All photos by Oxymoron Photography
To say that the last couple years of “racing” (I’ll use the
term loosely) have been frustrating would be an understatement. First, there
was the broken leg saga that lasted nearly all of last year (still hasn’t even
been a year since my last surgery), trying to adjust to the new, completely
different bike, and then the bike problems. Oh, the bike problems!
After the last round, when the bike really started to act
up, I decided to go and pull the transmission out myself (after arguing with
everyone about what was the problem and finally replacing nearly the entire
electrical system) only to find it destroyed. Good thing was I pulled it before
it tried really, really, hard to kill me, although I’m still fairly certain
that was the primary cause of my highside back at round 2.
I ordered parts, and one gear was on backorder, and since I
wanted to rebuild this right I
decided to gut my street bike and put that transmission and clutch into the
race bike for the time being. All of that had some interesting stories and
fiascos that I won’t get into here, but end result was I eventually got
everything installed, bike ran, and after all my issue chasing, I now had a
legitimate race bike with the kit ECU and harness too.
I got one chance to ride the bike prior to round 6, and
things went well enough that day. Bike ran beautifully, and I started to get
over the mental hang ups I knew existed after riding around the problems for so
long. I looked forward to getting out to Sonoma – it’s my least favorite track,
but the one where, last year, my times were closest to what I had previously
been doing, and I had high hopes that the bike running right would give me a
chance to finally break into a new personal best and be able to move past constantly
comparing myself to myself.
I failed miserably in that regard.
I couldn’t afford to ride on Friday, so that meant Saturday
would be my one chance to try to get back into the groove and get the bike set
up. I had only ridden here once this year, and that was back in February when
it was like 50 degrees outside and was my first time on the new suspension.
There was no baseline set up to even start from, and losing Friday really hurt
me in that regard. Practices went well enough, but I started out slow, just
making sure things were still working and remembering which way the track went.
I had a plan of attack from my coach, Tyler O’Hara, so I was trying to stay
focused on that.
After my first session, things were off on the set up, so I
went over to Jim at Catalyst Reaction who I’ve been working with for years now,
and we made adjustments. I went out, and dropped some time, and found something
else that wasn’t working. We adjusted that, and then I went out and dropped 4
more seconds, and now something else wasn’t working. My entire Saturday went
that way, and while I was finally enjoying my bike a bit (and more than a few
wheelies), my times weren’t where I wanted them.
It was suggested to try a different TC setting prior to my
race that afternoon, and I didn’t see an issue with giving it a shot, figuring
the worst thing that would happen would be that the bike would be a bit
underpowered. Oh boy, was I wrong.
I headed out to AFemme, with hopes of finding a couple more
seconds off my practice times. We gridded up, and launched. My start was okay,
but Valentine and Shelina took off, and then on our second lap, we got a red
flag. Okay, my chance for redemption. We gridded up for the restart, and I had
a great launch – woohoo! Aaaand, that didn’t last long. Valentine and Shelina
again took off, as I began to realize that my bike was severely acting up. I
was getting really bad “pump” coming out of pretty much every corner, and the
bike was sliding badly due to it. I rode the race that way, fighting with
Jennifer for 3rd place, but I wasn’t able to make my passes stick,
and she took the checkered with me right on her tail.
As I was rolling back to the pits, I realized how stupid I
had been – I could have changed the TC back during
the race – that could have been changed on the fly, I didn’t need to keep
riding the bike that way! ARGH! Oh well, was what it was, race was in the
books, and I learned another lesson about my “fancy” modern bike. The evening
was spent hanging and chatting with friends, then heading off for a relaxing
evening and some sleep.
Sunday I had moved the TC back – even if I couldn’t keep the
front wheel on the ground (not that I really wanted to as I was kinda having fun with all the
wheelies) – at least the bike was stable and predictable. The first race up was
Open SB, my least favorite race of the weekend. It tends to be a meat grinder
class, and it’s early in the day. We headed out, I rolled up to my grid spot
and started to get focused on what was ahead of me – only to get bumped by
someone screaming I was in his spot. I look over and my friend, Adli, who I’m
always gridded in front of, is in front of me. I check my mark on my tank, I’m
where that says, but see an open spot on the other side two rows up = probably
about where I’m supposed to be. I roll out of the other guy’s way only to see
the flagger moving forward to the 2 board, so I’m like “crap, guess I’m
starting from right here between spots, better get a good start…..”
My start was good, so at least I knew I wasn’t going to hold
anyone up behind me, and off we went. As usual the main part of the group takes
off, but I knew at least one or two people were behind me, and I wanted to keep
it that way. My times were still right where they had been, but I kept a few
bikes from making passes and managed to finish the race in not last place.
After the race I got called up to Race Direction where I got in trouble for my
grid spot and found out the guy who’s spot I had been in threw a complete fit -
like yelling and screaming and just in general a complete fit. Took my
punishment, and found out my crew had given me the grid spot for Open GP, not
Open SB, and I hadn’t looked close enough myself, either. They apologized to
the guy who’s spot I was in on my behalf (I would have myself but to be honest,
someone THAT upset over something like that had me a bit scared….).
After that, we had Open GP, where I’ve had a few friends I’ve
been duking it out with, and I wanted to put in a good performance. I had a
great start, and some fun battles, and I knew a few of my friends were back
there, and I was determined to keep it that way. I put in my best lap times of
the weekend, but still was over a second off from my old personal best, and
that was really keeping an overcast to my day as I had high hopes of finally redeeming myself.
I had time to rest and relax before the final race of the
day, Open Superstock, which was going to be my last chance to prove myself to
myself. A couple of my Curve Unit “sisters” had shown up to support me, and I
wanted to give them a good showing too. We gridded up, and instead of a great
showing, I had my worst start of the weekend, and possibly since I tried using
the launch control. Oh well, race was still on, and I still had bikes back there
to keep behind me. My times were consistent, but near the end I knew there was
a group behind me and I decided it was going to stay that way, dropping over a
second off what I had been doing the rest of the race. Traction was starting to
drop off by that point though, and my times were still slower than they had
been earlier in the day.
Ultimately, I can’t lie, I was very disappointed with my performance
over the weekend. Lots of folks working to help me get things sorted and the
bike working the way it should, but I couldn’t seem to pull anything new out of
myself. I had come in with high hopes that a properly running bike would be
enough to propel me past whatever hang up is there, but it didn’t. I had fun
hanging out with everyone, had a few fun battles, enjoyed many wheelies, and for
once I wasn’t scared of my bike – just couldn’t seem to translate any of that
into actually going faster.
There’s some time between now and the last round of the
year, so I’m trying to focus on getting the bike set up the way it should be.
There are a few track days, and I have some things I need to adjust/change on the
bike, both electronically and on set up before then. I know I should just “trust
the process” but that gets hard when time and races are ticking past, and
things still seem stagnant. The bike is getting there, now I need to get with
it too.
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