Out of mothballs

[Ken C]

I did a one day return to racing on Saturday just to get back out there and feel the heat of competition. I pitted with Graham and we commented on how nice it was to not have any responsibilities compared to our usual track day roles of instructors where we have to behave ourselves.

Anyway, I converted the MZ from streetbike to racebike by removing the lights and siddestand and threw it on the trailer.

The tires were on their last legs, but I was out for fun, not absolute domination (as if I could). But the rear tire kinda let me down during my last race.

Saturday practice was okay. I chose to run in the AM/EX red practice to keep things mellow. It took me the full session to get my head around the MZ's loose handling (compared to the ZX6), but managed a low 1:26 without much trouble.

Second practice was more fun. After passing slower riders, I finally got some open track and during the last two laps of practice I hit my marks consistently to run a couple 1:25.00s. I was hoping to see some 1:24s, but that's close enough.

My one race for the weekend was LW Sportsman, which is 75% motards these days along with some EX500s. I was gridded in the last row of 6 rows on the inside. The flag dropped and I drifted to the outside of turn 1 to pass as many bikes as I could. It works (almost) everytime and I went by at least 7 bikes. Graham says that a few bikes got together behind me, so it's great that I made the move forward.

I was in about 13th or so into T2 and was only passed by one rider the whole race. I was held up by a motard for much of the race, but he pulled off the track for some reason, giving me a few open laps toward the end. But, at this point, the bike was moving around a lot more than usual and after seeing that nobody was behind me the length of the straight, my motivation waned and I ran conservative laps to finish 13th.

Coming back was fun enough, but I wished I had more riders to race with and I wished the lap times were a bit better. But, expecting to even come close to my typical 1:23s after being away for almost a year was unrealistic.

It was fun seeing a bunch of folks from the forums and to see how far a lot of you have progressed. Good job!

[SilverDragon]

Man I wish I was up there this weekend. Congrats on your brief return, Ken.

[s a x m a n]

great to have you up there!

Thanks for the help!!

[13]

It was cool to know you were out there. I just saw you in the reg line, but I was excited anyway. Now we need to get Chris Bruno out there again. Screw the boat. And 25's on a street bike. Damn, I need some experience. Looking for a pupil?

[Ken C]

Tony's Track days! I'm there every time, at your service.

And 1:25s suck once you've done :23s.

[OreoGaborio]

Ken, great to hear ya got back out there & had some fun so when ya making another return?

(BTW, your comments about how I approach turn 11 helped me get that PTwins win since that's where I made the final pass Trail braked all the way around the outside of Clayton, so i owe that win in part to you )

[McBiggity]

i spent alot of time watching the experst go into 11. From what I saw they were decelerating all the way through the turn. I was going into the turn w/ a slight on throttle approach. More things to work on next time.

[Ken C]

Cool. Once you get turn 11 down the turn 12 chicane comes together, too. You want to use the throttle a bit to pick the bike up between 11 and 12 and again between 12 and 12a, keeping it on slightly as you flip left onto the straight to start your drive. This serves a couple purposes. The obvious one is that itgives you an early drive down the straight, but it also loads the rear tire earlier so spinning in up after T12 is less likely.

[OreoGaborio]

I'm still workin on it but i'm gettin close to doing what you just described... i like the 11-12 section... need to trail it in a bit more like you told me to, but i'm usually saying "I THINK i took a better line than that guy just did" as we go though 11a & 12 cuz i usually close in a tiny bit to alot of people as we come back onto the front straight, but once they get to full throttle.... see ya