Kaitoke Bucket Racing North Island Series Round 4

**hmurphy** · 8th April 2012, 21:08

Hahaha awesome Rich. Feels good to be alive after that last race, never been so terrified around that track til that race. I need to start testing other tyres I think or possibly a harder compound Bridgestone. The supersoft and the soft compounds just don't last long at all. If it was a 30 lap race I don't think I would have made it haha.

Cheers Skunk, Steve, Leigh, Craig, Sherrie (sorry if I spelt that wrong) and all others that made the weekend pretty awesome. Great people, great weather and heaps of fun. I will upload a bunch of footage from the weekend, I have looked through all of it and there is some really cool shots of you guys in A grade. I even caught someone having a crash at the end of the back straight - not sure who it was though but you will know who you are haha. Anyone got a rear tyre for me so I can race next weekend?

**Bert** · 9th April 2012, 11:54

Anther great Easter Bucket meeting (This has really turned into one of the events of the Bucket year).
A big thanks Steve, Andrew, Leigh, Nigel, and everyone else behind the this meeting that made it soo successful again.

Wellington put on a good show for the weekend as well.
Great to catch up with everyone again.

Also a big thanks to: F5dave, Tz350 & Rich for your help with the fine tuning of the new toy over the weekend; have come away with it nearly working and on-song (and now ready for some runs to find some mid range and clean up the ignition).
Really stoked with the bike; is has a solid foundation for a realible two stroke; again big thanks to CrazyMan and Griffiths Engineering / Colt Cams for all the help (esp last minute stuff that made the weekend possible).

Catch you all soon.
Brent.

**TZ350** · 9th April 2012, 15:48

An absolutely fabulous weekend , big thanks to Skunk , Andrew, Leigh, Nigel, the Flaggies and all the others who made the meeting possible.

A weekend that at the beginning of the week looked like miserable rain turned out to be two very brilliant sunny days.

A touch of sun stroke had me a little subdued Sat night but going to the Parrot and Jigger for dinner with a lot of the others, about 40 or so and getting to catch up with some old friends, riders and their crew and puting some faces to new names was great.

Sat, was Kels first look at the track and he rode exceptionally well. Hamish who normally runs at the front, was happy to tell us how impressed he was with the Beasts acceleration. He expected to be able to easily swing past it exiting the top corner only to see the Beast pull away down the back straight. If the track had not been so new to Kel there may have been a real race for 1st as it was he finished 3rd.

So there it was, the Beast flew, with no sign of the heat fade that’s supposed to affect aircooled 2-Strokes and Kel was able to peddle it at the pointy end in A grade first time out on a new track. It all looked good for Sundays points racing as Kel got to know the track better. I was feeling confident that we were in with a chance on Sunday.

The next time out Kel just quietly putted around in the two warm up laps, grided up and when the flag dropped the Beast had a heart attack and fell over.

WTF ….. The Beast screams around the track on full song then quits when taken out for an easy trot, what is that all about?????

Come Sunday Kel went out in the first points race on his trusty old FXR and finished 3rd, very impressive effort for a basically std chassis. Kel was well into the second race and chasing Rick, with a bit of exciting passing and re passing, then Kel dropped it trying to get around a back marker and that effectively handed Rick the North Island Series Win.

A Great Weekend racing at one of the best F4 tracks and with the nicest people in Motor Sport, what more could you want, a big thankyou to everybody who was there and those that organised and helped run the meeting, we had a great time, thanks.

**kel** · 9th April 2012, 16:07

Thanks to Vic and Pacific clubs for putting on the final round. Perfect weather, fantastic track and great racing!
Congratulations to Rick on taking the series win. Its been an epic series with some seriously close but always clean racing. I didnt really get a look at you on track Saurday but qualifying times suggested it was going to go to the wire and the first race certainly bore that out. The second race you pushed me beyond my limits and I paid the price.
Cheers to ESE for the support, getting me to the final round and of course the bike. The beast certainly turned heads when it was out on track, I have no doubt the huge horsepower advantage would have created a stir for the final round.
And of course - a big thanks to Steve and everyone involved in running and making the series happen.

**Henk** · 9th April 2012, 20:25

Thanks to Andrew Steve... Too many names to list and would probably miss a couple anyway for putting on the weekend and a special thanks to Helen, Malcolm and the mighty Bennett household for putting us up over the weekend.

Another absolutely brilliant weekend racing, catching up and talking crap. Super smoothly run event on what must be the best track in the NI.
I must say that the B grade guys are nuts and I was quite happy that the 100 wasn't getting great starts so that I avoided all the turn one mania.
Feel a bit guilty about not paying some sort of cross entry fee with the amount of laps I got in on the weekend. Bloody brilliant and it seems like every time we go down the racing gets better.

Thanks again to everyone who made the meeting both happen and be such a great time.

**Clivoris** · 9th April 2012, 20:56

Big ups to Skunk Control, Skunk, the Monsters, Steve, Mel, BERNIE, the WAGS who helped out and the others who I have no doubt missed. These North Island rounds are geting better and better. And it's like the championship winner said (paraphrased): The social side is as big as the racing. Congratulations on the title Mr Ford. Ford the younger showed some fine moves on the weekend too. Wont be long and we will both be on the has-been seats cos our kids are beating us.
I had an average weekend as far as racing goes. Wanted to go better but am always a bit cautious first time out in a new (proper A-grade) environment. The hang-overs don't help, so it's back to pre-race abstinence for me. Probably. Got some great advice from Sully which I will be working on and definitely know some other things that need to improve. Look out the mid-pack.

**F5 Dave** · 10th April 2012, 10:08

Yes Thanks Skunk, Leigh, Bernie, the Sullys, Steve & whoever else made this all happen.

But esp thanks Hels who arranged a great Sat night at the P&J! And probably for some sensible heads piking at the right time so I didn't make a mess of myself.

My weekend could have gone better with a cracked header (thanks Craig for welding it up with one of the neatest repairs) so I rode the venerable 50. On sunday the 100 had a seizure so I fixed that only to have it Chernobyl totally. Oh well it was on borrowed time & I knew that so new engine has been in progress since Christmas.

**quallman1234** · 10th April 2012, 10:28

Cheers to all who made it happen! Had a bit of fun sliding the little yellow drz around. Its back as a dirt bike now and will stay like that, it was fun but didn't enjoy getting carved up in B Grade..
Need to get my bucket under way. Never know i might have a chance in B grade with it if i'm lucky! Ha!

**SHELRACING** · 10th April 2012, 15:32

A big Thanks to everyone, Steve and Skunk and race steward ?? did a fantastic job of organising the weekend, and to the flaggies who took time out of their race day(s) to wave the flag. The Sat night out was just great too just about every rider including the kids turned up.

Str8 Jacket

This is the best weekend we have had in a long time. I rushed to try and get two bikes ready, and as I suspected neither of them were. Cheers to Craig who tried to sort the twin for us. Thanks to John Steer who came to the rescue and let us both use his bike you're a legend mate. Grandma Wobbler owes you a banana cake

Great weather, great racing, great people. Hope to catch up with you all again soon.

Steve and Ellen
SHEL Racing

**Rick 52** · 10th April 2012, 21:16

Thanks everybody involved with the best bucket weekend we have been involved in ,(and thats saying something)
we were lucky enough to stay with Clive and family again they make us feel very welcome thank you so much
The organisation of the weekend could not have been better, safe, ontime, great friendly comunication.

The racing was stressfull with only 1 point between Kel and I it was going to be full on but I did have an advantage having done Kaitoki twice before and it being a technical track to learn, then Kel having problems with the ESE bike on Saturday I was feeling more confident.
All this was thrown out the window when Kel set a qualiying lap quicker than me and we were back to square one, I was bloody impressed!

The racing was very close with Kel pushing me all the way to the end of the 10 lap first race, after I got a better start and had to defend every corner on the last lap, second race was red flagged after a crash this was a shame after another great start getting infront of Kel (I think he got the front wheel a little high) the re start was not the same and Kel was setting a quick pace from the start and we were going faster than we had all weekend, I made a mistake and Kel was pulling away by the half way mark but I got my self back into a rhythm and got back on his back wheel and made a pass as soon as a could, we then traded places with great clean passes for a lap or two before we got into traffic and on the next lap I noticed a blue FXR on the side of the track, It was great to have the pressure off but a real shame it had to finish that way ..Congratulations Kel on great riding and fantastic sportsmanship ..
On our way home we got to spend time in Hawks Bay enjoying the great weather and company from the Bennetts Thanks for the hospitality, it rounded off our best bucket weekend to date

**bucketracer** · 10th April 2012, 22:15

Congrats and big respect Rick and Kel, you both have earned it.

**Skunk** · 11th April 2012, 09:59

Thanks everyone for turning up and I'm glad you all enjoyed yourselves. I'm thinking of running a 'wet' meeting on Queen's Birthday weekend. Any interest?

Steward was Bernie. He does our Winter Series and just loves a meeting where he doesn't have to do anything!

Also I have a toolbox that doesn't belong to me. Please claim it.