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     Blublak |
Ow.. Ok, this really hurts more then you would think it should.. But I get ahead of myself.. Two weeks ago I took a motorcycle holiday of a track type ilk.. This would give me three out of five days on track at VIR North. The first two days, with Reg Pridmores’ CLASS. The plan was simple really. The first day, both Bumble Buell and I would be riding, then the second day she would ‘hang out’ while I rode with the school again. Saturday and Sunday were to be spent relaxing around Danville and Monday I would once again take to the track with Team Pro-Motion. Sounded like a great plan to me. Of course, as with all great plans, it started to unravel pretty damn quickly.. The day prior to our first day on track we arrived at the track and were able to ‘take up residence’ at the ‘Hospitality Suites’. This probably wouldn’t have been anything major, but Robin had planned on getting a little work done that evening and of course, the wireless router for the paddock was down. We had no internet connection and she was unable to do anything from the room. Oh well, minor problem since the next evening we’d be in ‘The Lodge’ and we knew there was always internet there. She would take care of what she needed to do that evening after CLASS. Separating into our respective groups (broken by ability/familiarity with track riding) we wouldn’t see each other again until lunch with my group being in the classroom while hers was on track and vice versa. I armed with my 1125r and she with her mighty Blast we made quite a pair. I was confident and felt pretty good working my way up to speed on the track with the instructors that Reggie always has with him. At lunch time, I ran into Ian Donald, a serious pro photographer that happens to be Reggie’s’ shooter of choice and is the only instance of ‘track day’ photography he does. He remembered me from a few years ago and chided me for not giving him any lean angles to shoot. I explained it was a new bike and I’d be happy to work on it for him.. Robin came to me and complained of difficulty shifting her bike on track. Despite this, she beamed when she told me of passing a BMW (GS1200) going up the hill and ‘making it stick’ when the bike tried to pass her at the end of the main straight and she ‘beat him on the brakes’ (she was so proud of herself – I was so proud she was excited about riding her Buell again after shattering her ankle last year – no, she wasn’t riding and that was probably why.. ask one of us sometime and we’ll tell you the story) So I took a quick putt around the parking lot and realized that her clutch wasn’t disengaging when the lever pulled in. I began to adjust the cable in as much as I could when one of the coaches walked by and pointed out that I was missing a pinch bolt in my fork! WTF? I checked it out and sure enough, I was. I checked the tightness of the other one then went back to trying to adjust the Blasts’ clutch cable again. When lunch ended I had used up all the slack available and it was still hit or miss on the little bike. Robin rode one more session and pulled in frowning. It was still making a lot of noise and she was concerned. I’m not sure if she understood right away when I tried to explain to her that she had been making clutch less shifts for the entire morning. She did however remember that she’d noticed it not shifting smoothly a couple of weeks ago and probably should have mentioned it then. For the sake of safety.. She decided to sit out the rest of the track sessions and only attend the classroom portions.  And she was lookin’ so good too boot! I went back out and finally started to give Ian something to shoot… At least a little closer to what he had expected of me. Oddly enough, I hadn’t actually touched down very much in the last year and really hadn’t given it much thought.. Hmmmm… The rest of the day went smoothly for me and we packed ourselves up to our new room at The Lodge. Robin was tired and we just kind of laid around, watched a little TV then went to sleep. She would work on her stuff tomorrow while I was on track. The next day looked even better then the previous one. As always, after a day with Pridmore and company enthusiasm is high, confidence is brimming and riders are raring to go.. I found a little trick here or there and got some good advice and observations from both Reggie and Allen and the next thing I know I feel like I’ve been fired out of a cannon coming out of turn seven.. Suddenly I’m at turn ten before I’ve finished ‘absorbing’ turns 7 – 9 .. Man, what a rush! I spend the rest of the day, sucking down water, eating very little, and riding very much. A few private minutes with ‘the man’ allows me to improve (at least in my mind) what I’m doing on turn seven and a quick glance at the speedo says I’m coming out of some of these turns way faster then I thought I could .. Three days ago.. At lunch Robin comes by, spends a few minutes with me then hustles back to the room to continue working since she’s in a groove.. kind of like I am.. She’s also been watching a little from The Lodge and says she’s having problems picking me out since the 1125 is so quiet compared to my old XB with its Drummer.  At the end of the day, I’m truly looking forward to two days off as my muscles are properly sore and I can’t wait for Monday.. One more day on the track before I put ‘er back to civilian use for the 25th party at Buell that’s in a couple of weeks… Saturday we talk about going to a movie, but first I sleep late and then Robin decides she’d like to continue her work and finish a few more things up.. (can anyone tell I married a work-a-holic?) We talk about what we’d like to see.. She’d like to see the new Indiana Jones movie and I look it up. Then things just kind of drift past and before you know it we’re chatting with one of our ‘new’ neighbors (who’s on track with his newly purchased old Beemer track car) at the lodge and try to decide if we’d like to do dinner. I while away the day surfing the internet a little and watching the cars, they are running the ‘Grand Course’ which is a combination of all three tracks at VIR. Damn, that looks like it would be a lot of fun on a bike as well as almost four miles long. We decide not to do the movie since it’s now well into the afternoon and watch a little TV and just take it easy. Outside however, the sky is getting dark and the winds are picking up. I step outside to see the blackness filling the Western sky and wondering how long before it gets too us. As it would turn out.. Not long at all. At 5:30pm the sky opens up just as the cars complete their day. At first it’s spotty, dry in the paddock but raining at the Oak Tree turn on the South side. The storm is surrounding us. I try to decide if I can safely move the bikes to the paddock and hide them in the tech shed there when it opens up; thunder boomers, sheet rain and high winds all assault the track in short order then the power dumps out and as the car folks come to the lodge (all of them a bit soaked during the trip from the car to the covered portion of the deck) we start to wonder how long this will last.. For the next hour we talk with the car guys. One of whom can’t help but insist that we ‘bike’ folks are crazy. Finally with the rain over and the power still out, we decide to go to dinner in Danville. Of course, there is electricity in town and we have a nice light Italian meal with the BMW neighbor. When we finally get back to The Lodge, the power is still out. Don’t worry, the windows are fixed as well, so unless you leave the room door open, there is no air moving in your room. Damn, it made for an uncomfortable night.. At 3:30am our lights flashed back to life and the A/C rumbled back into existence, I got up, turned off the lights and lay back down on the bed. Sleep would follow, of course. Sunday dawned bright and cheery, with the sun bathing down on the wet grass and the track crew working quickly to get it prepped for the coming day. I checked the bikes; they were wet, but fine. Robin quickly discovered that the internet was down since the power outage had tagged the router and until it was reset there would be no internet; she couldn’t get any work done. We went to the movies and for the first time in a couple of years actually sat in a theater, ate popcorn and watched a screen bigger then our TV at home. It was great! Afterwards, we putted around in the truck and finally stopped to get some water and fruit for the coming day. Then it was back to the track to watch the cars finish their day and to put my bike in the tech shed where I’d get it in the morning. Early rising and quick packing up then over to the track. While I got ready for my third track day in 5 days, Robin set up her lap top in the concession area and started .. What else, working. My two days with Pridmore had really primed me for this and once my group was let out, it took me only a lap or two to ‘come up to speed’. I’m sure I gave a few people pause, running the tight lines that Pridmore prefers, but I feel pretty comfortable running those lines and therefore I think it made me ‘feel’ better on the track. I came back to the pits and pulled back into the tech shed which I was now sharing with two of the TPM Staff (one a coach, the other a safety controller) we chatted and I mentioned the school I had taken and that my lines were from there. Both seemed to feel I was fine with my lines since once they’d seen them, I was predictable and safe. The coach, after taking a short break went out with the fast group and two laps into the session, went down in turn one. He pulled some muscles in his back and apparently had a high side with a sharp landing on his lower back. He was done for the day. With my next session I suddenly realized that my closing speeds with a large portion of the group were kind of ridiculous. I did a ‘tamer’ version of the turn seven rocket from the second day with CLASS and almost connected with a slower rider at the top of the hill. I was suddenly working my way around people, sometimes at an alarming rate. Now, don’t get me wrong, usually that happens with the students. TPM has a class they run with the ‘slow’ group (that I usually ride in) as an introduction to track riding. I’m used to coming up on them rather quickly and picking my points to pass them in ones, twos and sometimes threes. This was different. On the brakes I was passing going into turns one, seven, and fourteen. This is not that different from the way I normally pass.. but now, I was also passing coming OUT of turns, like two, six, ten, eleven, fifteen and seventeen.. It was quite exhilarating to say the least. At the end of the second session, the checker started waving at turn seven and the two bikes I was close behind both suddenly came off the gas. I knew I didn’t want to try and panic stop so I shifted inside both of them and let loose, flying past them both as I went up the hill. Thinking about it, I know I was close to the turn in point and thought I might hear something about it. I mentioned it to the safety I was pitting with and he just smiled and said after watching me, he’s sure I left them plenty of room. At the next session, while sitting on the grid waiting for the go, one of the coaches came up and chided me for an illegal inside pass at turn seven. The two I had passed, once seeing me on the grid had complained to this coach about my pass at the checkered flag. Oh well. I shook it off and went riding. At lunch I was joined by my wife who told me she had been at turn seven watching during the last session and had even started timing me. Once I was up to speed, even in traffic, I was matching my ‘circuit best’ time of 1:55. Damn, I was going faster! She also mentioned how smooth I seemed through the turn. Oddly enough, during the next session, while she was sitting at turn fourteen, she mentioned the same thing the smooth way I came through the turn and seemed to accelerate down the hill passing people almost every time I went by. I told her I was accelerating down the hill and her eyes got wide then she grinned and said she’d keep timing me. The second to last session of the day kind of went badly for me. On the second lap I came into turn one at about 60mph and going around someone ran wide through the early part of the turn. I ended up on the ‘junk’ the cars left behind Sunday and my back tire stepped out on me. For about a nanosecond I thought I’d make it through, but reality jumped up and yanked down on the tank and the next thing I knew I was rolling across the track and into the dirt and grass. DAMN!! I did a quick self check after I’d stopped moving, everything was fine, so I stood gave a thumbs up to the corner worker and walked dejectedly to the tires to await the end of the session. My bike lay on its side at the edge of the track and the fans mournfully called to me as the other bikes rolled by. Now I’m wondering if the dealer (who’s had both our bikes since Tuesday) can save us the ignominy of attending the Buell 25th in a Ford Explorer. Last I heard, there was no word on the Blast, they hadn’t gotten a chance to look at it yet. And the 1125? Close to $2000.00 in damages and no idea if the parts will be available. So, I sit here.. Writing my tale of triumph and agony awaiting the verdict. If you see us there and we’re not riding… You know why.. and if we are.. Well, I guess that would attest to the speed and skill of the dealer.. I will however leave you with this last image of me and my wonder bike.. From a much happier Friday.  |
