I think this story starts back in June but I won’t go there and bore you with the details, instead I’ll skip forward to January and the story of how I ended up at Round 1 of the 2008 Nationals at Ruapuna. After anticipating the arrival of my completely rebuilt, fastest SV in the country for a number of weeks, its eventual arrival 2 weeks before heading south gave me limited track time to get things set up. A few laps of Taupo and a day at Pukekohe with completely the wrong sprockets didn’t do anything at all for my confidence and I nearly canned the whole idea of going to the south island at all.
Actually just getting to the start line was miracle enough after driving all the way to Christchurch non-stop overnight and pulling into the campground to have the trailer drawbar snap taking the chain with it…
That aside, the first round at Ruapuna was going to be a challenge for me mentally (read no time on bike and 5 crashes in the past 6 months) and physically with my shoulder still giving me grief and a lack of track fitness to boot.
Practice day Friday my times were so hideously embarrassing I refused to tell anyone what they were. Over the course of the weekend I managed to drop a total of 13 seconds off my times but qualifying on Saturday morning I was still working on this and so ended up last on the grid…
Despite my last place start (not to mention missing the start completely in race 2 and having to start from the dummy grid – yay for Ruapuna’s sound system…) I never actually came last in a race which pleased me. Had some great battles at the back of the pack and really enjoyed the ride. After all, it’s why we are there!!
Huge thanks to Rodders for pitting for me all weekend – there were so many things still to be sorted out on the bike I never would have achieved it all without Rodders!!!
With the trailer welded back together and a couple of days relaxing in Christchurch it was time to head to Timaru and Levels. My confidence on the bike was improving by the day and with an extra day of practice on the Wednesday; I headed into Friday practice feeling good. Better qualifying here and again some great racing. Times still not fast enough to really be playing with the big boys but at least I could keep them in sight! Levels is a fun track and I definitely enjoyed it more than Ruapuna. Thanks to Kerry Dukie working consistently on my suspension, the bike was handling well and the engine was working great.
From Levels I spent a couple of days in Oamaru where Andy Bolwell spent every spare moment he had checking the valve clearances on my bike and making a few tweaks here and there. Apparently my SV was the first to ever grace his workshop floor. New sticker to be added to bike: “Boost by Bolwell” © Eric De Boer aka Feral1. A huge thanks here to Andy for giving up his free time to help me out.
After my two kiddies had scared enough Oamaru penguins to get us kicked out of town, we headed south to Invercargill. By now I was starting to feel tired after nearly 3 weeks on the road and 4 days a week on the track and I woke up Thursday morning with a cold. This was my first time at Teretonga though and my goal had been to try and be on pace with the boys by this round. What a great track – I love the huge sweeper at the end of the front straight although watching Eric cartwheel off into the dust followed a lap later by Tom Bos was interesting…
The biggest thanks for this weekend goes to Andy Bolwell who sat me down and talked through some different options in terms of gearing and gear changes. Although the between race sprocket change didn’t work, the rest of it did and by the last race I was finally playing with the pack – even beating Tom Bos! (I think he had bike problems but I’ll take the credit, thanks…)
Some statistics for those of you interested:
Ruapuna: fastest lap: 1.48.6 (top guys doing 1.39ish), best placing: 10th
Levels: fastest lap: 1.15.7 (top guys doing 1.10ish), best placing: 10th
Teretonga: fastest lap: 1.08.4 (top guys doing 1.04s), best placing 10th.
Over the course of the three rounds I went from 10 seconds behind the winners to 4 seconds behind the winners so I’m pretty happy with that. My theory, of course, continues to be that although I may be last, at least I’ll look good doing it…
Huge thanks to those people who helped get me to the start line and to those who helped out along the way: Paul from Cardales Stationary City Albany, Chris, Tony, Corinna, and Ness from Haldanes Motorcycles, Billy from Autocycle Refinishers, Steve from www.kiwitrackdays.co.nz, Pirelli, Rick from Pawson Reid Velo who do Dainese and Diadora, Andy Bolwell, Kerry Dukie, Rodders, Kevin (Bubbles), Gav, Aria, Tim, and Chris.
Biggest thanks go to the youngest pit crew in the world: My two kiddies Ben and Sally ages 9 and 7 who did my stands, tyre warmers and fuel on every practice day, drove me crazy the rest of the time, but gave me the biggest hugs when it all got too much.
Biggest, biggest thanks to Gordon who flew down from Auckland every weekend to help me out and has put up with me trying to do all this racing stuff for far too long.
Roll on Manfeild and Pukekohe!!
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Originally Posted by Keystone19
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