He stuck the front wheel of his 748 in between the under-tail exhaust canister of a Triumph 675 and the top of the rear wheel of the 675, going into T1 on the 2d lap of practice. Completely smashed the exhaust canister flat . . . from the bottom up. Think about it. How difficult is that to achieve? The guy he took out is a regular WERA fast guy, and he messed up a beautifully prepeared Triumph 675. It's trying-to-win-practice efforts like that which made the overcrowded practice sessions so sketchy.
My guy was running practice Saturday morning when he was hit. Practice group 3. He thinks it was red Ducati that hit him, but not sure.
I found there to be a very big differential in speed and skill levels in most of the races and practice groups. Since I was on the track with people I had never ridden around I gave wide berth and pretty much passed people only around the outside leaving at least a foot or two of clearance. I think only 1 guy passed me in all my practice sessions and races and he was on a Ducati 1198 I think. It's always the responsibility of the passing rider to do it cleanly. If a rider is riding like a tool, report him to the race director or find him in the pits and strike up a conversation with him.
Saw the whole thing, what do you want to know, up close .Guy on the duc screwed up bad and you could tell he fixated on the other guy instead of going around him, he got on the brakes so hard he went right over into the guy in front.
Well, I'm pleased the fast guys chimed in on this. To me, the practice sessions were a giant 'cluster flock' and I could sense something negative coming. Too many riders trying to win practice. Maybe the weather got to them, I mean, being almost perfect and all that...for me, discretion is the better part of valor. Tim and Joe have the right stuff to handle that kind of chaos.
I really have no problem with it, it comes with having a huge event with alot of new riders. It happens at any big event. Practice Day was nothing like pre race practice. Think all in all everything went great and sure things will only be better next year.
There were a lot of new riders that didn't wear their orange shirts/vests. Me and Ryan Ambrose almost got into it at the last turn trying to avoid a wayward new guy on a Thruxton. He went into the kitty litter at the last turn and came out in the apex. Luckily Ryan saw it happening and ran wide to avoid it, I was right on his back tire and almost didn't notice he was slowing down and came close to hitting him. My fault entirely for not paying attention to what was in front of me. Could've been bad for sure. I definitely got some good practice in dealing with traffic that weekend. I talked to the Thruxton guy later and he said he was in the rider's school, but they told him he didn't need to be in it for some reason. But this was his first race. I told him he needed to get an orange shirt so everyone knew he was new for all our safety. He never did. Why he wasn't kept in the school is beyond me...not cool.
I was in practice group 4 and one of the slow guys. A combination of breaking in a new engine and testing out a new setup kept my times high during Friday and sat practice. Due to that, I was very cognoscente of leaving ample passing room on both sides as I knew I have a few high speed differential passes made on me. Even with doing so, there were a few times I felt like I was back at novice track day. A few times the passer would immediately run off in the corner and other times if I hadn't altered my line, there would have been a nasty collision. As others have said. The "I'm going to win practice" mentality was mind boggling. I've only been racing a year, but I've never seen the crash truck so busy.
Hey Tim, Had some good races at Rd Atlanta and was considering driving to Barber to watch the weekend's races and visit some friends. Unfortunately, the death of my friend Chris Spencer on Friday really put a damper on the weekend so I went home on Sat. Hope your races went well and safe. I hope to be entered next year in the BOT classes. So I'll do Rd Atl Thurs and Fri, then Barber to be one of the gazillion bikes on track! How does AHRMA handle all that cash without Jeff Smith handling the checkbook?
hope its not the following weeke end ahrma and ccs are at Daytona.That would be even worse. I like it now.
Hope its not the following weekend ahrma and ccs are at Daytona.That would be even worse. I like it now.
I agree with Tim.....run Thursday at GNF, friday (optional), saturday, sunday at Barber, then the next weekend at Daytona......If AHRMA runs a practice day (tim?), that would be 7 days of Vintage racing in 11 days....sounds pretty good to me.....IF the bikes survive.....I'll have a spare motor! I guess GNF the week before Barber would work (for us locals anyhow), but dont know how seperating GNF from Barber would affect the Vintage grid.
Yep, that would be a season's worth of equipment use all in a few days. So, I guess next year will involve more than the usuall number of builds and rebuilds . . . . Better start planning early.
Great Event for sure but the problems were clear. I think it needs to be made clearer that you can bump down a practice group if you're slower than your group. Lots of people should have done it, but didn't.
Not to entirely digress, but the term "Rocktoberfest" is a stretch enough. No adult should ever have to say "Biketoberfest". kthxbye
Oh no, I wasn't blaming you, I was merely sympathizing that you had to, and will continue to have to, use it. Biketoberfest... good lord.
