PittRace Superbike Challenge/WERA National

Race Report:
*Pittsburgh Superbike Challenge/WERA National 2016*

The weekend started on Thursday as the Twisted Speed Racing team moved into the paddock Thursday night for the Friday track day.

Friday:
Friday was going to be a busy day for me since I was teaching the N2 Race School.

The race school went off without a hitch and the 4 students passed and had a solid performance in the "Mock Race".

After all was said and done with the race school I was left with two sessions to go out on the KTM RC8R and get her dialed in for the WERA National race on Sunday.
I was still on my back up bike as the Superbike motor is currently being rebuilt and refreshed by Tyler King (Coastal Racing).

The tank I had used at MidOhio was borrowed from John Carlisle and I now had the repaired tank (from the Talladega crash) back on the bike-remember this!)

During both sessions I gradually picked up the pace and felt like I was close but needed more time and hoped the two practice sessions on Sunday morning would provide me with the seat time I needed.

Saturday:
There was a great turnout for the the first ever 4 hour N2 Superbike Endurance race on Saturday. There were some impressive teams put together and it was clear that a win in any of the three classes was not going to be an easy task. At some point on Friday Brad Burns told me that Eziah Davis was looking to ride on an R6 in the endurance and needed a teammate(s). After some discussion late Friday we decided to not do the race.

Saturday morning someone was knocking on the door of the RV. It was Eziah. Eziah told me that Cory West had arrived at the track and was also willing to ride in the endurance race. The three of us met and looked over Will Leinker R6 and decide to give the endurance race a shot. This was all literally 5 minutes before registration was closing and the bike had zero quick change stuff for pit stops.

We had a great crew available to work as our team. Michael O'Malley, Kyle Alexander, Ben Wargo and Will all took to the bike. The did the normal stuff bleeding brakes, brake pads, once over on all the bolts, etc.
Cory, Eziah and I all ride on Pirelli tires so the tire choice was easy. We decided on a Green (SC2) front and Green (SC2) rear. We "planned" on doing one rear tire change at the end of the second hour. John Kremenik loaned us a rear wheel so we would have a back up tire set up.

The line-up was set as:
-Cory first hour
-Aaron second hour
-Eziah third hour
The 4th hour would depend on who felt the best to bring the race to closure

During the morning warm up we decided to drop in stiffer fork springs. Also noticed that the right fork seal was leaking a little and fork oil level was low. The springs were swapped and the oil level was topped off.

We were gridded row 7 and 18th overall as grids were based on time of entry in your respective class.

After the flag dropped by the end of lap number 1 Cory had us first in class and 4th overall!

A red flag early in the race brought Cory back into the pits. He said that the front end travel was gone and the fork tube zip tie indicated we were only using about 40% of the fork travel. The oil top off was causing the forks to hydro lock due to too much oil. At this point we would just have to "ride around the issue". Cory told me that real issue for the lack of front end travel was in the Rhythm section of the new track. He said the front end would chatter but if we stayed on the gas and kept the front end unloaded it wasn't that bad.
Cory is just an unbelievable rider and clicked of 1:48's with essentially no front end feel on basically a stock bike!
Cory came in after seeing the low fuel light at around the 26-28 lap mark.
We had decided that this Pitt stop would be fuel and rider change only.
It took us 1:30 seconds (as a reference point elite teams would be upset with a 20 second stop and that would be with a rear tire change! The lack of a quick fill system really hurt our efforts).
I was next up and took out on the bike a bit hesitant with the front end issues. After a few laps gaining some confidence I decided to push a little more and then the right clip on spun back on me when I was coming out of the last turn (carousel turn). I tried to push it back but couldn't so the remaining laps I just rode with the bars a bit twisted. The real issue was that it was the throttle side and I had to keep repositioning my hand to keep wide open throttle. Arm pump really started to hamper my riding and My lap times were no where near what Cory had ran. After 18 laps I pitted in.
The crew topped off the tank and we decided to not change the tire at this point. We did straighten and tighten them clip ons for Eziah. This was when we were scheduled for a tire change but the tire looked to be in decent shape and I was not spinning the tire much during my stint riding.
Eziah took off and was putting down consistent 1:51 second laps. Eziah kept us in 2nd place behind Apex Racing.
Eziah did around 22 laps and pitted in.
Eziah and Cory spoke about the rear tire and we decided to try and make the rear tire last the entire race!
Cory's times during this stint were 4 seconds slower that his first due to the tire being worn but he was still throwing down consistent 1:51 lap times!
Before the race would end Cory would have to get a partial tank of gas and if he was feeling ok we decided to keep him out there. Cory pitted and told us he could make the run to the checkers. We were currently in 3rd place and closing the gap on the second place team (Team Ramrod/BoobleHead- John Kremenik
Emerson Amaya Shiloh Salopek and Daniel Kaepernik)
With Cory closing the gap they decided to forgo their last pit stop and try to make the tank last to the checkers. Cory caught them but couldn't hold the pace and after 4 hours we took 3rd place in class and 4th overall.
Side note-Team RamRod ran out of fuel on the cool down lap and with one lap left Apex lost their motor but since they were one lap up on us they took the win!)
We were extremely proud of the effort we all put in as a team. Not bad for a team thrown together as registration closes on a bike with no quick change of quick fill!
Of course we could "what if" or "could've/should've done this or that" but that's racing we made decisions and are really happy with the results!
So... How about those Pirelli tires???
116 laps on the the front and rear tire!!!
... And Cory was still running low 1:50's!!!

Sunday:
I got up to speed on the KTM and felt good going into the race. I knew Gene Burcham would be my stiffest competition on his Ducati Panigale 1299.
15 minutes before the race I add my fuel and John Palmer comes over minutes later and says "what's leaking?"
Well... Remember that repaired fuel tank? Yep she let loose!
Luckily Tyler King had an extra tank with him and the team and Palmer swapped the tank in I'm not joking 3 minutes (as John said 2 of those minutes were me running to get the tank from Tyler!)

National HeavyWeightTwin Superbike race:
I made the grid and got a decent start Gene and I went into T-1 almost side by side when Tyler King flew past us to take the lead. Tyler led the race for two laps and the Gene and I broke away from the pack. I had areas where I could out drive Gene so on lap 3 or 4 I made a pass and led Gene for two laps. Gene passed me back and I waited to set up a pass on the last lap but a missed shift and no planning a pass on a rider I was lapping well set me back. I decided to walk away with the 17 National points and settle for Second place.
Congrats to Gene on another great win.
Got down to a 1:49 without pushing much so
Was overall pretty much an amazing weekend.

To see the Endurance go off with out any major issues and to have 25+ bikes on the grid was rewarding!
It was great to finally have the TSR media/marketing guru Jeff Empey back at the track with us! Jeff was riding his brand new 2016 Suzuki GSXR 600 for the first time. Jeff took to the new bike well and was dragging knee for the first time in his short amount of track time!

Huge thanks to:
Cory West and Eziah Davis for being my teammates for the weekend, Darrian Tissenbaum, Mary Wagner, Brad Burns, Jeff Empey, Marcus Empey, Kyle Alexander, Ben Wargo, Mike O'Malley, Will Leinker, Collin Blandford (Pirelli Tires/ShagMoto) for all their hard work.
Also thanks to everyone who came up to watch the races. It means a lot to me!
Also thanks to Robert Cichielo and the rest of the crew making the decisions at N2.
Good job Scott Rosey as Race Director on Saturday!
I was completely honored to help put on this race weekend!

Next up:
WERA National - Grattan Michigan

Oh ....and whose ready for some more endurance racing in 2017?!?!

Ride safe,
AAron

 

Awesome read. Great stuff how it all went down, and racing happened, and with Corey West, and 3rd place to boot!

 

Right on Aaron. There is nothing like going racing with good people.