Kyle Hammond's race report F3/125GP (VMCC Round 4)

**quallman1234** · 24th August 2011, 19:48

I suppose i should chuck something together in here. So here goes, haven't done one in a while.

Quick History : After doing the moto-academy thing for a few years, reported some pretty decent results but always wanted to do it myself. So i managed to score a deal and bought my own Honda RS125.
I had always planned to do at least a round on it before selling it or continue racing it.
So this is the round it was going to be : The two dayer VMCC Round 4.

Saturday Test Day :
I rocked up in my unpreparedness, and forgot to bring my stands, luckily we managed to sort out a center stand, and just pull the front end up with some strops. Orgainsed my dad to bring up the stands for race day. So i only had to put up with it for a day.
Fueled up the bike, did the pressures, checked the main jet, and the general tidy up.
The test day went really well... but i noticed the rear was wagging its tail up in the air under medium not even hard braking. So i asked Keith Biddle (Avalon's dad) for any advice, to my delight he was more than happy to give me a hand.
We discovered that the front end was only using 3/4's of its travel. Robert Taylor came and had a quick look and determined it was due to too much oil hydraulicing the front end and the rear was also over-sprung quite badly. Robert suggested removing 15ml of oil from each fork and going from there. Which we did and noticed a large improvement. The rear would have to wait for another day, and we tried to work around it by letting quite a bit of compression dampening off.

Race Day :

Qualifiying :
From expirence i knew that you had to be quick from the start, so i didn't really fluff around, i chucked in a couple of decent laps, and did a 1:18.8 which i was very happy with considering the track temp was very low. This put me 1st in my class and 3rd overall.

Race 1 :
Starting from the front row of a F3 race on a 125GP bike, i got eaten up from the torque monsters of the 650's etc. I headed in to the 1st corner in about 10 - 12th. And proceeded to show the guys ahead of me how to go around a corner.
Got back into 3rd within a couple of laps and proceeded to gap 4th easily. However by that time the top 2 were well and truely gone so i couldn't jump on to the back of them and get a tow. Managed a 1:17.2 which i was happy enough with. 3rd overall F3, 1st in my class.

Race 2:
Reduced the compression dampening on the rear to see what happened. Seemed to help turning in a bit however noticed i wasn't quite hitting the apex and tried to start turning in a bit earlier. To no avail.
Race pretty much went the same as previous, lost a few rows off the line and did the catch up thing and back into 3rd within a lap or so. Was great fun going around the outside of alot of people but again, i was too slow on it to catch up to the top 2. 1.16.8 was my best time. Improvement and not a bad winter time for a 125GP bike. Certainly had more in it from my point of view.

Race 3:
Reduced even more compression dampening to see again what would happened. Turned in better once again and managed to start getting my apex back. Pretty much the same as the first couple of races but this time i choose to just rail it around the outside of turn 1. This helped heaps and i found myself in 5th or 6th after turn 3 first lap. Much improvement from previous. However i lost time making a mistake coming out of higgens on the second lap and lost the top 2. Almost highsiding in the process. Settled into the race, and tried improving my brake markers and also focused a bit on counting gears. Found myself being very average through higgins. Nevertheless... Got down to a 1:16:6. Pretty happy with that as i did 4 16's without following anyone.

.

Overall a bloody good weekend, and many thanks to:
Katie for letting me borrow her tools
Keith Biddle for being more than helpful and giving me a hand all weekend.
Robert Taylor for having a look at my suspension and deducing problems with it.
Mum and Dad for being there and helping out!
Steve Bagshaw for general help!

Future : Time for a new crankshaft / piston, freshen forks up and new spring to test on the rear. Should be out for a test day to run it in and hopefully get to the final round in taupo. Should break the lap record no worries if its dry.

Kyle Hammond #13.

**crazy man** · 24th August 2011, 21:02

hi you were going well out there my bro court your near highside going down the back strate on his onboard camera

**quallman1234** · 24th August 2011, 21:54

Originally Posted by crazy man

hi you were going well out there my bro court your near highside going down the back strate on his onboard camera

Oh sweet, is he going to upload it? I do wonder what it looks like since, the same sort of thing has happened quite a bit.

PS Could you pm me his number? Was mean't to get it but didn't have my phone with me. Am after some rear springs. Cheers bro

**Clivoris** · 24th August 2011, 22:40

Was great to see you and your Mum back at the track Kyle. Watching you out there reminded me of the buzzing I used to get on my 400. Like a blue mozzy.