PMCC Summer Series Final Round

We had fantastic weather for the weekend at Manfeild park in Feilding. Feilding is definitely “Friendly Feilding” everyone we met were so pleasant. We set off on Friday for the six and a half hour drive with my self and Blayes sharing the driving in two hour stints.

No dramas on the way down. We stayed at a little bed and breakfast run by Kathie and Vernon at Oak Tree Bungalow Bed & breakfast, which is a short walk from the track. Convenient, comfortable and very amiable hosts. It made a plesant change from sleeping in the van, and we get a hot shower and a cooked breakfast as well.

Saturday we were testing and Blayes was getting to know the track. For some unexplained reason the bike decided it did not want to live up to its previous horsepower performance as recorded on the dyno and was so down on power that even SV 650’s were able to pass it on the straights. Although Blayes was somewhat frustrated we decided to concentrate on race craft especially in the area of entry and exit points to bends. On the forth session selecting a false neutral mid corner resulted in an off and a punctured raidiator. We performed a temporary fix on the radiator and added a detent wheel kit to our shopping list which will stop this from happening in the future.

Saturday evening we headed off into feilding in search of a decent resturant and quickly realised that this was not a priority in this part of the country, we ended up at Murray’s Irish bar and enjoyed an excellent burger in a pleasant and freindly atmosphere.

Sunday we were at the track early and met up with a number of fellow racers and met some new faces, the atmmosphere was relaxed, friendly with an underlying good willed competitiveness. Blayes qualified with adiquate times of 1.21 which he was not too pleased with. After some suspension tweeks and invaluable advice from Simon Banks and Daniel Kempthorn, Blayes was able to bring his lap times down by four seconds which was amazing considering the bike was running like crap. Well done Blayes and thanks a million to Simon and Daniel. We also ran with a Metzler K1 tyre instead of the K2 on the rear which gave a lot more grip in the prevailing conditions, thanks once again to Daniel who supplied it and to Scotty for tyre changing facilities and much appreciated help..

Thanks to all the people who helped out. The wonderful thing about this sport is the camaraderie amongst rivals, great friends off track and adversaries on. Of course there is the inevitable miss information spread about but this is all part of the fun, however when anyone is in need of genuine help, it is never too far away even for newbies like us.

Blayes finally achieved a 10th place in F2 and a 9th place in BEARS partaking in only three rounds.

Now we have the off season for winter testing, bike set up and the job of raising sponsorship and putting a team together for the next seasons campaign.

Bring it on.

Pacific Motorcycle Club Summer Series Round Three

Seeing my young son go out on track in his first ever race aboard a very fast bike for a 16 year old rookie was stressful to say the least, however he gave a very good account of him self. After open practice on Saturday which started off with Blayes running off track at turn 1 he adjusted his mental approach and by Sunday road with consideration and intelligence. His starts were terrific, from the back of the grid to making up six places by turn 1. He brought the bike home in all of the six races and by the end of the day cut eight seconds off his lap time.

We met some fantastic people all willing to help especially Sloan Frost, who took time out to show Blayes the best lines to take and what gear he should be in, also some points on the bike set up, his advice was invaluable and certainly had a huge positive effect on Blayes’s ride. Many thanks Sloan. We also met a guy called Scotty who was very helpful with our bike set up and has even lent us a race shift for evaluation, thanks Scotty.

All in all a great first meet.