Tyler Firn #94 Bridgestone Winter Series Round 2
Receiving a nice sunny weekend for the first round of the winter series had set my expectations higher than they should’ve been for round two. The weather report wasn’t looking so flash and I knew as soon as we made it to the track that there wasn’t going to be any consistency in the weather.
Qualify: ProTwin and Superlite were first up for qualifying. The rain just started coming down before riders briefing which meant we had to hurry to make the tyre change to wets. The rain stopped for us but we had a very cold and very wet track to go out on to set some good times. I was feeling relatively comfortable on the wets, but I haven’t spent much time on them on the 650 so I hadn’t learnt the limits of the tyres. I could see I was catching up to Connor and Nicki on the other ProTwins so I wanted to catch up a little more so I knew I had a better time and therefore a better grid position. Unfortunately I made a few silly mistakes. The first was wearing a tinted visor which makes it even more difficult to see when water is flicked up, the second was trying to draft the bike in front so I could get passed him into the corner, which also placed me in his roster tail of water, and the last was when I realized I had already gone past the point where I would normally brake in the dry before I touched the brakes. The bike then disappeared and I was sliding along the track watching the green bike beside me, hoping he wasn’t going to turn in and get me, before slamming into the gravel trap. I abandoned the bike and climbed up onto the fence and that was me out of qualify. I had to search for my GoPro which had launched itself quite a way away from the bike, but I figured that must be the only upside about crashing my bike for the first time, I had video footage! Unfortunately for reasons unknown... the video ended half a lap before I went down. I looked at the qualify times and I was happy to see that I had qualified ahead of the ones I wanted to placing 8th on the grid of 22 bikes and 3rd in ProTwin.
Dad had a lot of work on his hands and it wasn’t only tyre changes now. The fairings came off first, the front smashed to pieces and the sides severely damaged. The dash came off and the brake lever was replaced. The exhaust was straightened and pulled away from the swing arm and all the sharp parts cut off. Started the bike up and out came the water. The water pump had cracked and pushed a hole into the gearbox casing which we did have a spare of. So the bike went back on its side so we didn’t lose the oil. After a lot of time and effort from dad, we were ready to go for race two after missing race one.
Again there was another weather change and I didn’t have time to change both the front and rear tyres to drys, so we only changed the rear.
Race Two: I figured I didn’t really have too much to lose now I had no fairings on and the tank was already damaged so I knew I would have to push really hard without any fairings so I didn’t lose too much speed down the straights due to wind. I got a good start with a bit of a wheelie, but it didn’t disrupt me too much. I was in the middle of the front pact into turn one and watched as Zane and Jon took off as 1st and 2nd for the ProTwins. I was feeling pretty good with grip and had no problems with the wet front on a completely dry track. I was struggling down the back straight going into Dunlop with a head wind which was slowing the bike and bouncing my head around. I had held 3rd position until Mark came passed on the second to last lap coming into Dunlop with more speed, I was able to make the pass back coming out of the turn and holding him off for another lap until he did the same thing again, picking up more speed down the back straight and making the pass. I wasn’t quite able to get him back over the finish line so finished 4th .080 of a second behind Mark.
Race Three: Yet another two tyre changes in this time. It cleared up so we changed the front to a dry as well then at the very last minute before the race changed back to full wets as it started bucketing down. Not a good start this time. Lights went out and I sat on the grid with the rear wheel spinning on the slippery surface. I got moving a decided to stay out of the possible chaos that often comes with a wet track and turn one. I watch as Nicki took off and looked like she was flying, leaving me well behind, until the bike slipped out from under her again as she had gone down in the first race as well. I was slowly getting to grips with the track and started to catch up to Connor in third position but didn’t have enough time to make a pass so I finished again in 4th place crossing the line just 0.40 of a second behind.
The bikes were looking awesome with our newest sponsor ‘Spinning Planet’ stickered up on the bikes on Friday afternoon, and it was hugely unfortunate for both Ryan and I to have crashed and made a mess of the bikes on Saturday, but they will be back looking immaculate once again next meeting!
Thanks to all our Sponsors for all your help, Spinning Planet Web Design, Baycad Services, Burrell Signs (who is going to have lots more painting and sign writing before next meeting), Hyosung NZ and Dad!
Reply With Quote
Originally Posted by Tyler_94
Bookmarks