Aftera bit of a disaster at the last round we were hoping for a better day at the track
Gates opened at 7am but as I couldn't be bothered turning up that early as it just means you stand around for a hour extra so I got out there about 7.45 and straight down to sign in and get the scrutineering form
pushed the outfit down to scrutineering only to be told that the scrutineers where going to come down to where the sidecars where grouped,after passing scrutineering and after getting the sticker to place on the fairing I pushed it back down to where we had parked up
Diesel Pig had managed to tear himself out of bed and make his way to the track so he put the battery in and did the tyre pressures,we found another volunteer and gave the outfit a push and it fired up first time,let it warm up for a bit,checked the oil and water and had a bit of a look over it.
Practice and we fire it up and out onto the track,I'm taking it pretty easy as Diesel Pigs collar bone hasn't healed 100% and his mums not happy about him being out on it(she calls him Fluffy if you ever meet him),it's not carburetting very well and unless it's kept cranked right up doesnt pull off the corners very well,brakes are a lot better than last time I raced it but I'm not using them as hard as I should,practice finishes for which I'm very grateful as my wrists are kiling me
Race one
We get up on the front row as my starts are really crappy and I need all the advantage I can get,I let the clutch out till I feel it bite and bring the revs up as I hold it on the rear brake,lights out and we're off,not quite as quick as I'd planned but not to badly and we make it into turn one in third as we hit the fast left hand kink we get slightly out of shape and scrub off speed which lets Russel/Darryl and John/Laurie pull out and pass us down into the hairpin,I'm doind Ok on right handers just getting the outfit on the edge of sliding and holding it there but I'm struggling on lefts, as you turn left on a sidecar the bar moves further away and it makes it harder to gas it up as you exit the turn so we finish 5/5
A bit of discussion in between races,Neils moving over to fast into the right hander after the hairpin and its unsettling the outfit so i ask him to slow down we havent been braking as hard as we can and decide to try them hard on the warm up lap to get a better feel for them.we dont manage to do this as I don't give us quite enough room and there's other outfits in the way we also decide to start gassing it up before we start turning into the lefts and see if that helps drive out
Race two
We line up on the front again as we operate a first come first served as far as grid positons go,lights out and we're off,slightly better start but the R1 outfit of Pig/Goober soon blow past us along with everyone else we hit the haipin right behind Russle/Paul and get better drive off it,they go out wide to turn into the right hander and we slip up the inside and into third,coming around the infield sweeper there's a waved yelow and John/Laurie are parked at 90 degrees to the track and Pig/Goober are just rejoining the track,a lap later and I get the same corner wrong and Russel/Paul pass us down the short straight into the next right,we're right behind them exiting the dipper and they leave the door open at the sweeper and we go through on the inside and run out wide, I'm getting a bit excited about actually managing to make two passes in one race and dont hook the right gear to get good drive they out drag us down the straight and we chase them for the rest of the race finishing 4/4
We're both reasonably happy how things are going and starting to work together a bit better
Race three
We get a far better start and dont get passed until we're almost at turn one ans despite chasing as hard as we can can't quite keep up in this one as there's been a change of crew and the guys we've been keeping up with aren't out in this one,we're getting dropped off a little bit each lap but we're riding faster and smoother than before and then exiting the dipper on the last lap a bad vibration sets in,we nurse it to the sweeper and stop for a quick look,we decide to idle to the flag but the spockets turning but the wheel isn't as we've managed to shear the rear hub in 1/2,Colin soon turns up with the ute and trailer and we load up and head off to the bar and bbq
Well we had a great time even with the breakage,we're working together a lot more effectively and starting to get a bit faster,but we've found a few more things that need fixing and thats not just the rear hub,it doesn't pull well out of the corners which just seems to be the carbs so a balance might be in order there,the brakes while good aren't quite right so a bit more attention there might be in order,so we'll get that sorted in time for the next round at Timaru in April![]()
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