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I usually don't kiss and tell, but here goes...
Got to the beaver around 5:30pm Friday night after going the LOOOONG way there due to flooding. The track is a simple place with a welcoming staff of one.
Set up the bikes with Zambrana (my engine builder) and Steve Wenner (his rider). We didn't bring a canopy, so it was old school... under the blue sky.
We all took a track walk together and noted that the place is NARROW, leaving relatively few passing zones. The pavement is good and most turns are on camber and the layout is flowing. There are significant bumps, but only on the straights. Decent elevation change, good runoff everywhere but Turn ten, where an unprotected armco barrier runs just ten feet from the pavement parallel to the braking zone.
Saturday we got 4 practice sessions af between 12-15 laps each. Lap record for a 125 was in the 1:03 range. Each session I went faster and finished practice in the 1:05s.
Qualifying: We put the A kit cylinder/piston in my bike and I went for it. I dropped another second and did a 1:04.5 to qualify seventh. There were definitely some seriously fast machines there, and the pole was set at a phenomenal 1:02.0
Race Day: Practice was wet, and I rolled around to check it out. Great traction! Fun in the wet. Tying to take the kink wide open in the wet takes balls of steel though!
Race: DRY. 45 125s!!! I got a good launch and entered T1 in fifth. I followed the lead pack into 5 where the pole sitter had a violent motoGP style highside right in front of me. I had to check up and I lost the lead group. I tried to settle in and improve my times further, but three guys had different ideas. We got in a royal scrap for 5th or so place. It was a drafting and late braking battle, but it wasn't allowing me to get the lines I was looking for to go faster. Anyway, it was fun until I threw a chain on lap 9 or so... Bummer.
It didn't go to plan, but we had an absolute blast and saw that the level of the USGPRU is very high. It would take some practice with those guys to get near the front...