08/21/08 Hockenheim (Full Course) Training day Report:

We decided to take Baxley to his very first trackday since his birth 3 weeks ago!!!
: )

Thursday looked to be the nicest day weather-wise and was the only real training day available this week. So we loaded up the van with an extra passenger this time and headed out to Hockenheim to see how it went.

Baxley seemed to be completely unbothered by the noises made by all the bikes (not even the thundering Ducatis nor the single cylinder classic bikes). He did very well for his first track day but kept Yasuyo pretty busy all day.

Art-Motor gave us six 20min sessions throughout the day. The traffic in group 1 was pretty light and everyone seemed to be moving at a pretty good clip. I was trying out a new gearing combo to try and make it down the parabolica without getting stuck bouncing off the rev limiter in 6th. The 16/44 was a bit closer but as I picked up some better lines entering the parabolica, I managed to top out again. I guess I'll have to try another tooth down which would put me nearly back to the stock gearing!

All in all it was a great day for weather and for learning. I did not run a laptimer during the morning sessions but was hoping to extract timing from the onboard video. Unfortuantely the camera was experiencing technical difficulties and I was unable to record any video except a few short moments in the pits.
: (

I ran my lap timer on the final session and managed to pick up some hits. So I was at least able to confirm my previous personal best lap time was bested. My previous best was a 1'59" The final session showed me getting consistent 1'57" and a high 1'56" on the very final lap of the day. I was able to identify a few problem areas that I could hopefully work on next time out to get the times down a bit further.

All in all a good time at the track with the family!

Word...