TSR
08-10-2000, 04:45 PM
WERA Sportsman, Round 7
Summit Point, WVA
Aug 6, 2000
This weekend was a National race event(as opposed to Sportsman, which
is what I run.) On Saturday was the Annual 4-Hour Endurance Race,
which I have run the last two years. My partner Romeo went to the
practice day on Friday, and was courted by another, so they ended up
running it without me. Even though I had asked to run this race with
Ro over 3 months ago. Needless to say, the feeling of rejection are
running high, but I'll get over it eventually.
Romeo wrecked in T5, and later went out completely on a mechanical. I
don't know where he finished.
---===---
Sunday was a day of 18, 6-laps sprints. I was registered for my
standard 3 races. Practice began on Slicks, and I squeezed in about 4
laps when the rain drops began. I started thinking about Miguel
Duhamel breaking his hip at Loudon in these conditions, and pulled off
after 1 more lap.
Well that was it for the sunshine and dry track conditions. The next
couple of hours were spent swapping to rain tires, and waiting out the
lightning. When practice finally resumed, it was in the WORST rain I
had EVER ridden in. Coming out of Turn 10, and coming down the
straight, you could see a wall of water that you were about to hit at
amazing speeds.
At the rider's meeting, I brought a card for Ernie Miale who was
seriously injured at Nelson 3 weeks ago. Many racers signed the card,
and I collected ~$120 which I gave to Robert Rudnicki to hand deliver
to Ernie and Rose, his wife.
Due to the break in the action, and the PA being shut off, and a bunch
of other weather related mishaps, I decided to head to the Chez Summit
to heat up my Chef Boy-R-Dee Ravioli. Normally, I let the sun do the
warming, but today I need the power of radiation. For about the next
45 minutes, I hung out at the Chez, ate, and chatted it up with anyone
that walked through the door.
Realizing that it was getting ready to race time, I sauntered back to
my pits, and sat down to finish my nukewarm pasta chunks. As I sat
down on a toolbox in the back of Quentin Mise and Jay's trailer,
Quentin posed an interesting question to me. He said, "Isn't this your
race?"
"Naw..", I replied, "..it's the last practice."
"No, dude. Practice is over!", he said with staunch certainty.
As the roar of the D-Superbike left the pits, the commotion and random
curses coming from our pits easily drowned it out. I strapped on my
helmet and gloves, and roared off to assume my grid position without
running a warm-up lap.(Luckily, I had kept my leathers and boots on the
whole time.)
As I waited on the grid, all by myself, I awaited the arrival of my
nemesis Robert D. Nees. I was gridded in the middle of the front row,
and since he is ahead of me in points, he would be gridded to my right.
When the 2 minute board was shown, Robert was still not in position.
At the one board, I realized that he would not be attend this wet
soiree'.
All alone on the front row, the green flag flew and I led uncontested
into T1. With great caution, I eased around the track, and finally
looked back after the 2nd lap. Coming out of T10, I saw a bright red
bike behind me. I assumed it was Donnie Unger of Doc Pond Racing, and
figured, he would be passing me in no time. Completing another lap,
and taking the halfway, I had not yet seen any part of the red bike,
until just before the entry of turn one. As I broke, the whine of an
FZR400 zipped past me. It wasn't Donnie, it was Jason Parker, former
WERA Nat'l Champion. Having previously made short work of him on many
other weekends, I affix my sights for a wet, sloppy battle, but didn't
realize how sloppy things were about to become.
As we came into T3, I got a better entry and exit, and began to
overtake Jason on the entry of T4. Unfortunately for me, there, on the
inside, was parked an Orange T-shirt. Jason eased left to overtake
him, I eased more left to overtake Jason. Well, that was the kiss of
death, as the bike let go and slid off the edge of the track, and onto
the wet, sloppy, slippery, nasty, disgusting, red clay mud dirt we have
all come to know and love at Summit Point.
Thanks to Steve Keener and Pete Friedman, I logged some time on a
couple of dirt bikes early in the off-season months. Right about now,
everything I had learned really hadn't been much use to me. Right
about now, was the time I began employing EVERY concept that I had
learned in those cold winter months.
As I descended the hill, in the mud, my options began to vaporize. I
had the tire wall to my left, the mud underfoot, and the race track
cutting a hard left straight in front of me. I threw a quick glance
over my left shoulder, and saw that no one was coming down the hill.
Praying that my rear Penske shock was all that and the chips, I
attempted to cross T5, to head for the infield, where I could pick up
the track again at T8. Evidently this maneuver caused both wheels to
leave the ground, as I jumped a good portion of the payment upon
reentry.
I have watch at least a dozen people head into the infield. Many have
made it, other have found that perfect chuck-hole that sends them
brains over bread basket. figuring that I had used all my luck to this
point, I just stood in the pegs, and waited for the inevitable. As I
slowed to a stop, it happened. *SPLASH!* My front tire dove into a 1"
deep mud hole and splashed water everywhere. I hammered the throttle
and drove the whole bike through it.(Good thing I drilled that drain
hole in my lower fairing.)
I looked right to signal the cornerworker, I looked left to see where
first place was, I looked back to the cornerworker, who was already
frantically waving me to get the hell out of his jurisdiction. So, I
waited for Jason to come by and reassumed the chase.
As you can imagine, Jason saw me in the mud of T4 and assumed that
death was imminent. He had failed to see me perched to kill when he
came through T8, so he thought he was home free for the checker. At a
break-neck pace, I caught Jason coming into T3 one lap later. As he
checked up for another lapper, I refused to learn my lesson, and passed
them both on the outside. Coming into T5 there were 4 more lappers in
line. I diced through them, leaving Jason stranded with mouth agape.
In the midst of all this racing action, the flagger had missed giving
me the white flag, so I ran an extra lap, at full pace, and took the
checker one lap later than everyone else. As I traversed the cool down
lap, there was no one behind me. When I pulled into post race tech,
Jon Hovey and Brian Kcraget we're chatting it up. I pulled in behind
them and asked, "Who won?"
Brian looked at me like I was an idiot and said, "You did?!"
I completed post race tech and tried to make heads or tails out of the
event. Jason came over later, with his eyes bugging out of his head.
As you can imagine, "Where'd you come from?" was the first thing out of
his mouth.
---===---
Robert Nees' dad came over to say congratulations, and said that
Robert's battery was malfunctioning. Upon winning this race, it put me
into 1st place in the region by two points. Robert is also ahead of me
by 4 points in Formula 2.
On the hot pit prior to Formula 2, it was good to see Robert. Jason
wasn't signed up for anymore races, and I wanted more bar bangin'
competition. Unfortunately, I saw Robert get off and start pushing as
I left for the warm-up lap.(I didn't miss it this time!)
As I sat in my grid, I again waited for Robert to show. As the 2
minute board was displayed, I heard an FZR screaming and coming at me,
as Rob slipped up next to me. He had to keep the bike revved to keep
it running.
As the green flag dropped we ran neck in neck. I normally brake at the
3rd brake marker, but we past that, on the gas. We passed the 2nd
brake marker, on the gas. When we got to the 1.5 mark, I laid on the
brakes and began downshifting. I had started using the back brake in
the rain to help settle the bike, but not risk tucking the front end.
Well, it began to backfire. The rear locked up, and began sliding out
and too the left. Again, employing that off-road experience, I didn't
panic, but I also didn't turn it turn 1 when Robert did. As a matter
of fact, 3 other guys after Robert turned in before I did. So, exiting
turn 1, I was now in 4th place.
Robert was in the lead entering T3. I reminisced about a death slide
that I had in T3 back in April. Well, I didn't have to reminisce no
more. Robert's front end broke loose, and he slid about 6 feet across
the track. He put his left foot out, in flat track racing style, and
got off the gas. The 3 of us quickly made short work of him, and I
never saw him again.
Other than that, some National level racer was on his 125cc bike. I
took chase, but he was too smooth for me. I began breaking the bike
loose in all kinds of places that I didn't want to. I looked back and
saw that there was no one behind me, so I backed off to take 2nd.
---===---
LW Twins was race 16 of the day. It was about 6:30pm, and just for
giggles the sun poked out of the clouds. Tired & wet, I didn't know if
this was a blessing or an insult from God. I took it as the former,
and went out and lead Green to Checker. Well, that's not entirely
true.
During the race, I got a pit signal telling me I was waaaaayyyy
ahead(Thanks Jennilynne!). I backed off, and looked back to see yellow
on a bike. My LW Twins nemesis, Daniel Josephs, has lots of yellow on
his bike, so I thought he was catching me. I put my head down and
turned a few more hard laps.
Getting the all clear again, I backed off. With a lap to go, I checked
my six, and there was Novice with his yellow plate some ways behind me.
I started thinking about what would be the coolest thing to be able to
say as a Novice racer?? The answer, to be able to say that you beat
the entire field of Experts.
Exiting T2, I looked back, and began waving to the Novice to come
around. I slowed, but stayed steady. The novice got excited, and he
said later that he almost washed it out in T8, but he finally caught me
out of T10. I was hoping to have a drag race to the finish with him,
but I had checked up too much. The novice took the checker and
celebrated. Needless to say, Jennilynne gave me the WTF? as I crossed
the line.
Another great weekend of racing. Thanks go to all the following folks:
FastLaneCycle.com
RamMC.net
JB & Bridgestone
MW Services
Sisson Landscaping
WCS Landscaping
Jennilynne Guthridge
Quentin Mise, Jay, and Kelly
WERA Officials
And the biggest thanks goes the sopping wet MARRC Cornerworkers, who,
even though they were understaffed, still managed to keep the day going
smoothly.
---===---
Donate $5 to the TSR Injury Fund, *FREE*, just by registering with
PayPal using the following link:
https://secure.paypal.com/refer/pal=TightSqueezeRacing@Yahoo.com
Thanks,
=====
Steve Clark
Tight Squeeze Racing
'99 Suz SV 650 - WERA #16, CCS #239, MARRC #2352
Sponsors: http://www.FastLaneCycles.com
http://www.RamMC.net <--Bodywork
Click below to donate to the TSR Injured Rider's Fund
https://secure.paypal.com/refer/pal=TightSqueezeRacing@Yahoo.com
Summit Point, WVA
Aug 6, 2000
This weekend was a National race event(as opposed to Sportsman, which
is what I run.) On Saturday was the Annual 4-Hour Endurance Race,
which I have run the last two years. My partner Romeo went to the
practice day on Friday, and was courted by another, so they ended up
running it without me. Even though I had asked to run this race with
Ro over 3 months ago. Needless to say, the feeling of rejection are
running high, but I'll get over it eventually.
Romeo wrecked in T5, and later went out completely on a mechanical. I
don't know where he finished.
---===---
Sunday was a day of 18, 6-laps sprints. I was registered for my
standard 3 races. Practice began on Slicks, and I squeezed in about 4
laps when the rain drops began. I started thinking about Miguel
Duhamel breaking his hip at Loudon in these conditions, and pulled off
after 1 more lap.
Well that was it for the sunshine and dry track conditions. The next
couple of hours were spent swapping to rain tires, and waiting out the
lightning. When practice finally resumed, it was in the WORST rain I
had EVER ridden in. Coming out of Turn 10, and coming down the
straight, you could see a wall of water that you were about to hit at
amazing speeds.
At the rider's meeting, I brought a card for Ernie Miale who was
seriously injured at Nelson 3 weeks ago. Many racers signed the card,
and I collected ~$120 which I gave to Robert Rudnicki to hand deliver
to Ernie and Rose, his wife.
Due to the break in the action, and the PA being shut off, and a bunch
of other weather related mishaps, I decided to head to the Chez Summit
to heat up my Chef Boy-R-Dee Ravioli. Normally, I let the sun do the
warming, but today I need the power of radiation. For about the next
45 minutes, I hung out at the Chez, ate, and chatted it up with anyone
that walked through the door.
Realizing that it was getting ready to race time, I sauntered back to
my pits, and sat down to finish my nukewarm pasta chunks. As I sat
down on a toolbox in the back of Quentin Mise and Jay's trailer,
Quentin posed an interesting question to me. He said, "Isn't this your
race?"
"Naw..", I replied, "..it's the last practice."
"No, dude. Practice is over!", he said with staunch certainty.
As the roar of the D-Superbike left the pits, the commotion and random
curses coming from our pits easily drowned it out. I strapped on my
helmet and gloves, and roared off to assume my grid position without
running a warm-up lap.(Luckily, I had kept my leathers and boots on the
whole time.)
As I waited on the grid, all by myself, I awaited the arrival of my
nemesis Robert D. Nees. I was gridded in the middle of the front row,
and since he is ahead of me in points, he would be gridded to my right.
When the 2 minute board was shown, Robert was still not in position.
At the one board, I realized that he would not be attend this wet
soiree'.
All alone on the front row, the green flag flew and I led uncontested
into T1. With great caution, I eased around the track, and finally
looked back after the 2nd lap. Coming out of T10, I saw a bright red
bike behind me. I assumed it was Donnie Unger of Doc Pond Racing, and
figured, he would be passing me in no time. Completing another lap,
and taking the halfway, I had not yet seen any part of the red bike,
until just before the entry of turn one. As I broke, the whine of an
FZR400 zipped past me. It wasn't Donnie, it was Jason Parker, former
WERA Nat'l Champion. Having previously made short work of him on many
other weekends, I affix my sights for a wet, sloppy battle, but didn't
realize how sloppy things were about to become.
As we came into T3, I got a better entry and exit, and began to
overtake Jason on the entry of T4. Unfortunately for me, there, on the
inside, was parked an Orange T-shirt. Jason eased left to overtake
him, I eased more left to overtake Jason. Well, that was the kiss of
death, as the bike let go and slid off the edge of the track, and onto
the wet, sloppy, slippery, nasty, disgusting, red clay mud dirt we have
all come to know and love at Summit Point.
Thanks to Steve Keener and Pete Friedman, I logged some time on a
couple of dirt bikes early in the off-season months. Right about now,
everything I had learned really hadn't been much use to me. Right
about now, was the time I began employing EVERY concept that I had
learned in those cold winter months.
As I descended the hill, in the mud, my options began to vaporize. I
had the tire wall to my left, the mud underfoot, and the race track
cutting a hard left straight in front of me. I threw a quick glance
over my left shoulder, and saw that no one was coming down the hill.
Praying that my rear Penske shock was all that and the chips, I
attempted to cross T5, to head for the infield, where I could pick up
the track again at T8. Evidently this maneuver caused both wheels to
leave the ground, as I jumped a good portion of the payment upon
reentry.
I have watch at least a dozen people head into the infield. Many have
made it, other have found that perfect chuck-hole that sends them
brains over bread basket. figuring that I had used all my luck to this
point, I just stood in the pegs, and waited for the inevitable. As I
slowed to a stop, it happened. *SPLASH!* My front tire dove into a 1"
deep mud hole and splashed water everywhere. I hammered the throttle
and drove the whole bike through it.(Good thing I drilled that drain
hole in my lower fairing.)
I looked right to signal the cornerworker, I looked left to see where
first place was, I looked back to the cornerworker, who was already
frantically waving me to get the hell out of his jurisdiction. So, I
waited for Jason to come by and reassumed the chase.
As you can imagine, Jason saw me in the mud of T4 and assumed that
death was imminent. He had failed to see me perched to kill when he
came through T8, so he thought he was home free for the checker. At a
break-neck pace, I caught Jason coming into T3 one lap later. As he
checked up for another lapper, I refused to learn my lesson, and passed
them both on the outside. Coming into T5 there were 4 more lappers in
line. I diced through them, leaving Jason stranded with mouth agape.
In the midst of all this racing action, the flagger had missed giving
me the white flag, so I ran an extra lap, at full pace, and took the
checker one lap later than everyone else. As I traversed the cool down
lap, there was no one behind me. When I pulled into post race tech,
Jon Hovey and Brian Kcraget we're chatting it up. I pulled in behind
them and asked, "Who won?"
Brian looked at me like I was an idiot and said, "You did?!"
I completed post race tech and tried to make heads or tails out of the
event. Jason came over later, with his eyes bugging out of his head.
As you can imagine, "Where'd you come from?" was the first thing out of
his mouth.
---===---
Robert Nees' dad came over to say congratulations, and said that
Robert's battery was malfunctioning. Upon winning this race, it put me
into 1st place in the region by two points. Robert is also ahead of me
by 4 points in Formula 2.
On the hot pit prior to Formula 2, it was good to see Robert. Jason
wasn't signed up for anymore races, and I wanted more bar bangin'
competition. Unfortunately, I saw Robert get off and start pushing as
I left for the warm-up lap.(I didn't miss it this time!)
As I sat in my grid, I again waited for Robert to show. As the 2
minute board was displayed, I heard an FZR screaming and coming at me,
as Rob slipped up next to me. He had to keep the bike revved to keep
it running.
As the green flag dropped we ran neck in neck. I normally brake at the
3rd brake marker, but we past that, on the gas. We passed the 2nd
brake marker, on the gas. When we got to the 1.5 mark, I laid on the
brakes and began downshifting. I had started using the back brake in
the rain to help settle the bike, but not risk tucking the front end.
Well, it began to backfire. The rear locked up, and began sliding out
and too the left. Again, employing that off-road experience, I didn't
panic, but I also didn't turn it turn 1 when Robert did. As a matter
of fact, 3 other guys after Robert turned in before I did. So, exiting
turn 1, I was now in 4th place.
Robert was in the lead entering T3. I reminisced about a death slide
that I had in T3 back in April. Well, I didn't have to reminisce no
more. Robert's front end broke loose, and he slid about 6 feet across
the track. He put his left foot out, in flat track racing style, and
got off the gas. The 3 of us quickly made short work of him, and I
never saw him again.
Other than that, some National level racer was on his 125cc bike. I
took chase, but he was too smooth for me. I began breaking the bike
loose in all kinds of places that I didn't want to. I looked back and
saw that there was no one behind me, so I backed off to take 2nd.
---===---
LW Twins was race 16 of the day. It was about 6:30pm, and just for
giggles the sun poked out of the clouds. Tired & wet, I didn't know if
this was a blessing or an insult from God. I took it as the former,
and went out and lead Green to Checker. Well, that's not entirely
true.
During the race, I got a pit signal telling me I was waaaaayyyy
ahead(Thanks Jennilynne!). I backed off, and looked back to see yellow
on a bike. My LW Twins nemesis, Daniel Josephs, has lots of yellow on
his bike, so I thought he was catching me. I put my head down and
turned a few more hard laps.
Getting the all clear again, I backed off. With a lap to go, I checked
my six, and there was Novice with his yellow plate some ways behind me.
I started thinking about what would be the coolest thing to be able to
say as a Novice racer?? The answer, to be able to say that you beat
the entire field of Experts.
Exiting T2, I looked back, and began waving to the Novice to come
around. I slowed, but stayed steady. The novice got excited, and he
said later that he almost washed it out in T8, but he finally caught me
out of T10. I was hoping to have a drag race to the finish with him,
but I had checked up too much. The novice took the checker and
celebrated. Needless to say, Jennilynne gave me the WTF? as I crossed
the line.
Another great weekend of racing. Thanks go to all the following folks:
FastLaneCycle.com
RamMC.net
JB & Bridgestone
MW Services
Sisson Landscaping
WCS Landscaping
Jennilynne Guthridge
Quentin Mise, Jay, and Kelly
WERA Officials
And the biggest thanks goes the sopping wet MARRC Cornerworkers, who,
even though they were understaffed, still managed to keep the day going
smoothly.
---===---
Donate $5 to the TSR Injury Fund, *FREE*, just by registering with
PayPal using the following link:
https://secure.paypal.com/refer/pal=TightSqueezeRacing@Yahoo.com
Thanks,
=====
Steve Clark
Tight Squeeze Racing
'99 Suz SV 650 - WERA #16, CCS #239, MARRC #2352
Sponsors: http://www.FastLaneCycles.com
http://www.RamMC.net <--Bodywork
Click below to donate to the TSR Injured Rider's Fund
https://secure.paypal.com/refer/pal=TightSqueezeRacing@Yahoo.com