NBT- I'm going racing 😳

[David]

Go for it! But I do think that the front mudguard rails are a little OTT.

[weeksy]

You got wets Rich?

[Tricky]

You got wets Rich?

Oh yes and they are coming with me this weekend albeit I'm anticipating not needing them ( thought power can be a powerful thing, umm I think )

[Skub]

It tidied up really well. Sterling work,old bean.

[ChrisW]

Looks alright!

Have fun.

[crust]

I like that

satin black paint job, mandlebars < well 'ard

[Tricky]

Well, although the forecast for the shakedown track day was looking to be a dry day, it of course absoloutely hoofed it down the day before ( Friday), and this was the van when I jumped into it at 7 am yesterday



And what I saw when I got to the track at 15 minutes later



Ice everywhere!
I was nearly on my arse just stepping out of the van, and the big surprise was that even at that time, the paddock was absolutely full, with all the garages rammed , wasn’t expecting that.



But I managed to get some space in a garage, msged @Dodgy69 to let him know where I was ( he’s proper nails riding there in this weather ) and pulled the bike out of the van and put some tyre warmers on it- Brrr!


Perhaps unsurprisingly, the start got delayed a bit to 10am to let the salt ( seriously, they salted to the track to thaw it out ) do its stuff- this how things looked ar 08:30ish, just before the briefing






The first session was decidedly slippy, but the sun had come through and things warmed up and dried out nicely throughout the day, albeit there were offs and stoppages in almost every session- we had fun though
As for the bike, well, it failed noise testing first time around - 107dB with baffle out, which I think must have been an erroneous reading, as it really doesn’t seem that loud to me and reduced to 99 with the tiniest ( it’s only approx 2” long) and unrestrictive baffle.
But with that sorted, I headed out with Dodgy for our first session trying to remember RACE SHIFT!, and I have to say, apart from having the slipperiest seat known to man ( probably not helped by me wearing brand new virginal leathers and me riding like a (slow) granny, first impressions were that the bike seemed good.
The track was still pretty wet, with big chunks of road salt over every corner and a fair bit of the straights so it was very much steady as we go, but so far so good.

When we got in I gave the seat a thorough soaking and scrub with brake cleaner, and also moved the stompgrips as far forward as I could from the ridiculous place I’d stuck them to try and get at least a little bit of my leg in contact with them.




TBH they still aren’t really a lot of use, but this tank just doesn’t really seem the right shape to be able to grip with your knees
Anyway, along with that, I also had a good check over it to make sure nothing had come loose and no fluids were escaping anywhere, all was good

As dodgy said in the trackdays thread, things started drying out and warming up a fair bit as the sun did its stuff, I started to work out which way the track went and really started enjoying myself and the bike- it is far better and a lot more fun than I was expecting it to be.
By the end of the day, although I’m still woefully slow there, I was absolutely loving the bike- it turns so fast, the motor although not over-endowed with power, is an absolute peach - fuels perfectly, really screams, the gearbox is effortless, and the brakes with my newly added M1000RR master cylinder were spot on – loads of power and really good feel

I’d only very roughly set the static sag on the (brand new but built for a CBR600RR ) YSS rear shock, and set the compression and rebound to the middle (15 out of 30 click) settings when I’d built it, and guessed at where to put the forks in the yokes, maybe as I start going quicker I’ll find some limitations and start experimenting but as far as I went, it was brilliant.
Very very quick steering but completely stable everywhere, and as anyone who knows Oulton will know, there are some fast ballsy corners there- am thinking Cascades and Island particularly.

Nothing fell off, came loose, or went pop so all in all was as good as I could have hoped for very happy with how it went- and this bike is just the best ever glove warmer




Oh, and I also did a (highly scientific) fuel consumption check too



( For anyone interested, I can confirm that n the only full session we got, which was mid-afternoon, it consumed between 4 and 5 lites of Esso Super )


The oil still looks crystal clear ( I changed it after the dyno sesh), so the bike will get a clean over the next couple of days to get the salt off it, another cursory check of a few fastners and I might strip/repaint the calipers, but that'll be it- next outing will be in two weeks time for a wobble around Castle Coombe to get the rubber stamp on my race license, then two weeks after that it's race day!

[Skub]

The heart of a lion riding in those conditions/temps,Tricky.

I felt cold reading it.

[weeksy]

Brrrr, crazy lads, proper crazy!

[KungFooBob]

My racing fuel measure was better than yours, cos mine was a Snap-on!

[mangocrazy]

You're a braver man than me, Gunga Din. I'd have taken one look outside and headed back to bed...

[Tricky]

You're a braver man than me, Gunga Din. I'd have taken one look outside and headed back to bed...

@Dodgy69 was the really unhinged one- the mad fucker rode to the TD and rode home afterwards!

[Tricky]

My racing fuel measure was better than yours, cos mine was a Snap-on!

That is so Gucci compared to mine, I feel a re-design coming on.....

[mangocrazy]

You're a braver man than me, Gunga Din. I'd have taken one look outside and headed back to bed...

@Dodgy69 was the really unhinged one- the mad fucker rode to the TD and rode home afterwards!

Yeah, that's above and beyond the call of insanity...

[Skub]

@Dodgy69 was the really unhinged one- the mad fucker rode to the TD and rode home afterwards!

I bet he was really holed up in a hotel just around the corner.

[Dodgy69]

was a bloody cold ride up in the morning, about 45 minutes. Little finger right hand was not happy. Heated grips are my friend . Ride home was fine.

Was a great day in the end and a very successful first test for the red bandit. Good luck @Tricky on your next visit to Oulton in a few weeks.

[Dodgy69]

Page 5...

[weeksy]

pits are fine, there's often an entry fee for coming to races of about a Tenner i think.

[Tricky]

Also - can one just wander into the pits area at Oulton if one comes in as a normal spectator?
I realised that it's years since I went there as a normal fee paying member of the public. Are the pits accessible?

And the last time I saw Tricky we were both naked in the showers, I'm not sure I'll recognise him with his clothes on

Be good to see you again if you do make it, and yeah, the showers, I remember... I'm not sure what the facilities are like at Oulton in that respect, but maybe we could check them out- you were a good looking chap as I remember

[Tricky]

Just a little update as ooo-err day approaches - Today I completed the ACU CTC rider training assessment thing day via NGCC at Castle Combe.

The weather wasn’t ideal in the morning when I unloaded the bike…







But thankfully, the morning was classroom stuff and the sort of exam ( impossible to fail unless you are seriously special IMO ) at the end, and by the time we made it out onto the track at lunchtime, it was almost completely dry.

There were 20 of us there, a fair mixture, and I reckon it spanned four of the five generally accepted marketing demographics, and included two 16 YOs
Four or five were using road-legal bikes, the rest on their intended race bikes, just three of us on Bandits.
Anyway, we did three short-ish sessions, two were follow-the-instructor with the second sesh a bit faster, then the third was do your own thing, and then three race starts ( or single lap races as I would class them), and it all came flooding back to me- it is of course not a race, and lots didn’t treat it as such but some did and wow- that waiting for the lights ( or flag in the olden days ) and the mad dash to the first corner had it all flooding back to me , it is absolutely brilliant and I really can’t think of any drug that comes close for me, ( and I’ve done most over the years.... )
Loved it, and loved Castle Combe, even though I’m sure it’s grown another 2 or 3 chicanes since I was last there 30-odd years ago.

Am pretty sure I am going to have my arse handed to me ( lots of experienced Bandit boys there doing the ACU test day that this was running within, and just about all of them seemed to have two bikes … ), but am also sure I’m going to enjoy the race experience, wherever I end up finishing

Am excited and scared in equal measure for my first race in two weeks, can't wait!