
Katie and I packed up the van found our way to the after match function (eventually) did chatting with a few people and applauded in all the right places and headed off early to my sisters place in Whiritoa.
On the way up we had passed some hitch-hikers, Katie had given them the “sorry no room” shrug of the shoulders and I muttered “probably axe murderers, wouldn't pick them up anyway” only half joking. There ensued a bit of a discussion about the merits of picking hitchers up (or not).
So when just outside Paeroa I spotted someone on the side of the road holding a petrol container I stopped to give them a lift, it was after all stinking hot. I should have paid more attention to his clothes and not been distracted by the petrol container. The guy was wearing an oilskin coat over a jersey and had not removed either for several months by the look of it, but what can you do ? We had stopped already and he was out of gas. So despite his wild looking hair and beard and slightly mad staring eyes I said “jump in”, “mmnnff” he replied as he swung into the van and fastened the seat belt. “How far you going” ? I asked as I patted the van into gear and pulled onto the road, “nnnmmmffhhmm” he replied. Holy shit what was wrong with this guy ! Did I mention it was STINKING hot ? Trying not to run off the road I checked him out from the corner of my eye, he was REALLY dirty and had interesting dental features, his fingernails were black and one leg was bouncing in a rather alarming fashion. “Have you been to the races ?” asked Katie “mmmmnnnffhh, nnnmmmfffhhh” he replied, with some violent head gestures that may (or may not) have been an affirmative. “how far to your car ?“ Katie asked again “mmmmffffnnn” was the reply. It occurred to me then that he probably didn't have a car, maybe the petrol container was just a prop to get people to pick him up ? Maybe he was hoping we would take him home ? We were now into the Karangahake gorge and I was starting to get worried – what if he WAS and axe murderer ?
Just as I was trying to figure out what I would do if he didn't want to get out he suddenly pointed at a driveway and said “mmmmnnnfffhhmm !” I slammed on the brakes and the van shuddered to a halt beside a driveway that lead up to a dilapidated shed and what could have been a house behind the trees, with a very old car in the paddock. It took several minutes for him to open the door with us say things like “good luck with the petrol” and “see ya” and him saying “mmmmnnnffhh”.
Eventually he did get out but was enjoying our chat so much that he held onto the door and continued to make unintelligible sounds while we tried disparately to think of other words for “bye”. In the end putting the van in gear and creeping forward got the desired result and he shut the door. As I shifted into second Katie and I looked at each other and burst out laughing.
“it will take me ten years to get you to pick up another hitch-hiker” said Katie. (maybe)
After that the rest of the trip was so boring I wont bother with it.
WE had a bloody great weekend !!!
Thanks to the organizers, sponsors and volunteers BOTS is shit hot !!
Thanks to my sister for putting us up
Thanks to the lovely Katie O'Donnell for being pit crew, and supporting me
Thanks to all the bike fraternity for being such good bastards.
See you all again next year I hope
Oh where does the hot metal come in I here you ask ?
While Deano was fitting my rear tyre warmer I leaned over to help and my throat came into brief contact with the rim of the 675's exhaust, I now have a very interesting looking scab there....
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Originally Posted by wharfy
Intellectually I KNOW the 675 can go round corners much faster than I ever try (check out Jarrod Wintles times on a bog standard one !) - but after 40 years of road riding the instincts (and bad habits) are hard to control !
Had a blast tooo
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