Sunday is trophy day! AFM races, Infineon Raceway, 7-10-11

A great day of racing at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, California. One of the premier tracks of the U.S.A., host to many other races including, NASCAR, AMA, Indy Car Series. It has been almost 2 1/2 years since I raced at Infineon, much less ran on this track. So Friday I opted for a trackday and worked on getting the rust out. That went over very well, although by the end of the day I was sliding out of T2 pretty easily.

So into the pits, and new tires on the bike, and back out to scrub them in for the weekend.

Not much to say, my goal was to complete the races, get my feet wet again, and go as smoothly as possible. smooth = fast.

My race schedule was

Race 2 (650 Twins)

Race 10 (Open Twins)

Race 11 (Formula 4)

I'd be running back to back races. Race 2 went without a hitch, I didn't push it, and just picked the guy in front of me to reel in and try and pass. Successful race, and goals complete.

We had a lot of friends over to the pits this weekend, as the weather is amazing, and we bbq'd some dogs and burgers. With the evening races fast approaching, I readied the bike and went to watch the formula pacific races (premier race of the weekend). Just what I needed to get jazzed up for my races coming up.

Race 10: Open Twins (all motorcycles that are of a Twin cylinder nature. usually large bore ducati's. I run this race to run with fast bikes. Like a carrot dangling and enticing you to go faster and faster. haha great way to speed up.

It would prove a difficult race. After the green flag, I settled in behind a Duc and went at it. On lap 1 I saw a bike laying on the outside of T7 and dude on the inside K-wall. The race continued, but when I came back around there was a bike on the outside of the entrance to T7 and the rider towards the outside. First race stop. So back to the pits. Here we were made to wait for too long, before race control sent everyone back to their pits. Since the downed rider ended up being flown out to the e.r.

On Race start number 1, we all got around to T2, and as I crested on the right hander, I see bikes everywhere, 2 are on the ground sliding left, one has just landed, 3 bikes are riding in the dirt, and I'm weaving left and right, get through, and get back on the throttle hard. Race is on until red flags fly. Well, didn't take long...by T4 black flags were out, and red flag in T7. So there we sat again, then were shuffled into the pre-grid area.

Lets try this again. haha

On the 3rd restart I got the jump on one of the bikes going into T1, and held it for the shortened race of 4 laps. Eventually, the guy would not finish, crashing out instead.

It was a fun race, and I immediately gridded up for my next race, Formula 4. I was tired, it was hot, but hell, it's only 8 laps, and I did the same, went out, reeled them in, picked them off one at at a time, and got my feet wet.

After finishing up, I arrived to my pits to many friends and a cold PBR!!!

after checking my results, it appears that I won a trophy, for Top Novice in Open Twins. :D

A great day with a Sunday trophy!

Top Novice, Open Twins July 10th, 2011. :D

AFM races

Been a while, but I'm getting a chance to go back at it.

This weekend at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma Co. my roommate and I will be making our long awaited (lol) ghetto comeback to racing. :D

Sunday Sunday Sunday!

Races:

650 Twins (Race 2), before lunch

Formula 4 (Race 10)

Open Twins (Race 11)

Yesterdays track day practice went very well, for shaking out the bugs and quirks on the bike.

battling an issue with my throttle tube, but I think buying a simple throttle grip will do.

What's racing without a party and bbq...

haha, it's not fun, that's what it is. So we've thrown our pits together, and had a great crowd of racers.
Stan (#750), Conan (#849), Chris (#897), and myself (#782)

For lunch, we had invited a bunch of friends from our motorcycle forum, and usually get a good crowd of enthusiasts who come out and cheer us on and hang out to eat our food and drink our beer...hahaha much like hashers.

So for lunch, we fired up the grill and threw on the dogs and burgers. The sun was out, and this was a phenomenal day of riding.

I am very happy with my conditioning and the higher miles of running I've been doing, as I don't feel tired, nor out of breath after running a race or a long practice session as I used to. It takes a lot of muscles to man handle the bike around a track consistently over and over....and it's obvious when the guys get tired, as you can see their lap times slow down, and they don't go into the corners as confident. Not conducive to moving up in the ranks.

Our pit set up. We got a good crowd to come out for lunch.

Bryan Davis, probably one of the fastest men out in 650 Production. :D hahahaha poor B.
Josie loves our weiners. for real.
Group six?! That boy is fast on his bicicleta.
Stan "sexy" Chan
"I don't do autographs, please don't take my photo, or I have to charge money" hahaha ghey.


Marco and his son out cheering on the local BARF racers.
Josh took over the grilling duties.
Da pimps of DC (Daly City), sorry guys, we didn't have any rice cooked for you all. :( hahahaha
Val, rocking out! hahaha
myself, Stan, Conan, Chris.
and finally, Joe from 4theriders.com came over to get a group shot, and we obliged with a little kung fu action, except Chris who was too cool for school, and just used sign language to let everyone know how efeminate he was. :D

Awesome weekend. I am skipping out next round to do some other things I have planned over the summer, as well as the 5th round to go down to Souther California to a hash campout in the southern Sierras.

AFM Rd. 3 - Infineon Raceway - race report

May 23rd and 24th was the AFM Rd 3 races at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma.
I did very well at my last race here only 1 month earlier, so I was looking forward to another fun filled weekend, hopefully without the drama and injuries that marred the first round at IR.

I decided to skip practice on Saturday to save some money, and try and budget my weekend, hence only 2 races on Sunday.

Some of the guys were already up at IR, so I drove my things up there on Saturday morning to set up my pits and hang out at the track. It was cold on Saturday and a few guys had gone down due to cold tires and pushing it too hard.

Mid morning we heard that the track was red flagged and they were out picking up some riders, about 15 min later we saw the chopper coming in. Fuck. Never a good sign. Wishing whoever it was a speedy recovery.

We got to working on bikes, and then I saw the crash truck come through the pits, and a friend of mines bike was in the back. shit! Went over to his pits, and after looking at the bike, it looked in really good condition....so where was Mark. Turns out, he was the one that got life flighted out. He lowsided in T2 and in the process of vacating the track, he was struck by another motorcycle, hard, and was thrown down the track. It's basically like being hit at about 50+mph...as from the reports from the NMP's (National Motorcycle Patrol) the yellow flags didn't fly immediately, and the two riders that came up on him, didn't realize their was an incident on track. First bike saw Mark, and went around him, but the 2nd bike couldn't avoid him. He hit Mark, and also went down, fracturing a jaw and getting beat up. Marks injuries were worse, with several fractures, from scapula, 4 ribs, pelvis and elbow. update: he's out of the hospital and recovering at home, as cantankerous as ever. hahaha great thing to hear.

With Saturday pretty much being just a day of hanging out, I went home to get some sleep, and come back on Sunday: May 24th.

I arrived just a bit late, so didn't have everything prepped, and I hadn't teched my bike the night before, so down to tech, registered and got the bike started, as Practice session 2 was coming up fast. I got out to the hot pits by 3rd call, and only did about 3 laps in the hot pits, no where near what I should have, or usually do, and went out on track with cold tires. The weather was overcast and cold still, and I thought I was taking it slow, but as I came around T3b (a cresting right hander) the front just tucked all of a suddent and I lowsided as I went over the crest and slid to the outside of the track. WTF?! Well, this sucks, I've now crashed my bike in the first lap of first practice and I'm Race #1. :|

After I stopped sliding, I looked around, hopped up and ran for the fence, lest I get run over by anyone. We managed to prop up the bike, and I had to wait for the end of that session, which seemed like forever. Afterwards, I was given a quick break to grab the bike and take it down the hill. After getting her started, I managed to bring the bike back into the pits. With all the guys there, they immediately jumped on the bike, without even asking me if I needed help. They quickly assesed the damage (broken brake lever, frayed throttle cables, bent clip on tube, bent Right rear set, some rash, otherwise good to go).

The guys started grabbing parts, and tools and immediately went into action tearing apart the parts that needed either replacement or repair. It was very cool to see the comraderie of a race weekend and all of these guys working super hard to get me out on track for my first Race.

Random racers (Thanks #517) stopped by to lend parts, after going to their pits and bringing everything they had to help with the rear sets.
Alan came by to see if I needed anything, and offer help with repairs.
The craziness ensues, tools flying, repairs made, and trying to keep track of who I owe parts too, and who helped was getting out of hand. hahahaha
Rear sets torn apart and I managed to frankenstein functional rear sets on the bike, from all the parts donated.
Hands everywhere. Throttle cables replaced, reset and tube replaced, front brake lever replaced.
On On mofo's.
Determined to do something, or at least give it a good effort, although at this point I had mostly resigned myself to missing the first race.
Cleaning out the rest of the dirt and grime that was all over the bike. Luckily nothing went down those blue tubes, which feed through the carbs directly into the motor. One little rock, and the engine would have been toast. I really need to get some type of filters on them.
Well, long story short......the guys managed to get me rolling out of my pits, down to the tech garage, teched the bike, got my grid position, and made the riders meeting as it was starting...and hell yeah, I made my first race. Race #1, Formula IV. Fucking awesome...but with the quick turnaround, I didn't have time to tweak the throttle tube, and it was a bit stiff throughout the race, not letting me get on the throttle to full throttle as quickly as I would have liked coming out of the corners. Oh well, I was racing dammit! haha
Cresting over T3b where I earlier low sided in the morning. Under full throttle trying to keep the front tire down on the ground.
A nice shot apexing T2 I believe.
T2, with Marcus behind me. haha He is very fast, and is the guy who lent me the other set of throttle cables. Thanks dude.
I wanna say thanks to all the guys that helped out. Stan, Conan, Dimitry, Alan, Marcus, Bryan Davis, #517, #791, and everyone else that I may have missed.