Hi Boys and Girls... here goes.
Me and my pit bitch Mike headed down to taupo the long way via a few mates/rallies on saturday morning and made it there to enjoy a quick handle at the local pub with a few other F3 racers + Slim. We then headed out to the taupo pools in our new found taupo pre-raceday tradition and vented some energy and just played general silly-buggers, you know, the sort of childish things that get legs broken the day before the big race etc etc, but we were lucky this time, Slim just managed a nasty whack on her shin
So here came raceday.. signed myself up for F3 + F2/F1combined just incase i felt like a little more racing/practise but could just as easy flag a race or two in F2. Lined up for practise.... had a great time, everything was flowing, just felt a little off pace as EVERYBODY GOES SO FAST IN PRACTISE BUT ME?!... anyways had another 2 practises (1 more was F1 the other i just did one for F2/1) Yeah they went well but the 3rd one (last) just wasnt right and wasnt working for me which made me a little more nervous about the first race.. but anyway, the big moment...RACE ONE FORMULA 3 AND GP125's TO THE DUMMIE GRID NOW PLEASE.. blah blah warmed up tyres and here i was on the 3rd row thinking this is going to be interesting... well bang! we were away, with a bit of a holeshot and an ugly move into the first left i found myself in 5th position!(no way i thought!) which i was stoaked about but knew i couldnt keep it long... so i played the "lets keep it ugly i nthe corners and try scare the tailers away from passing me!" it didnt work.. soon lost a position on the 2nd lap i think and then another 2 eventually... unfortunatly our newest joiner to F3 was ahead of me (i know, its a real beating on the ego)... but then was to my right hand side picking up his bike on the hairpin after 'gassin her a little hard on exit (no toruble, bit of duct tape and the bike was back together). So i beleive i got a 7th position in that race! may not sound like much to you guys and its probably because the fast guys were sick or waiting for bigger races like the nationals etc BUT I FINALLY broke into a top 10 place in F3, that was my day made already and just in the first race! i loved every bit of the race and have found some real passion for Taupo, what an awesome circuit and so nice and tight you can learn it and try new little things without much worry to affect your times much etc, it was just great!... anyway come the 2nd race i beleive i found myself on the 3rd row again (possibly 2nd actually that time?) and yet again saw that green flag-was prepared- and boom, pulled off another holeshot putting me lined up with 1st position but only to slowly loose it into that 1st left and hold 4th untill the hairpin where i lost another 3 odd places, now i am not sure where i ended up in this race but would guess it was an 8th or 9th, another great race and infact i called this one my favourite for the day! everything worked, i picked up pace and was just giving the ol' girl a good hard race!(thought i had better state RACE and not RIDE incase some of you got the wrong idea or something!), and once more our newcommer Brett #124 became unlucky and managed a last position.. why?! well i tell you! he is blimmin fast! like, always up with the top front runner but this time he looked back on exiting the hairpin (probably to see how many kiliometers i was behind!) and by the time he looked straight again the right hander was passing him by... i ended up coming out of the hairpin thinking "what the?! brett mate the idea is to complete a race to get points not go wandering off into mid-field!" but luckily as i said he came back onto the track without throwing it away (as i bet i would have at that speed) and completed that last lap. Well, ive already had a great day and i had better quickly say before i forget that i raced in F2/F1combined(with motards!) before my races just for the first race as experienced and in the 6 laps managed NOT to get lapped much to my amazement and think finished 3rd to last (or at least i counted 2 bikes behind me, hopefully there were more?!) out of a good 15 bikes or so, it was a good experience though. Well yeah, id had 3 races, was tired, had the biggest grin a wee lad my age could have on his face and was satisfied with the day already, i just wanted another race to get another practise on my starts and wanted to race but not risk throwing her away as id already had so much fun! so this time i was on the inside of the 2nd row... and Boom, the green flag goes down! yet again the yellow wee-beast pulls like mad and earns me a 4th place through the first corner (Mike you better have got a picture of me up there! its probably the only time ill get to say ive been up the front!) and had lost a number of places into/exiting the hairpin THANKS ALOT BRETTbut continued the race loosing one or 2 more places during it and still finishing approx 8th-9th again.
Well the summary of this raceweekend you ask?! - was great fun, this time learnt more aobut the racing then the social/life side of things but man was it great! im calling this meeting the most fun ive had yet and would be satisfied if everyother was only half as fun! The one thing i concentrated on and seemed to work well was my starts. i dont understand it as my bike is geared the highest it can be basically (for top speed) for pukekohe and @ taupo i was only just getting into 5th on the straight(and was often finding a false neutral between 4th/5th).
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What?! some of you dont want me to go without a little HWF(High Wank Factor) written up? Righteo - its hardly worth the space it takes up on Spanks site but the edges of the tyres are shagged, both knee sliders are well carved, boots carved a little(learning how to tipytoe on a bike more helps stop this!) And footpegs ground down more (despite already beind 3/4 chopped off at angle), gear change lever litterally smacked into ground on a number of lefts and ground away bottom edge, lower fairing ground(NEW PAINT JOB OH NO! but luckly udnerneith so cant really see), did lots of drifting and sliding the rear wheel aswell as a minor front end drift leaving the sweeper too fully crossing-her up. Oh and i cant forget to mention the minor stoppies going into the hairpin, and totally loosing the rear too often doing so, but in saying that, i was following Brett(very briefly as hes too damn fast!) into the hairpin and thought "F*** and i thought i got sloppy into that hairpin! Ill admit i certainly dont have the stones to want to be within 5 bike lengths of him in that hairpin and Would appriciate(if your reading brett) you giving me a quick toot or something before you rammed it up from the inside to steal my line and i would have happily moved WELL out of the way!
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haha cheers guys, this writeups been a bit of a laugh for me and something visual to reflect back to me the way the day panned out, enjoy!
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Originally Posted by Kwaka-Kid
(or even a race).
can't wait to see it on the track, passing me several times per session
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