No, to be fair I had a few warnings on that corner and a couple others in earlier sessions as well so should have twigged that the tyres were not what they were in the morning to be fair. Couple of big slides that I kept hold of. Thats the biggest problem with Pirelli Supercorsas and slicks, they are very good for about half a day then they drop off in a big way. Dunlops just stay the same until there's nothing left of them.
6' 4" tall,22 years old,a race circuit and a Laverda Monduic that could proper bite you in the arse was never gonna end well
Thundersport GB at Donnington this weekend was about the most epic thing I've experienced in a long time. Friday is test day followed by a 15min warm up and two 8 lap (20 mile) races on each of Saturday and Sunday. I must admit that before hand I was thinking of finding a way to enter two classes for more track time but it's so intense and physical in the races that I had more than enough over the three days. I qualified 26th of 40 in the 600 class and 6th in my freshman class which I was really happy about because these boys are really really fast! My best lap times on the Panigale around Donnington are 1'42'' getting a good tow from my mate and I could only manage low 1'47'' in qualifying probably party due to inexperience on the 600 and partly due to the cool track temps. The leaders were around 1'42'' I think. Thundersport GB is basically the feeder series for BSB so all the leaders are doing BSB speeds. The track was quite cold but the Elite class lap times were still around 1'34'' or less. The leaders in my class which included the club sportsman and freshman 600 riders were getting down to 1'39''. Race one came along and I was feeling fairly relaxed and excited about my first race start. I'd been practicing the lights on the computer driving game! Unfortunately Donnington only has three red lights and I completely cocked it up. It's a mental experience having forty bikes tearing around and trying to stay in the pack without accident. I think a couple went into the gravel on the first corner and another going down craner curves. I figured I would push hard to get back to my qualifying position and then see how things went. Unfortunately I got too carried away on the cold track and tyres and high sided coming out of McCleans on lap two Flying through the air I thought there's way too much crashing going on and was preparing for a crunch on landing. My new D-Air suit activated it's airbag without me even feeling it it and I had a reasonably soft landing apart from a bit of shock and smacking my elbow. It felt quite surreal as whilst not as fast as Jerez a few weeks back I was still going pretty quick. I'd accelerated hard out of the corner so must have been 80mph plus I reckon. I got unceremoniously transported back to the paddock from my first race! We got the bike fixed with the help of my hero mate about ten minutes before the afternoon race but it was washing out the front on the fast corners due to what turned out to be no rebound dampening in the front forks so I couldn't push and came in second to last but very happy to have completed a race and still at my qualifying speeds despite the suspension due to the adrenelin pushing me on. The second days grid positions were based on the Saturdays results so I was starting from the back of the grid. I went really well all the same and I'm proper happy with it. 23th of 38 in Clubman 600cc and 5th in Freshmans class. I had a tighter line than most into Melbourne hairpin so managed to overtake about ten people there over the course of the race with my back end up in the air doing crazy stuff. A lad who I'd mugged on the earlier race passed me so close into swantz at the bottom end of the track I swear he clipped my front wheel! I passed someone on the inside on the last corner and we smacked into each other as he tried to come back. luckily we didn't crash and it was a sprint to the finish that I just managed to win Such an amazing experience. Once I get some video processed I'll stick some up. Imazing experience, proper gladiator style. I hit someone on the last corner after going up the inside and he tried to cut past again. Sprinted for the finish line together and I was ahead 75 is my water temp by the way, not a freaky constant speed
Always need a mechanic @cookster even if it's just a handy pair of hands. My mate who helped rebuild at Donnington is supposed to be coming again but he's unlikely to be there all weekend due to family. Plus Seb who came second in Elite GP1 ( he does 1'33'''s ! ) is not there so I have no voice of experience this time so a bit more on my own.
I have the chance of riding that weekend in Wales, wife is away, but quite fancy this too..Sat/Sun or Sun/Mon racing @royalwithcream ?
You could do both So here's the vid, not exactly a show of perfection but I'm very happy. Loads of room for improvement as everything you know goes out the window once you've stepped into the gladiator pit!! I'm really gutted I've got the number board on the screen blocking the camera, it was all I could get after the high side the day before.
I enjoyed that. Have you got a gear indicator fitted? I always find it really handy for trackdays/racing. You were very strong on the brakes into the hairpin.
There's a bit of back ground around the gearing. I was going easy to start with to warm the tyres and because I had no rebound in the earlier race after my high side the day before. I was trying to work out if my mate dismantling the forks had actually fixed the problem. I had changed the gearing also but it wasn't quite right for me and it only really worked once I got faster. I thought this gearing would be safer as I was way too short the day before but should have chosen the ratio in between as I was only really fast enough for this gearing on my very quickest laps. It took too long to get up to speed and work out my gear changes , might have been ok with a bit of practice.
I wasn't criticizing by the way, I could tell it took a couple of laps to settle in and get your rhythm. It's hard to race a track on a new setup with no practice so all credit to you.
Thats cool mate, I pasted my reply from my phone as I was just discussing it with another mate on whats app so it was a bit garbled. I don't really need a gear indicator but I definitely have a few issues with changes. The R6 is very cramped in comparison to the Panigale I'm used to riding so I still get myself in a muddle when under pressure or off balance. You can see a bunch of times on the vid where I drop out of gear on heavy breaking, once on the Esses and particularly into the last hairpin. For some reason I never had an issue on the heavy breaking on the Melbourne loop where I was making a lot of passes. I'm not sure why, possibly because the last corner goes a bit off camber and I'm treating it differently?
Do you thing that maybe you were catching the gear lever with your foot as you brake on an angle tipping in to Goddards? I last raced an R6 and had gear change problems because I was cramped and now on my ZX6r I catch the gear lever with my toe occasionally on left handers causing an unplanned upshift with the quickshifter.
I didn't think about that, it's possible? It basically drops into neutral instead of first or second which can really ruin my day if I don't match the revs when putting it back into gear. I've put it down to sloppy technique but I might be catching it with my foot. It is definitely happening more on left handers.
I find it happens on left handers where I have my foot poised over the lever ready to tap the next gear. More often than not it goes into a false neutral which is not great mid corner. I'm messing with rearset position to try and cure the problem.
