Coming off of a reasonable first round result in which I scored points in each of the 3 races I entered, I would normally have started to ratchet up expectations.  However, my fear of returning to the track where seven months earlier I had broken my collarbone, wrist, and hand, in addition to sporting the full TigerBike / eBay Motors livery for the first time kept my expectations in check.

Day 0 – Thursday night

I got up to the track early on Thursday night.  I had left work at a reasonable time, got home, packed, and left for the track on time (for once).  I set up my pit, and blocked off space for my teammates for the rest of the weekend.  I got to hang out and drink some beers with a few other riders and just generally relax.  I even got to bed early enough to catch a full 8 hours of sleep. 

Day 1 – Friday

Early on Friday, the rest of the folks started to show up.  TigerBike Racing’s chief mechanic delivered the “mascot” for the team – my ’00 M944s, which was on-display all weekend in the pits. 

Session 1 – The track was a bit cool in the morning, so I didn’t want to push hard right away.  I treated the first session pretty much like sighting laps.  Going around the track the first time and getting my bearings was helpful.  By the time I got back around to turn 11, I had started to pick up the pace a little.  Almost a bit too much, though, as I had forgotten to stay to the right for the new turn 1 chicane configuration that we’re running now.  I had to throw the brakes on a bit early to get over in time to make the turn, but I did clear it.

Over the next several sessions, I kept it fairly slow, but also kept making steady progress.  By lunch time I’d gotten down to a reasonable clip.  The new challenge to the track is figuring out turns 1 and 2 – everything else remains unaffected by the turn 1 chicane. 

Once I got up to pace, my teammate Adrian and I went out for a session in the afternoon where we took turns leading for a lap each.  We ended up pushing down to a really good pace, despite that the lead rider would have to check up to let the other by on the front straight.

On the last session of the day, I told my teammate Adrian that I wanted to get out and “drop the hammer” for a couple good laps.  Sure enough, after a couple laps to get in the rhythym, I had some open track in front of me.  I ended up putting down 2 laps at 1:51 and closed on two laps at 1:50 pace.  This was EXACTLY what I needed.  To put that in perspective, I had run a 1:48 in a race on a faster configuration at the end of 2005.  This was the rough equivalent of a 1:47 or 1:48 on that configuration.  To be running that pace in FRIDAY practice this early in the season made me really happy. 

Day 2 – Saturday

I noticed that my new tire had developed some odd tear patterns.  I took the bike over to the Dunlop guys for them to take a look.  Terry Newby, the main Dunlop guy took a look and told me to adjust my pressure by 1 pound.  I was a little skeptical, but did as he instructed.  Sure enough – the tire “healed” and held up the rest of the day. 

I made it through the three and a half practice sessions all day without running better than a 1:52.  I was frustrated for two reasons – one, I felt I should have been running faster than the day before, and two, because I knew I needed to demonstrate my faster times to the AFM or I could get relegated to a slower practice group in the future (which makes it nearly impossible to run good times).

In terms of setup, I spent most of the day fiddling with tring to eliminate the nastry headshake I was experiencing on the back straight.  At around 105-110 mph, my bars would start to shake side to side, making the whole bike swerve.  I felt like I was going to crash several times when I went through this.  NOT good.  There were a few potential explanations, but I tried to resolve it mainly by lowering the rear ride height.  This worked, but had the unfortunate side effect of making the bike slower to steer.  At the time, I didn’t relate this to my slower lap times for the day, but I’m of the belief now that I need to rely on my steering damper to take out the headshake and allow me to run the more aggressive rear ride height so I can steer the bike very quickly.  TBD on this one, but I’m going to experiment with it when I head back to Sears for Round 3. 

I spent Saturday afternoon quickly doing a tire change and then moved on to cleaning my bike.  I spent quite a while polishing everything up – including my street bike.  I wanted to put on a good “show” for everyone who showed up on Sunday.  Also, I have started to find the time I spend cleaning the books and crannies of the bike a good outlet for some of my obsessive-compulsive tendencies.  Better that than washing my hands until they bleed, right?

Day 3 - Sunday – Race day

I woke up and checked my tire pressures first.  I turned on my warmers and started stretching out.  The first practice session was VERY cold.  I treated it essentially as sighting laps – I ran easily 10-15 seconds off my pace, just trying to look over a few turns and trying to maintain total traction so I wouldn’t scare myself. 

Time to race.

Race 1 – Open Twins

I was gridded up on the third row – I believe this was my best grid position ever. 

Off the line – I did “okay”.  The lead pack got away from me at the start and one bike had come past me from behind.  I didn’t want to take a large risk passing this guy back with the track conditions sub-optimal.  Instead, I waited until turn 8a, my strongest turn on the track.  However, once I’d blown by him, I had already lost contact with the lead group.

I ended up running the whole race by myself, until the faster wave of Open Production guys came past me.  I just focused on not making any mistakes, but didn’t push hard.  At the end, I saw I was starting to gain slightly on Sherwick, another guy in the class.  I just couldn’t get myself to push the extra little bit to really reel him in, and ended up finishing one spot behind him. 

Result: 12^th out of 17 starters
Best lap: 1:52.338

Race 2 – Formula 1 

I knew Adrian would be motivated after he lost out to me in the last turn in two races during round 1.  We gridded up next to each other at the start of the race, and although I got away from the line a lot better, he came sailing past through traffic within a few turns.  This time he managed to put a few more riders in between us, and I knew I’d have my work cut out for me if I wanted to make something happen.

I kept sizing up the other riders, but wasn’t able to put together a move until some of the 250 riders came up from behind.  Once the “little bikes” joined in, I knew I needed to pus a bit harder.  After a couple crashes in the race, and a few riders passing me under yellow flags, I finally had enough motivation. 

I managed to get within two bikes of Adrian with about 5 turns left.  Coming through 8A, I got a MONSTER drive on everyone and managed to pull alongside Adrian going into turn 9.  I didn’t want to risk us both crashing, so I didn’t make the pass on the brakes.  However, I hoped that by showing him a wheel and letting him know someone was right there that I might throw him off his game and force a mistake in the next few turns.  Sure enough, on the exit of turn 9A, Adrian ran a bit wide and had to check up on the throttle a bit, allowing me to drive around the outside on the following turn.

Now one turn to go, and I had the lead between us.  I had driven so hard through the previous turn that it threw off my braking for turn 11, the final turn.  I ended up going way too deep into the turn, but was able to hook it back and get on the gas with enough time to outdrive my pack to the line.

Result: 37 out of 59 starters
Best lap: 1:53.696 

Race 3 – 600 Superbike

This race is typically a “meatgrinder” class, with the most crashing.  Part of it’s due to the large grid sizes, and part of it’s due to the mix of riders in the grid.  At any rate, I’m typically a bit wary of crashing in the class, and tentative on my starts. 

In this race, my teammate Tim was back for his first race start since the previous year.  In the first couple of turns, I saw him squirt past me, and I groaned to myself in my helmet.  I knew it would be tough to regain contact with him, given the increased traffic and the faster mix of 600cc bikes.

In the first couple turns, I stayed a bit tentative.  In turn 3 / 3a, I took a line much closer to my usual race line – I stayed a bit left through 3 and then came over toward the apex for 3a.  As I was nearing the apex, I felt a sudden sharp pain in my back.  Thoroughly surprised, it took me a couple moments before I realized there was a bike there.  I started to stand my bike up so that I would make less contact with this bike, but felt a couple more bumps on the back of the bike, felt my bike wobble, and saw the edge of the track approaching fairly rapidly.

Once the contact stopped, the bike was able to self-correct.  I took a quick glance back to see if anyone had gone down (I’ve never caused another rider to crash as of yet, and am very proud of that fact).  When I didn’t see any clouds of dirt, my next reaction was anger – so I waited until I had a quick moment on the straight between turn 3a and 4, and I flipped that rider the bird.  It’s the only time I’ve done that on-track, and it’s definitely not a classy move, nor one that I’m proud of. 

Anyway, back to the race.  I saw Tim a few bikes up ahead, but was really struggling to make contact with him.  He wasn’t pulling away from me, but I was having trouble lining up the guy in between us for a pass.  His Honda 600 was pulling REALLY strong, and making my job difficult.  I knew he was weak between 8 and 8A, but unless I had him lined up right, I couldn’t just outdrive him through turn 8A alone.  After 3 laps, I decided to make my move.  I took a small chance and built my drive starting at the exit of turn 7.  By the time I was at the apex of 8A, I was right on the rider and had RIDICULOUS closing speed.  I hoped he would hold the same line as he had before, and he did.  I ducked to the other side and left him standing.

Then I was up on my teammate Tim.  I got up on him on the brakes going into turn 9, just to let him know I was there.  I had done this to him in practice, so I knew he’d recognize the sound of my Ducati twin amongst all the in-line 4’s on the grid.  I was lining him up for a pass going into turns 10/11, when I saw the red flag come out and we all had to coast to a stop.  Since 3 laps had been completed, the results stood – I didn’t get credit for my pass on the Honda and ended up with 31^st place.  I was disappointed because I felt like I had the spark of motivation and was getting ready to do something more.  *sigh* 

Result: 31st out of 50 finishers
Best Lap: 1:52.875
 
Parting thoughts:

I had higher expectations for the weekend, again, and again it wasn’t a wash.  I’ve started running the math, and if I continue at this clip, I’ll be able to qualify for my AMA pro license by the end of the year.  This is an important goal for me, and I’d like to run in an AMA pro race in the 2008.  Of course, unless I start finishing even higher, I’ll need to avoid *any* crashes for the duration of the year… so I’m not exactly sitting in the catbird seat.

Speaking of birds…  the bird-flipping incident taught me a pretty good lesson, as well.  I’m not as prepared as I should be for the eventuality of rider-to-rider contact.  I’m planning on having a follow-up conversation with the other rider involved, and hope that by talking through the situation a bit more, I might be better prepared for the next time I find myself in a similar situation.

I've got a few more things to shake out with my setup -- specifically, I think I can change my suspension springing and ultimately improve my overall ride.  I can also let my steering damper mask my suboptimal geometry and allow me to turn the bike a bit more quickly. 

I’d like to thank my main sponsor, eBay Motors, for helping make the effort possible this year.  I’d also like to thank Helmut from Helimot leathers.  The new suit looks killer, and more importantly, it is much more comfortable and less distracting than my old suit.