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Got up to the track Wednesday night so I could try and do Thursday practice. I needed to replace my quickshifter sensor so the later practice start would give me a chance to do this.
Thursday morning, I replaced the sensor and decided to take the bike down the access road to test. I ran it up through to 6th and then grabbed a bunch of front brake and down she went right in front of the Heroic tent. Minimum engine speed for QS engagement is set to 4,000 RPM , in other words, I was going a bit quick. A few people got a great show for sure as my bike went sliding down the access road for a decent distance. Of course I was dumb enough to try to stop it from sliding and in the process, got dragged for a little and tumbled. I got decent rash on the upper part of my left arm, tore a chunk out of my right palm and a nice hole in my left hip and some miscellaneous booboos. Poor form.
Friday
Woke up feeling like shite but decided that I was going to ride, right hand be damned. I did practice and realized that this weekend was going to suck. Every time I rolled on the throttle, there was searing pain on the right side of my palm and every time I hit the brakes, there was searing pain on the heel of my palm.
GTU - I seem to remember this was a pretty decent sized grid and got a great launch putting me somewhere in the middle of the GTO field along with a few other GTU guys. I was holding position well considering I was barely using the brakes but on the 3rd lap, my lap timer came loose and lodged itself in the fairing and I had to fish it out while going through T2. I got it out but not before allowing like 10-15 people past me. I tried to get it remounted but gave up and tossed into the grass on the outside of the T3 chute. Later found out that it bounced back out onto the track and hit Rich O'Connor. Very sorry mate. The race was red-flagged at about the 13:00 mark and I thought I was going to die. I just wanted it to be over. We were regridded based on the running positions but I got an awful start so just sat back and tried to finish the race. Ran a bunch of 23's and 22's in this race.
Finished 14 of 17
Fastest lap: 1:22.268
Saturday
HWSS - I can't remember much about this race except that I was gridded just about in the back of the field just in front of Brady Ward on his SV (WTF? I swear he's insane). #154 (Marc Manley) and I had a decent back and forth for a few laps and I tried to make a move in 11 on the last lap but ran up on the inside curb and that screwed me all up. Happy enough with this one as I finished 6 positions up from where I started.
Finished 20 of 27
Fastest lap: 1:22.941
Sunday
MWSS - This was one of the craziest races that I can remember in my short two years of racing. I got a decent enough start and gave up a few going into 3. I had a huge moment in 7 and whoever was behind me must have really checked up after that because I didn't not hear them for the remainder of that lap. The race got red-flagged and on the warmup on restart, I could feel that the tires had cooled off considerably. I decided to back off a bit and just finish the race. On the restart, as I came around into 4, I watched a bike get really sideways and then the rider pitched off. I have no idea how no one hit him while he was in the air. Extended red flag number two and a bunch of the riders were pushing to get an extra warm up lap to warm the tires. No dice and on the restart, exiting T2, #617 (Patrice Cort) lost the back end and missed Kevin Frost by inches. Another red flag and another restart.
Finished 7 of 18
Fastest lap: 1:22.642
MWSB - Got a decent start but the gave up a bunch of positions on the first lap. The rest of the race was quite lonely.
Finished 8 of 9
Fastest lap: 1:21.983
This weekend was a huge wash for me in terms of getting back to a decent pace. At least I know my QS works again as that was a real pain in the A when it was intermittent. Props to all of the lunatics who get back onto bikes with broken bones, no idea how you all do it. My eyes would tear up every time I even thought about touching the brakes. The road rash is mostly healed and my hand is mostly OK so hopefully I will be ready for next weekend.
Thanks to: the IMC people who patched me up after my crash test dummy moment (Ralph and Jodi?), Roland for pushing my bike all the way back to my pit, Justin Torres for picking me up, the T1A/LDR fellas for driving me to the walk-in clinic (Heath and Clahkie), my mom for bandaging me up all weekend, my brother Dan for working the wrenches, Alex for keeping people fed, everyone who checked up on me and all of the funnies for all of the nicknames:.
See y'all in July.
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