Got to get that monkey off my back!!!
It hasn't been my year up to now. Somehow I've had back luck every time out:(
The annual Ducati Club Days at Assen were next after Oschersleben. We took the new and improved '04 Aprilia RSV Mille Factory out for a spin and all was well. The bike needed some powercommander adjustments, but it ran smooth and fast. Unfortunately the new 1098 Ducati's are allowed to race in the Sound of Thunder class, these beast are unbeatable with an old RSV. But I was able to nibble of 2 seconds off my lap record on that bike, so I was happy to qualify 5th.
But then on raceday, after two weeks of complete sunshine, it started raining. And somehow, the Dunlop raintires we had on the bike just didn't work. I dropped like a stone in the first race, no traction at all. So I pulled into the pits. DNF in race one:(
We made major setup adjustments for the second race, which helped a bit, but people were still riding around me in the corners. I mean, I AM A GOOD RAIN RIDER, so this really pissed me off. I still got to finish 12th, but the day would have been a lot better if the damn rain would have just stayed away.
Anyway, two weeks later at the same track but this time for the Dutch Superbikes Championship on our Suzuki GSXR 1000. We bought a spare engine (just in case) after the Oschersleben disaster. Unfortunately, we needed it. In the first free practice the engine broke again. As allways, a valve broke off. What the hell is wrong with that damn engine????
So we put in our new engine, and it ran like a beauty! First qualifing went really well, I improved my personal best at Assen by 0.5 seconds and qualified 9th. We experimented a bit with the tires for the second practice, this worked out pretty well I just kept on running into traffic in the last 6 laps. So I wasn't able to improve my time and dropped to a respectable 13th position on the grid.
As you can guess, raceday was a disaster. This time the sun stayed out, but some FOOL crashed right into me in the first lap! Can you believe that? What an idiot!!!! The crash pictures are pretty awesome though.
This weekend I'll have a retry at Assen. But there's 90% chance of rain on saturday and sunday!:( So I hope we'll have some good rain tires...
All the best,
Politics
The annual Ducati Club Days at Assen were next after Oschersleben. We took the new and improved '04 Aprilia RSV Mille Factory out for a spin and all was well. The bike needed some powercommander adjustments, but it ran smooth and fast. Unfortunately the new 1098 Ducati's are allowed to race in the Sound of Thunder class, these beast are unbeatable with an old RSV. But I was able to nibble of 2 seconds off my lap record on that bike, so I was happy to qualify 5th.
But then on raceday, after two weeks of complete sunshine, it started raining. And somehow, the Dunlop raintires we had on the bike just didn't work. I dropped like a stone in the first race, no traction at all. So I pulled into the pits. DNF in race one:(
We made major setup adjustments for the second race, which helped a bit, but people were still riding around me in the corners. I mean, I AM A GOOD RAIN RIDER, so this really pissed me off. I still got to finish 12th, but the day would have been a lot better if the damn rain would have just stayed away.
Anyway, two weeks later at the same track but this time for the Dutch Superbikes Championship on our Suzuki GSXR 1000. We bought a spare engine (just in case) after the Oschersleben disaster. Unfortunately, we needed it. In the first free practice the engine broke again. As allways, a valve broke off. What the hell is wrong with that damn engine????
So we put in our new engine, and it ran like a beauty! First qualifing went really well, I improved my personal best at Assen by 0.5 seconds and qualified 9th. We experimented a bit with the tires for the second practice, this worked out pretty well I just kept on running into traffic in the last 6 laps. So I wasn't able to improve my time and dropped to a respectable 13th position on the grid.
As you can guess, raceday was a disaster. This time the sun stayed out, but some FOOL crashed right into me in the first lap! Can you believe that? What an idiot!!!! The crash pictures are pretty awesome though.
This weekend I'll have a retry at Assen. But there's 90% chance of rain on saturday and sunday!:( So I hope we'll have some good rain tires...
All the best,
Politics