air modules at road a

After (3) riders meetings with that ole geeeeezer (J.C. aka GOD) I was about ready to load my shit up & head back to Mississippi It was made very clear that they (Rd. Atlanta) do not give shit about motorcylist in general.

The whole scene left me completely terrified of the place before I ever made the 1st lap Honestly though before I ever started racing I had nothing but bad experiences with the whole Rd. Atlanta bunch & I was just a lowly high paying spectator. Screw 'em I might not go back.

 

You're on for October Charlie! I'll bring the generator, extension cords, a bigger cooler, and I think my boss has a blower we can borrrow too. We might even have one at work I can borrow for the occasion.

 

Nope, I'm one of the naturals too, and now then some. LOL!!

 

Holly Cow! I thought this was home to the Kevin Schwantz riding school. Isn't Kevin on the "Take back the AMA" team? I thought for sure he'd be an advocate of rider saftey. I'm suprised that the track he bases his school at wouldn't have the latest saftey equipment (or at least haybales). How could Road A not like the motorcycle racers but have a world champ based at their track?

 

Huffdaddy, you are dead on with your exlplaination. I could not believe the FIRST words outta his mouth was the "god" bit. Sure was funny tho how he looked with one foot up his ass and trying to pull the other one out of his mouth when he brought everyone in for the 3rd meeting to ATTEMPT a feeble apology.

As far as the airfence goes, Sean, i asked about helping take them down before i left and was told there was already a good sized crew out doing it. My kids were home w/granma and we needed to scoot, thats the only reason i was unable to help out. I really wanted to help take down what i help put up.

I TOTALLY appreciated the airfence. After riding on eggs on Fri's track day, looking at the pissy assed haybales that i might slam into, i was MORE than happy to help set them up Fri. night. I will way this, to those that install/take down at each race, kudo's to you folks. Those things may be "simple" to do, but its pure BULL work. I was exhausted after riding all day long then dragging those things out of the truck and getting them set up.

Thanks again to WERA and Dan and to all that helped with the installation/takedown and contributions. Just knowing those things were there helped my lap times TEMENDOUSLY!!!!

Now, WHERES MY TSHIRT!!!

 

As Dan Lance stated in an earlier thread, he was ready, willing and able to set up the Air Fence on Thursday evening and had done so for Road Atlanta three times previously for free. The track, who ran the practice day, was not willing to pay for the rental and Dan can't keep doing it for free. My assumption is that the track never made the connection, no Air Fence (duh, wipe the drool off the chin) means we need hay bales.

Earl, the manager who spoke to us at the third rider's meeting, said there were 136 (or 137) riders registered for the practice. That's $17,000. If no one got a full refund and left, they lost $8,500 in refunds. They could have had the Air Fence set up for less than 25% of the lost revenue. I believe this is the definition of "penny wise and pound foolish" irrespective of any safety issues.

Dan, sorry I had to scoot and couldn't help take down the Air Fence, but WHERE'S MY TEE SHIRT ANYWAY?

Robert Patch

 

Were the 2nd and 3rd riders meeting announced? I never new about them until now. I found out about the refund just because I was riding around and I saw people lining up at the gate and asked what was going on.
I saw a couple of people that turned around as soon as he said "God" so he wouldn't see them laugh .

You are right those things are heavy once they are inflated. Glad I could help out some in the installation. Next time I will Skinstastic or Off I got eaten by the mosquitos . I don't who the guy was but he got stung by a wasp or something in the toe

 

Sorry, but you haven't really contributed to Air Fence until you help take it down. I have to say it was about as much fun as racing in the heat on Friday and Saturday, actually much much less.

 

yeah, that was gocr6, (grant catoe) who got stung by the wasp. i don't think i've ever seen that kid move so fast. he was standing on the tire wall and then i heard a "whoah!....owwww!" and then i saw a flash that must've been him bouncing over the airfence and next thing i knew he was on the track in T4 hopping around yelling "coco! coco! wasps! watch out! save yourself! oh no, coco!"

 

Wow, sounds like things were pretty crazy on Friday. So, what happened now? They gave people the option of a parcial refund because there was no haybales?
I think someone said there was a red flag in the first practice, was a rider hurt?

 

I heard they gave refunds (half I think) because when they shut down they didn't get restarted until 1:00. Then they ran until 6 or close to it.
They ended up getting haybales after the track director somehow found out (he was somewhere else long distance, fwiwt) that they didn't have them and called and told them to shut it down. Of course he was covering his own backend here. Haybales were ordered and a crew of about 15 deployed them at specified turns.
I don't think there was a rider hurt in the first practice. I think they just shut it down because of the crash itself. Maybe the bike was on the track, I don't know. There were probably alot of car people working corners that day, so for them to shut it down for a crash is not unusual, and especially since it is just practice. I know of several car people who won't respond to a bike crash. In other words, they won't run onto the track. But I wouldn't think you would shut down EVERY time a bike went down. That would kill the schedule.

 

Interesting....it sounds like they made the right decision to shut it down until they could get the haybales out but I bet a lot of riders were ticked. It also sounds like they tried to make it right by offering a partial refund. Unfortunately when something like that happens it's pretty tough to make things right.

 

I agree

Definitely the right decision to stop until haybales were out. Someone dropped the ball or misunderstood or probably the appropriate word here is ASSUMED. It has all been mentioned earlier about who thought what. I talked to a few riders and yes they were not real happy but the refunds definitely took the edge off of the situation. It was very hot that day so the combination of a short day, plus a refund I think overall was OK with most racers. It's unfortunate that it happened but at that point you can't really do more than what they did. I doubt it happens again.

 

(quote)yeah, that was gocr6, (grant catoe) who got stung by the wasp. i don't think i've ever seen that kid move so fast. he was standing on the tire wall and then i heard a "whoah!....owwww!" and then i saw a flash that must've been him bouncing over the airfence and next thing i knew he was on the track in T4 hopping around yelling "coco! coco! wasps! watch out! save yourself! oh no, coco!" (/quote)

Was that the guy who put tobacco on his toe and walked around with it all day? What a loser.

 

hey now watch it missy - you put it there. maybe i need a bag of wasp at home since they make him move fast!

 

ROTFLMAO!! You are right he jumped that tire wall and air fence like it was nothing. When I looked at his toe later I was like WTF is that?


JC(God) in the 1st riders meeting said that he was going to bring out the red flag on every bike down.
Yes, they did give out refunds for half day. My buddy that came with me said "screw it" and went back home. He was not staying around all morning for half day practice.

 

I completly disagree with you. There was a good crowd of people who gave about two hours labor on Friday evening after spending an exhausting 100 degree day at the track and every one of their efforts were appreciated and was a significant contribution.

Robert Patch

 

I kneeled on a nest of fire ants and got over 25 bites on my right knee and leg. I'll bet Dan has a few stories too.

Robert Patch

 

Ya got that right Robert! I was in the last session of the day on Fri. I was exhausted at the end of the session but i had said i was gonna help and WANTED to help set the AF up. I pulled the bike into my pit, jumped outta my leathers and into a pair of shorts, hopped onto the pit bike and down to the track i went for every bit of 2 hours. And i'd do it again too.

Matter of fact, even got a blow job from the man Brian Drebber himself!!

 

So I guess you're not one to toot your own horn
;-).

Robert