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| MARCH
13-14 WSMC Round One of the new WERA West series was held at California Speedway in Fontana, using the AMA layout. Peanut and I attended a track day there last month and were pretty eager to see how the new series was going to shape up. During the couple of weeks since the last willow round, the only change I made to the bike was the addition of a nice pair of black TCM rearsets with the GP shift linkage, and a pair of their framesavers. I knew I needed to work on dialing in the forks, but didn't get a chance to before practice rolled around. Race what ya have; I've been there before. In addition, the new race bodywork with fluid catching lowers didn't arrive in time, so I had to come up with something to pass tech. You can see in the pictures that Little,Big racing always goes the high tech route. Britt and I headed up to Fontana pulling a trailer with the RSVR on it and her two bikes inside. It was nice not to have to take the generator, as the pits at Cal Speedway are positively palatial and come with all the amenities. When we got to the track Saturday morning there were huge lines for pre-entry. It was costly, but actually better to be in the post-entry lines. I'd like to say here that I'm very grateful to Dave and the Fastrack gang for bringing WERA down here, and know that it'll take a few meetings to get all the kinks out. However, Saturday morning was a mess. Britt missed half of her practices just waiting in line. I rushed to get my first session in and headed out onto the track sweating and harried. It was immediately clear that I'll need to get the fork thing handled before I race next. I'm starting to get my racing legs back and figure out what I need the bike to do. Right now It's not really finishing the corner, and I'll need to make some changes at the front to allow that to happen. On the other hand, the shock is as good as any I've ever used; the rear end really feels great. |
Pick your caption:
1. The pits at Cal Speedway spoil you. 2. We were upset the TV's weren't on all weekend.  Pick your caption: 1.One of the coolest things
about roadracing is the high tech gadgetry.
2. Aisle
8, on sale for $2.29. 3. "Shut up, I got through tech." |
| I got three practice sessions in, the
first shortened because of a red flag. Not a whole lot of seat time. In
the afternoon, Peanut raced the solo race and I just did pit crew duty.
I got to ride the pit bike around and root for Britt. It was a lot of
fun.
I applied thread locker to my left footpeg that kept coming loose and
goofed off. |
 The heavyweight twins, both of them. |
| Sunday morning we got a couple more
practice sessions before racing started around noon. My first race was
750SB. I was gridded WAAAAY back and didn't get a great start. It was a
very competitive group that I race just to improve, and I ended up with
a fast lap of 1:37.61 and eighth place. I actually felt better about
the race than the final position might indicate as I'm steadily
improving. I felt like as soon as I'm able to improve the bike set-up
just a little bit I'll be able to make a couple of big gains in
performance. I think there's two seconds a lap in improvements with
just a little work, which would catapult me up in the standings. My final race was the Heavyweight Twins Superbike race. There were six of us on the race, 5 experts and 1 novice. We were gridded in a waved start with the 600 Superbike race. By that time, the races had been shortened to six laps, which was ok since I've only recently started working out--Cal Speedway is a tiring track for us out-of-shape-moose types. After some confusion about grid positions, where I was told to grid in the third position instead of the first, the flag dropped. I got the holeshot and rode hard to about corner four; not hearing anyone behind me, I turned to look. There was absolutely no one. I kept waiting for a red flag to come out, thinking maybe there was a big shunt behind me, but no. I'm pretty sure it was the first time I've ever run away far enough to just hang out by myself. It felt pretty wierd, but I notched it down and just cruised around to the checkered flag. It was a little strange, but I'll take it. A runaway win, whoulda thunk? On to WSMC round 3. Thanks to California Race Services. The Pirelli's are so good I ran the same set I used at Willow last month. Incredible. Thanks to Airtech for helping with the dam on the 125 lower and general support. New bodywork soon (with a proper paintjob)! Welcome to our new sponsor Motul. Can't wait to start using the product again. |
 Pick your caption: 1. Jack Pfeifer, 4th place finisher at the 2004 Daytona 200, is about to say "Look, an eagle!" then run away. 2. "Just follow me and I'll show you the wierd lines nobody uses."  1. Looks pretty good on the table, doesn't it. 2. I modeled for hours for this sculpture. |