Pat's Race Report from California Speedway
02/05/2006 Fontana, CA - with WERA West
The off season is over and it's time to start racing again! I
have not been on the track since early December. Tom and I plan on
doing all the AFM and ASMA rounds this year and the occasional CCS and
WERA West rounds. We thought the first rounds of WERA and CCS
would be good tune ups for March.
 I added a Tectronics Quickshifter and new brakes to the 999r. I
had a Dynojet Quickshifter on the the bike and wanted a little more
adjustability. The Tectronics unit had to be spliced into the
stock wiring harness and came with a cool shift lever with a built in
switch. In December it worked great for the first session and quit
working after that. After trying to set it up again on the dyno,
it still did not work properly. I switched back to the Dynojet
Quickshifter for Sundays races. I was lucky enough to get some
Brembo 2-pad Monobloc brake calipers for Christmas from my wife. I
purchased new 108 mm fork lowers from
Moto wheels and
sent my forks to Mark at
Duc Shop to have
them installed. I sourced some Brembo full floating narrow band rotors
from Italy and was ready to go racing.
Tom had some new body work to get painted and his motor freshened up.
Mike bought a new Ducati 999s to prep and break in at the track day.
We also purchased a new to us trailer. This trailer is BIG! It's
32'-0” long and has an 8'-0” livable area in the front and a full work
bench and cabinets. While I was at the sand dunes last weekend,
Tom spent all weekend getting the trailer ready. With the bigger
trailer, Mike was able to come along to do the track day and be the BSR
crew chief on Sunday. It does take us a little longer to get to
where we are going now. Tom has to keep the truck under 70 mph.
 We got to the track around 11 PM and unloaded our bikes into a garage.
California Speedway has garages with power and air for racers included
in the price of a track day or races. It was nice not listening to
generators all weekend. We did have a two stroke pitted close to
us, so it wasn't all quiet.
We were running the AMA track that we raced on last September. My
best time last time, after two days, was a 1:40.2. My goal for
this weekend was to get into the 1:38s. After showing Mike around
the track for a few laps, he passed me and was on his own. During
the day, I was easily able to get into the low 1:38s. It was hard
to get clean laps in, with all the traffic. With the gearing I had
(14-40) I was topped out in sixth gear at the finish line. I also
was experiencing bad head shake in turn 10-11 and on the banking.
I had to back off in these two areas.
After talking with Jason from
Section 8
Superbike on Saturday night, we discussed lowering the rear end and
adding preload to the front. And if all else failed, clamp down on
the steering damper!
I probably get more sore from this track then any other. I just
wanted to get loose during the first
.jpg) practice on Sunday. I put on
new tires, did suspension adjustments and changed the rear sprocket to a
39 tooth. I was able to go faster on the banking with the new
gearing, but still had some head shake. My first race was Heayweight
Twins Superstock. Corey Eaton (very fast AMA racer) was in this
race and just walked away from the rest of the field. I had a back
and forth battle with Greg Freeman (V-Twist from ROGUE and Speedzilla).
Greg was able to take second and I placed third. The race was 8
laps and I was exhausted at the end. I was disappointed with this
race. I was only able to do a 1:39.4 in the race. I was
hoping for low 1:37s.
My next race was Heavyweight Twins Superbike. Kenny Kopecky (WSMC
#1 plate holder) would be in this race. During practice, Kenny was
running solid mid 1:36s. I was hoping I'd be able to stay with him
at the start and have him tow me around. With all the delays and
red flags in the earlier races, it was announced that the races would be
shortened to 4 laps. This played right into my hands. I had
the fastest bike in the field and there was no way I could hang with
Kenny and Corey Eaton for 8 laps. I got my usual bad start and was
in third going into turn one right behind Kenny and Corey. I
stayed within a second until the red flag came out after a lap and a
half. At the restart, another bad start, this time in fourth, but
still close to the lead. After the first lap, the third place
rider on a fast Buell pulled off. I was able to get closer to
Eaton going on the banking. My bike had an easy 30 horsepower on
his Suzuki SV1000 and I was able to pass him before turn one. I
was able to stay in front of him for a lap and a half until I went too
deep in turn 5 and then went braking and downshifting into turn 12 and
didn't release the throttle all the way and ran too wide. By the
time I recovered, Corey passed me and put a little distance on me to
finish a couple of seconds behind Kenny. I was able to do a low
1:37 in the race, A new personal best for me and three seconds faster
than I had in September. The third place was still good for $200
in Ducati contingency. I think with a higher fitness level, 38
tooth rear sprocket and no head shake, I should be able to get into the
1:36s or lower. I wasn't able to hold it wide open going over the
turn 10-11 jump.
It was close to 6 PM after my race and they still had five races to
finish. The last race was actually finished after it was pretty
dark.
I would like to thank my sponsors:
Section 8 Superbike, Duc Shop, Ducati, Speedy Moto, Moto Wheels, Motorex,
Universal Forest Products, Vesrah, Suomy, Sidi, Lockhart Phillips,
Michelin.
Thanks to Tom and Mike for all the help in the pits.
Pat
#468
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