OMRRA – June 26th & 27th 2010 - Portland International Raceway
Front Straight PIR June 27th 2010
Race Report
The second round of the OMRRA race season got off to a good start. We had time before the weekend to customize the fuel mapping for the updated race fuel and the motor felt solid up to red line. In the morning practice, I made some adjustments to the pre-load on the front forks that helped the handling in the middle of the high speed corners. I was putting in some fast laps during practice and was laying down lap times about a half second faster than my competitors. I was really looking forward to the races.
Then during the last practice session after setting my 3 fastest laps, the crankshaft had a critical failure and split in two. As soon as the motor died, I pulled in the clutch and coasted around the back straight and off the track. It is amazing how fast a good motor can turn into rubble.
While pushing the bike back to the pits, I had time to consider my next step. I had no idea what the problem was or if it was something that could be fixed. I didn’t think about it long and was loading the bike into my truck as soon as I had my leathers off. I didn’t want to call the weekend over just yet and my sponsor, Vicious Cycle is about 5 minutes from the track. I was headed there as fast as possible to see if there was anything that we could do to salvage the weekend. The clock was ticking though and my first race was in two hours, my second race was in two and a half.
It didn’t take much discussion at Vicious Cycle before it was decided that we should install the backup motor and get back to the track as fast as possible. The backup motor was pulled out of the bike at the end of last year. It had 3 racing yrs on it and hadn’t been tuned up for the same period.
We didn’t know if we could replace the motor in time for either of my races, but we tried. We had the motor swapped, the bike loaded into the truck and I was on my way in just under two and a half hours. I called the track to find out where they were in the schedule to determine if I had any chance at making my second race. No dice! I missed the track crossing by 5 minutes and had to sit in my truck and watch the race I was supposed to be in.
Middleweight Superbike – 3rd place
On Sunday, my only race was the Middleweight Superbike race. We had the backup motor in the bike. It’s a supersport built motor with 3 racing years on it since it’s last tune up. The fuel mapping was custom to the motor we pulled out of the bike and was running really rich for this motor. I was down on power by about 10% and I could really feel it. There was nothing coming out of the corners. This race was about getting the best result possible when things go bad.
The race started and I slotted in behind Dustin going into Turn 1. I followed him around for a lap or two but could not keep up. I didn’t have anything for him today and was holding onto 2nd place. On lap 4 Devon passed me going into turn 1. I was afraid to follow him for very long because I wasn’t sure I could keep up. As soon as I could, I passed him back going into turn 4. We traded places about a half dozen time for the next three laps. I was determined to be in the lead after the last turn. I had tried several times to draft by Devon coming out of the last turn but as soon as I was out of this draft, I would start slipping back behind him. If I was behind him after the last turn, I had no chance.
After a few laps with me block passing Devon at every chance possible, Devon decided to just let me lead until the last lap. When I saw the white flag I put tired to put in my best lap but Devon had me covered and drafted by me at the finish line to take second place by .002 of a second.
Not the kind of weekend I was hoping for.
