Today's free practice went well and we ended up 29th. We found a much better suspension setting that worked really good on a full tank. It's been tough since we don't have a base line setting and we are throwing everything we can at the bike to see what works. It's been awesome having the KYB guys working with us! I also ran into Ben Walters at the track. He's working in Japan for a couple months and had some free time. The team has adopted him as part of the pit crew. He's been spotting and helping me with lines and he is going to be a "wheel chuker" for the pit stops. Awesome having an old teammate at a race like this! The 4 hour 600 race was really exciting today. A Malaysian team came form behind in the last minutes to take the win. The 4 hour is pretty crazy, that are not allowed any tire changes so it gets really interesting in the final hour. The time trial was interrupted by a rain shower, so they waited for the track to dry and gave them a timed session. Kagiyama, Akioshi and Nakasuga were flying! All were in the low 8s! Josh Waters looked good and clicked off a low 9. It should be a tight race tomorrow. They are calling for a chance of off and on showers for the race so it should get interesting. I have been designated the official rain rider for the team. I'm kind of hoping it gets wet! The night party is pretty crazy. As soon as the sun set the fans rushed in to watch all the teams practice their pit stops. I have one Japanese fan who asked me to sign their program and wanted to video me on their phone....they even gave me some strange food as a gift. It's really an amazing fanfare here in Japan and they really love the international riders. Off to bed now, tomorrow's a long day!
Anybody else watching? Who's that lady? http://www.fim-live.com/en/media/ne...kasugi-a-woman-committed-in-racing-at-suzuka/
Better late than never... $25 sent! Good luck man! I'm crazy jealous of being able to race over there!!!
So today went really well. We finished 25th! We had a hydraulic pre-load adjuster bracket break off in the 4th hour which turned the rear shock into a bit of a pogo stick. Then with about 5 minutes to go the bike shut down on me and as I was pulling over to get off the track it fired up and worked fine until the end of the race. I must say that this is by far the coolest events I have ever done! The Japanese fans are amazing! The entire Suzuka weekend is a great show, I'm really excited that I got to experience it! Thanks to everyone for their help in getting me here. I will post up some pictures when I get a free moment to download them to my computer. I have over 200 pics to sort through!
Every pit box had a kiddie pool, it was a necessity! After the race the pools turned into umbrella girl dunking tanks. It seemed like some sort of "Hachi Tai" ritual (sorry, I didn't get any pics of the wet umbrella girls).
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/16350722 found a video of the finisher's victory podium. Our team starts around 55 minutes. They give all the finishing teams a medal and a champagne podium celebration, very cool stuff!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHZYNOGUbZY&feature=related starting at 4:03 is a lap of me running in qualifying on Saturday
I couldn't stay awake for the finish. Fantastic battle between TSR and Yosh for the entire race! Congrats you finished!!
