Phil and I showed up on Saturday for a bit of practice, pitting with Benk and Anthony. Went out for the first session and found myself sliding around a fair bit even though I was taking it pretty easy. Back in the pits I discovered a few oil drips coming from my sump plug - the thread was knackered, from what I later found out, was a bodgey repair job - Bugger! Chucked the bike back on the trailer and headed into town to find an engineering shop, nothing openJames and Simon Jarman's old man came to the rescue, got hold of a heli-coil kit and he sorted everything for me - legend - big thanks to Tamaterau Engineering. Got back out on track mid-arvo and in my haste, had put my tyrewarmers on but hadn't plugged them in. Then did back to back sesssions and ran out of fuel....
At the end of the day I was hoping I'd used up all my muppet moments and Sunday would run a bit smoother.
Phil and I headed out for a few beers and bumped into the Jarman's. We went about repaying them for their help in the form ofneedless to say, a few beers turned into a few too many.
Race day:
Pre'89 Qualifying- Went out near the front of the pack in the hopes of get some clear laps. Followed Benk around, but couldn't really make an impression on him. Grid 4. 1m52.4
F3 Qualifying- Did two laps then Scratcha bit the dust (good effort on getting back out there, duct tape was about all I could offer, Anthony and Ben did a good job) Back out for one more lap. Qualified 12th.
Had a bit of a chat to Chappy, he said the inside line on the resin patches was the way to go, he was not wrong.
Pre '89 Race 1- First time on the front row, got an absolute mozza of a start, damn near stalled it and as a result was about 15th into T1. I was a bit defensive for the first few turns not wanting to get cleaned out, then cracked on to try and make up the lost ground. By the 2nd to last lap I was back up to 5th position behind Benk. This was my first meeting since I'd converted to racing shift. I had a lunge up the inside of him at T5 but changed up instead of down - luckily he didn't see me and I managed to make the pass on the final lap and bring it home for 4th. Best lap 1m49.1
F3 Race 1- I knew all I had to do was just finish the 2nd Posties race and I'd pick up some silverware so was a bit of a Nana in this race. Another bad start, pegged a few back to bring it home in 9th.
Pre '89 Race 2- Once again I got a bad start and was pretty ginger into T1. The bike was feeling great so decided to go hard anyway. One by one picking riders off and working my way up to 2nd, my first podium. Chappy was sooooo far out front it almost felt like I'd wonOn the the warm down lap saw Scratcha and Benk having having a play in the sandpit after their "racing incident"
F3 Race 2- Now that posties was over with I had no excuse to be a pussy. Got away to a satisfactory start (didn't lose any positions) and wound up behind Anthony. We had a good dice for a couple of laps, swapping positions a few times. He pulled me along to record my best lap of the day 1m47.4 - I started to slide around a bit and made a few mistakes which allowed him to pull a bit of a gap on me in the end. Finished 9th again.
So I wound upin Pre '89 for the series (they decided not separate Senior and Junior) and 6th in F3. There's some thing to be said for doing the whole series and not having any DNF's eh
Well it's been a bloody steep learning curve since my debut at Round 1. The 4 meetings I've done have all been at different tracks. Thanks to all you good bastards out there for the help and advice. And of course my sponsors RED-i Print (Yep it's still the same bike, looks a bit flasher now, not that smashed up yellow thing anymore) Cycletreads and Divide Interior Design.
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Originally Posted by sharky
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