After last weekend, today seemed almost like a vacation. I can’t imagine what I’m going to think when I finally race Pacific again.. all this beautiful buttery-smooth pavement at Portland, Miller and Vegas is definitely spoiling me!
For June, there was an unavoidable conflict in the WMRRA and OMRRA schedules – both organizations landed on the same dates for their race weekend, and neither was able to change its commitment. This left the many riders who compete in both series with a difficult question: Which races should I run, and which should I let slip? I chose to go down south to OMRRA, for while my GSXR-750 is competitive in its classes in WMRRA, it’s dominant in its classes in OMRRA (thanks Fuzzy!) and I’ve got in my sights a class championship.
I wanted to keep this weekend as light as possible on the pocketbook, so I only registered for two classes: Sr. 750 SB and Sr. Open SB. It turned out Sr. Open SB didn’t have enough entries to constitute a separate class and I got bumped up to (regular) Open Superbike, so I actually ended up withdrawing. After last weekend’s endurance race I have almost zero brakes left, and I didn’t feel up to fighting tooth and nail with a 40hp disadvantage for a top-fifteen finish instead of a podium.
I know, heh.. I’m a brat
Sr. 750SB/750SS was the first race up in the morning. I did two practice sessions beforehand to set my tire pressures and reacquaint myself with the track, then went out and gridded up. I was gridded in position F3, near the back of the pack, and to make things worse, I bogged the start! I saw the field taking off and Troy McCrae, my main competition (and also the Pac NW Bridgestone vendor! *shameless plug*) pull away toward turn 1, but thankfully Mike Castro of Fuzimoto built my GSXR into a monster. All I had to do was twist my right hand and.. oops.. see ya Troy It’s because of this fire-breathing beast that Castro got my brand-new R6.. if he can do to it what he did to this bike, that R6 will definitely be something to be reckoned with.
As thirty bikes piled into turn 1, one poor sod got pushed off the outside of the track into the grass, luckily enough keeping it upright. The sight of that caused the whole field to check up and hesitate for a second, though, and that was all I needed to bomb through on the outside and try to make up for my poor start. I made several positions up in each of the next corners, mostly on the exit, making good use of the bike’s power while trying to avoid taxing my barely-present brakes too much. After a lap of that, I settled in and contented myself with roping people in on the straightaways – I was in the lead of the Senior bikes, so as long as I kept that up, any other bikes I passed were just gravy. Eventually I found a pair of bikes I couldn’t simply motor on past – Justin Watkins, #70, and Michael McBrady, #212, both on ZX-6R’s.
I started trying to pick up my pace through the corners and on the brakes, but it was difficult as my pads were so worn I could bring the lever nearly clear to the bar. I finally caught a break when we came up on some lap traffic and they both had to slow for a moment. When I passed the lapper and caught up to them, Justin had just passed Michael, and we were headed down the front straight. I drafted past Michael and began going toe-to-toe with Justin. Several times in the next few laps I would manage to draft past him along the front straight, but he would get me back on the brakes into T4. Both of us were ramping our game up rapidly, hoping to pass and gap the other, but neither of us could.
Finally, on the white-flag lap, I drafted past him coming into T1 and then squeezed my brake lever for dear life, praying that my brakes would work.. wouldn’t you know, this time they did. So well, in fact, that according to Justin, he almost rear-ended me I kept the lead however, and around T3 we came up on another lapper. Knowing that this was where I was weak and not wanting to give up anything, I took a very tight, defensive line into T4 and ended up stuffing the lapper pretty hard, who in turn spooked and stood his bike up, nearly pushing Justin off the track! I felt a little bad about that but wasn’t about to stop and apologize, as Justin was already on the gas and was getting a better drive than I was. Thank you again Fuzzy for the motor in my bike though, as I was able to stay ahead of him down the power-hungry back straight and then kung-fu-grip the brake lever again for turns 8 and 9. I ripped open the throttle for the last drag race down the front straight, and crossed the finish line about half a second ahead to clinch 1st place in Sr. 750 Superbike, and 8th overall in 750SS (which actually went to Justin, as I wasn’t technically in the same race as him), with a best lap of 1:11.4.
The rest of the day I spent wandering around the pits, helping out where I could, and generally just getting a sunburn Kudos go out to OMRRA and their staff for putting on a great race weekend, and as always a million thanks go to all my sponsors, for without them I could not go out there and do all this. MorePower Racing, Adrenaline Freaks Track Days, Highway 66 Motorsports and Bridgestone, the best damn tire out there, Studio819 Photography, PowerStands Racing, Race Tech Suspension, Vortex, Motorex Fluids, Pipercross Filters, Junior Monkey Design and last but never least, PNWRIDERS.COM, the best damn community I’ve ever been a part of. All of these sponsors are what make racing possible for me, so show your appreciation and support them like they support me!!
