Eric Stump is a bit upset.

The guy can roll. I got to ride/watch him at Josh's house raising some serious hell on a 450 motard a few years back. I've honestly never seen anyone ride a bike that well before in my life, and he'd go from drifting on the mini track to throwing 30' tail whips on the MX track... all on the same bike with slicks.

I was looking forward to gridding up with him this year.

 

I didn't vote him off anything.

 

Thanks Jed. Call me sometime man, been a while since we caught up!

 

So....where do I apply to be his replacement?

 

10--4

 

That FB post could very well explain the "wrong attitude" part of things. That's not a very professional way of dealing with things in any aspect of the situation. I've been in his shoes, half way through the season my first year as a pro. At the time I felt shafted and cheated. Now I realize how much of it was on me. I still think it was wrong to be dropped half way through a weekend and sent home on a plane after riding with the team all the way to Wisconsin lol but I hold no ill will towards the team or the people who made the decision. I made mistakes and it bit me. I never once bashed the team or said anything negative about them. It is what it is, I moved on and did everything I could to get to the next race, every year. The owner of that team is the reason I got to ride a triumph my last year and made me a lot of great contacts. You gotta keep people in your back pockets, even the ones with questionable history. You never know when it could come back to help you.

Also, any chance of him picking something else up just got all but diminished. What team would want someone using profanity and bashing another team on social media?

 

You mean that wasn't your application on the last page of RRW Last month??

 

As we have even seen on the Beeb, sometimes a bang to the head can make someone lose their filter and have a very short leash. Not saying it's the cause, but it very well could be. So, actually Eric Stump's response makes more sense now, when you put it in this context.

 

What makes you think that happened?
Is that even possible?

 

true. ya never really know someone till ya spend a long day with em.. but dang, how about

preeeeety sure Robby-Bobby was joking with Brandon

 

Second team test is already scheduled to take place on the dragon.

 

Testing at an open trackday doesn't seem like a good idea to me. I ride open trackdays at chuckwalla a couple times a year and there are always a couple beginners out there not to mention lots of not very fast [compared to the big boys] people like me. Just doesn't seem like the time a professional can really focus and make changes. His comment about not wanting to blow past the trackday peeps is spot on as well. At best it'll piss off the insecure and at worst it'll become a physical problem for some hot heads.

 

indeed.. the closing speed differences in an advanced group, when there are PRO riders on track, is crazy. It's like you are mixing the typical advanced group with "fast novice" and intermediate riders. It's WAY cheaper to do 'testing' at a track day vs. renting the track though, but have to agree. How much quality track time do you actually get.

I wish everyone involved the best, and as Brandon stated earlier.. i'm sure there was more to this story.

 

If I had a dime for every time someone was "testing", at a track day, I'd have a factory rig by now.

It's called a track day for a reason.

 

The grey area are probably teams that are semi-pro. Not everyone that shows up to race MA even for the full season is really a pro level team. I am not saying that is the case here.

It also depends on what the goals for the test are going to be. If they are just looking to get the rider comfortable on the bike (adjusting all of the controls, making sure a newly built bike is running well, doing some rough base suspension set ups and that sort of thing) then I think that would be fine for the non-factory pro teams. If they are really looking to push lap times, not so much.

With that being said as a track day guy, not racer, I have been on the track with some pretty fast company at some track days. They generally are not the ones that have done stupid stuff like completely stuffing me going into the corner. That seems to be the realm of the guys who are trying to "win" the track day. The real fast guys usually have passed me so quickly and smoothly that they were gone before I knew they were there and left me with my jaw hanging open as I pondered how in the heck they could be so fast.

 

I've dealt with a few guys "testing" at the track days as a CR, and had to caution a few if they didn't cool it.

It's not cool at all, and honestly it's a shitty way to acquire data, as you can rarely get a flying lap. I'm all for testing, making geometry changes, etc, but not at the expense of my safety or others.

If you're at the level where you need to "test" then you should go racing, or rent a track like Tally or Jennings for a few thousand during the week.

 

Back down to six.