Tri-Series Round 3

Tri Series Round 3 – Cemetery Circuit

Going into the last round of the series I was level on points with Deano for fourth place in the F3 championship and we both had a shot at 3^rd place depending on what went down (no pun intended).  My goal for this round was to basically just have fun and not worry about points too much. I still hold the view that this round should not have any points associated with it to remove some of the pressure from such a risky track.

Anyway, as with most racers, Xmas was a bit of a non-event and I spent the day getting packed and headed up the road to Wanganui to claim a pit spot, get signed in and scrutineered. I made sure to hold back from eating too much for dinner and restrained myself to only one glass of wine.

The next day was an early start so I was glad to have been mostly organised for the day before I had even got to the track. First on my list was to consult the Dr about suspension changes for such an extreme track. We decided to add oil and softer springs and see how it felt for the first session. Having ridden here last year I was not classed as being one of those pesky virgins who were first up.

Not long after, I was out in the F3 class for the first of the combined qualifying sessions. It took me a couple of laps to get back into the groove but by the end of the session I was feeling a lot happier and setting a fairly respectable 56.1 to put me 4^th in the session from memory. I was a bit shocked to see that Deano wasn’t taking prisoners setting a lap time quick enough to put him second. Better pull finger!

The next session I went out hoping to improve my time significantly but I ended up going slower. I was stuck behind a few riders during this session and I didn’t really get any clean laps ending up with a 56.5, which was irrelevant as they would take my time from the previous time to put me 6^th on the grid. I was relieved to be on the second row as a bad grid position could put an end to any high aspirations here.

Race 1

RT worked his magic on the front end to help make it more compliant for this race, which helped a lot in the braking areas.

We lined up for race one and I got a pretty decent launch to put me about 4^th into turn one. Deano got good drive out of turn two to put me back a place going over the rail tracks. Moments later I caught sight of a blue object out of the corner of my eye, Terry squeezing past into the same corner and running both of us very deep but fair enough. I clung on for the next lap but disaster struck when Jason went down just after the tracks and leaving Deano with nowhere to go but up, as he had to run into Jason’s bike. I was extremely lucky to avoid both Jason and all the carnage around me and get through unscathed. It is moments like these that you don’t know what to feel – the racer in me say’s that I just gained two places but I couldn’t help but feel bad that both Jason and especially Deano had gone down and this would probably spell the end of our battle for 4^th in the championship.

Unsurprisingly, the race was red flagged but fortunately both riders appeared fine as we lined back up on the dummy grid. I put all this to the back of my mind as we lined up for the restart and this time I got an even better one thanks to the empty grid spot in front of me. The usual suspects Scott, Glen and Terry got out into the lead and Scott especially was riding it like he stole it to clear off into the distance. I knew that I could hold onto 4^th if I put my head down but made sure not to out brake myself and throw away the gap I had back to 5^th place. Towards the end of the race I was pretty isolated from the other riders so I tried to ride as smooth as possible but as it turns out I was faster at the beginning of the race when I was riding ragged trying to keep up with Glen and Terry so I decided that smooth could kiss my arse for the next race. After the race I was stoked with a 4^th place finish and a PB of 54.7 but it felt a bit hollow considering my main competition was missing.

Race 2

I was glad to hear that Deano was for the most part uninjured and his bike was surprisingly well off considering it had ridden off without him in the first race.

We all lined up the dummy grid for our compulsory tyre cool down period and, after returning back to the pits to do the crossword, we were signalled to start our engines again and head off on the warmup lap.

Darn, no gap in the grid this time so a good launch was important. The first corner is a bit of a blur but I think I was about 4^th again going onto the back straight. This time I held on and stuck to the back of Terry and Glen while Scott checked out. To my surprise, as the laps ticked away, I was still sitting behind Terry and Glen. There were a number of places that they could pull a gap on me but I was more than determined pulling them back on the braking zones, with the bike handling the bumpy corner entries amazingly well. This was the first time in the Tri-Series that we had not made any significant setup changes between the races and it meant that I could bring my riding up to the level of the bike instead of trying to do the opposite.

Just as I was getting ideas of causing an upset and snatching 3^rd, I ran deep on the brakes at turn one and then again on the next lap at the exact same place. Those mistakes put an end to that and meant I had a 2 second gap to third. I was just pushing too hard and this had given me all the warning signs I needed to settle down and take home another 4^th place finish, which was fine with me. The best thing about this race was that I had smashed my PB and set a 53.2 lap.

Robert Holden Memorial

I was on a real high after the last race and was disappointed to have to wait another year to race here again just as I had hit my stride. So when I heard that I had qualified for the invitational race I jumped at the opportunity.

For some reason I had been gridded based on my fastest lap from race one, which was 1.5 seconds slower than race two and put me way back at 30^th on the grid. I wasn’t too fussed however so when the flag dropped and I found myself in the middle of 30 equally mad motorcycle racers heading for a narrow turn one I decided to leave them to it and file in behind. Last place seemed safe enough.

Everyone around me seemed to be running very similar pace with no one really making any passes. A small gap developed in front of the rider ahead of me so I passed him on the brakes and set about chasing down a swarm of 600 riders. I was definitely hauling them in on the brakes but would have to pass from a long way back to get ahead of any of them. Coming into the last lap I was braking as late as possible at the end of the back straight only for the front brake lever to come back to the bar with ZERO resistance. In that moment I was horrified but there was no time to do anything except stamp on the back brake. I effectively came flying into pit lane at top speed with the rear end fishtailing. After a couple of pumps the front brakes returned enough to slow me to a respectable speed. Before I had time to contemplate this life / death experience I was asked if I wanted to have my transponder removed!!! They must have thought I was a reckless lunatic but I was just happy to roll the bike into the pits all in one piece. As it turns out, one of the brake calliper bolts had completely fallen out leaving the brake pads to bite down on nothing but thin air. How this happened I’m not sure but I will now have a new ritual of checking those bolts every time I go out!

So it was a great days racing and the grid call ups aside, I think the organisers put on an excellent event and series. Later that night I picked up my prize money for fourth place in F3 overall but Geoff rode well enough on his first visit to the cemetery circuit to just secure 3^rd and take the weird helmet trophy thing. At least I can say that I did my best and apart from a top 3, I really just wanted to gear up for the nationals next month, which is looking good.

I had lots of supporters turn up to cheer me on so thanks to everyone who came and saw me in the pit to wish me luck. And of course a big thanks to my family for their support at all the rounds.

Obviously with suspension being so important there RT from CKT did an awesome job of getting the most out of the bike and without him I wouldn’t have been able to go fast (and probably would have crashed trying).

Also a big thanks to:

Pirelli tyres, which were insanely grippy and competitive through to the last race of the series

Brent Kennard (Kennard Collision Repairs) for the ‘sun shining out of arse’ paint job, which has made me really stand out

Simon Banks (Banks Engineering) for all his help and bike prep