Snowy Snetterton

Got the Wee Monster prepped and loaded Friday night for the first round of the Ducati Sporting Club’s Desmo Due Championship at Snetterton.Last time I was at Snetterton in March it snowed and I think just about every other time I have been to Snetterton, the weather has been shite. True to form we had 15mph wind, 4 degrees and rain on Saturday.

Up with the sparrows and arrive at a rain sodden track. Scrootineering and signing-on done quickly, then loaded the bike back in the van to keep it out of the rain while I have a nap. It didn’t stop raining. Qualifying sessions were started and stopped becasue of a water-logged track. I waited around, but our session never arrived. Desmo Duo racing was eventually cancelled becasue we run on road tyres and there was just to much water around. Bugger!

I've got my best results in crap weather, so was up for it. 4 hour round trip 6 hours hiding out in the van trying to keep dry and warm is all I got from Saturday. One of the big negatives for me in road racing is all the waiting around. Crap.

 

Sunday's forecast was worse. They got it right this time... I got up to the circuit to find 1 inch of snow and freezing cold. At 09h15 it was annouced that the Sunday's racing was to be abandoned. Great... another 2 hour drive back home.

 

Pretty disappointed about it... was really keen and up for it. The plan was to have two more qualification rounds for the Manx under my belt and perhaps a trophy or two. Will have to wait till the next schduled round on 20th April at Oulton Park to try out all the improvements to the MD-Racing tuned Wee Monster and get those qualification rounds in.

ManxGP 2012 - Day 4 - Damp Shakedown

Overslept. The last few days catching up with me. Got the wheels off Wee Suzy - those haggard old tyres from last year having done their job. Smart new Bridgestones on - heard good things about them. We'll see if it's just talk.

A clean, gas up, top-up the battery, a little tweak to the front-end to sort the dragging pads and we're good to go.

Full tank, cold tyres in the damp - taking it easy through Quarterbridge

 

Load-up, to the day-paddock, unload and the heavens open up again. The rain hold up after half an hour and practice starts late. I'm in the second session so I got time to get the bike through skrootineering and all my crap up to parc firme.

Rain, rain go away...

 

Second session and I'm out on Betty. Wet and damp around the course - I take it easy. The bike feels planted and fast... but it's still a big old beast compared with the wee Suzuki. It has a couple of strange hiccups at high revs... might be the quickshifter engaging over the bumps... must check that out.

...come back another day.

 

I come in, generally happy with the bike, but didn't really have a chance to let her rip. I park Betty up, have a drink and warm up Suzy. Ten minutes later I'm heading down a dry Bray Hill - flat out. Yeeeeeeha!

I take it easy through course - not worth taking a chance in those slippery conditions. I test my gearing and am getting her up to 9200rpm in top. Might need one tooth longer on the back - I'll see what's in my spares box.

Ready to rock for a few laps of the Isle of Man

 

Rain flags out at Hilberry... they were out on teh last lap. Wet under the trees. I take it easy and accelarate up the hill to Cronk y Mona. Half way around and I hear teh rain pinging off my visor... but the time I slither into Signpost on it's proper rain. I spash through the puddles down to Governor's Dip where Suzy cuts out. Huh? I fire her up again... but she's running on one cylinder. Shit. I limp back to the Paddock. I got some work in the morning.

Now here is a work of art - a proper race bike.

Phil McGurk built this custom frame around a super-tuned ER-6 motor. See the Ducati Supersport infleunce there. Roumors in the paddock last year had his bike making 112bhp. He says it's a little lower this year (he blew two engines up last year in practice). He's going to be up at the sharp end on this beauty.



ManxGP 2011 Day 1 - Welcome Back!

Left work early yesterday afternoon for a scenic drive across the Peak District to Liverpool for teh evening sailing to the Isle of Man.

Trusty Chev-Dawg and the gurls...

Due to poor conditions, and a broken engine, the ferry departed an hour late and the 2.5 hour journey took 4 hours. Lovely 70mph winds and a big swell greeted us once we were out in open sea.

Views from the van...

Bobbing like a cork on the Irish Sea wasn't too good for me... or my £6.99 dinner. Two hours into the trip and I chundered, puked, vomited, barfed, blew chunks and spewed until I was retching and the occasional gob of Valentino-yellow bile came up. Fuck me1 That was a long 24 hours. was I glad to get off that boat! A few months ago, I'd organised and payed for the house on Bray Hill that I'd rented last year. The owner called last week... they're going through a rough time and have more than one family tragedy... could I find other accommodation?

All calm down the Mersey mouth... 

I'm one lucky sonofagun and within a few hours I managed to find another house just a few minutes down the road in Braddan. It has no garage, but my original landlord generously offered me his garage. The gods smile on me :-) So... I'm signed-on, riders briefing done, technical briefing done, a bit of grocery and fuel shopping done... I'm catching up with my mates over a cup 'o tea and it starts to rain. Piss and bollocks!

Getting kit skrootineered is part of signing on...

The forecast isn't good for the week either with Monday and Tuesday looking to be the best days toi get qualification times in. Not going to get caught out like I did in 2009. "Bing-bong!" Paddock tannoy announcement; "This evening's practice session has been cancelled due to averse weather conditions. Thank you.". You're welcome. And I was wearing a tee shirt in teh sunshine just an hour ago. Bah! Fucking IOM weather!

Candy gets a new paint-job.. and new wheels, brakes, forks, swing-arm... ;-)

So... I sit out the worst of the rain... then load the bikes back onto the trailer. They're wet and slippery... so I drop Suzy V on her side. Nice one! Plonker. Bikes back on the trailer and I head back to the garage on Bray Hill to offload all my crap and setup a wee bike prep workshop. While maneuvering Candy off the trailer, she too goes down with a sickening crunch of fiberglass splintering. Tremendous!

Offload the bikes... load the bikes... offload the bikes...

Once in the garage and organised but wet, I dry off the bikes and check them out. Broken clutch lever on Suzy V. Just the tip so nothing a file can't sort out. Footpeg took impact too... hmmm... peg's a bit loose... let's get it off and tighten it. So I go and strip the footpeg bracket bolt. Great!

Setting up base camp for the fortnight

Candy just suffered a bit of concrete rash and small split in the fairing. Duct tape sorts that. It's been lasing it down for a few hours now and the ground is all waterlogged - I hope the forecast of a good Monday and Tuesday is right... but then... I hope it's wrong and we have fantastic weather so we can get some practice in. Welcome back to the Isil-of-pizzle!