So much to say about the USCRA Big Fish, Little Pond endurance race, but I'll try to condense it. The only bad was the registration process. Two long longs (one for the surprise entry wristband fee and one for an all-manual registration). However, this was minor in the scope of things. The rest of the experience was awesome! It was a great group of people, fully willing to talk shop and show off their rides!

The racing was really cool to watch. The best was the 33-35 Indian tank shifters! You couldn't pay me to get on them, but the guys who did tore them up!

Our team was originally cast by Christian Smutnick and was to be named L.A.C.C. of Control. the first initial of each Members' first name made up the acronym for the team. (Louis Peck (loudog), Adam Butler (Rada), Christian Smutnick (csmutty), and Chuck Boucher (me). As we're all control riders for Tony's Track Days, the name was perfect. However, with Christian's MSF schedule, he wasn't able to originally make it and he asked TTD's Chief Instructor and former racer Ken Condon fo fill the bill and we became Team L.A.C.K. of Control.

The ride was to be one of Steve Heider's EX500s. Coincidentally the bike was Christian's former race bike. Adam, Ken, and I got to take the bike out during the previous week's TTD event. We all arrived at the track after 7:30pm Friday and had a litle maintenance to perform. Ken surprised us with the gift of a loaner pair of Woodcraft rearsets, courtesy of Twisted Throttle. We also had to fab up a belly pan, as USCRA rules require it for all 4 strokes. Adam came to the rescue with a 13x9 cake pan, some mesh, a little abrorbant cloth, and 4 hose clamps. We were ready to rock!

Fast forward to race time. After setting up our easy-up and outfitting it for comfort with several chairs, and fans, we discussed strategy. It was decided to go with a heavy/light/heavy/light order. Adam would kick things off, being the best starter of the team. Lou would run 2nd, me 3rd, and Ken would be the anchor. The race was cut down from 3 hours to 2.5 hours to make it inside of the 5:00pm end time. This meant each team member would do 2 shifts of 18.75 minutes each (give or take).

Adam got an awesome start and went into T1 in the top 5. However, Adam found out quite quickly that the newly fabbed belly pan made the bike a little lower than it was when we had practiced on it a few days earlier. He was having a tough time of his first shift, dragging it in most of the corners and signaled to come in 5 minutes early. Adam clicked off laps between 1:34 and 1:38 in his first shift.

Lou took the next shift and cruised, looking very well and gaining some ground on our next door rivals, the team of Bill Coolahan (Mustang), Jimmy Folan, KB (KB), and David Olivares. We dubbed them the "pretty team". Lou managed lap times between 1:30 and 1:33, for a great ride.

On our second rider exchange, we topped off the tank and I jumped on the bike. I had run the bike pretty well at the track days, so I figured I would do ok. I ran into the same issue as Adam, dragging the belly pan everywhere. I settled in though and got comfortable with the sound of scraping metal. I came in and stalled the damned EX in the stop box. I managed lap times of 1:32-1:36 and gained more ground on the pretty team's Jimmy Folan.

The third exchange saw out ringer, Ken take to the track. This was Ken's first race in several years and it's as if he never left. His smooth riding style pulled in more on our rival's member KB. Ken clicked off laps between 1:29 and 1:33.

Our next door rivals had some slower rider exchanges, taking time on gas and checking tire pressures and it cost them time. We took over the rivalry "lead" during Ken's first ride.

Adam decided that since he had such a hard time the first shift, he would only ride 10 minutes on the second shift. We agreed and the three remaining members would ride 20-25 minutes each to split the remaining time. Adam's second shift was better than the first. He was more comfortable and a little faster than shift #1, grabbing laps betweek 1:33 and 1:38.

Since we had plenty of gas on the first exchange, we decided to go 3 riders btweeen fueling and this time right before Lou mounted the bike. He took off, determined to better Ken's best lap time in the mid 1:29's. He managed to do just that and pulled some more distance from our rivals, dropping into the 29's with a best lap of 1:29 flat.

My second shift was almost exactly like my first. However, I started getting off the bike much more than the first shift and I found I was bottoming out much less. Like my teammates, I gained more ground on our rivals and did similar lap times to my first shift.

For some reason, I was flagged in a few minutes earlier than I had expected, leaving Ken with a 25 minute shift to the finish line. Ken ran like a champ the entire shift and caught rival team's David Olivares to lap them with a couple laps left to the race. Ken was on fire, dropping 2 whole seconds off his first shift pest with a high 1:27. He crossed the finish line on our 95th lap with a huge smile on his face!

We found later that we had finished 4th in the Modern Endurance class behind Low Down Racing (3rd place), Ex Mafia (2nd place, featuring ECK's Christian Smutnick), and The Dark Side (1st place featuring ECK's Jake Vader). We finished 7 laps behind 1st place, 5 laps behind 2nd place, and 3 laps behind 3rd place.

Thanks to the USCRA for having the event in the first place. The staff and participants were extremely friendly. Thanks to all of our family and friends who came out to support and watch us. Thanks to MTAG Pirelli for providing the tires we used. They stuck like glue while that frame flexed beneath us.

I think we may be up for repeating this next year. It was a fantastic time!

Highlights of my shifts. Sorry about the camera position, it was the first time I have used a helmet cam.