June 5-7 2009 European Speer Championships @ Magny Cours, France

Friday June 5th
Weather was looking great for the day. Vinny, Eli, Cy, Jaz and myself all signed in Thursday night and were ready to go for group practices Friday morning. We all head out to try and familiarize ourselves with the circuit. Magny Cours is filled with only slight elevation changes, but those combined with decreasing radius corners and cambers make it a little more tricky to learn than expected.

The Speer-Cup talent field was deep with 199 riders attempting to qualify for various classes. Top of the time sheet was a 1’47” followed by a group of 1’48”s and 1’49”s!!! Fastest 600 from Friday qualifying was a 1’51”.

Myself and most of the American crew were floating around the 2’00” mark. Not quite fast enough to put us in the podium running by very respectable for our first time there.
Thanks to our various video sponsors (big thanks to the Tachyon guys from me) we were able to run 4 or 5 different onboard cams throughout the qualifying sessions.

Rich’s comments for the day:
“Good weather, Great Friends, No work and a world-class circuit… What more could one ask for? I was hoping to be up to speed a little bit faster, but the forecast seemed to be calling for wet conditions the rest of the weekend anyway.”

Saturday June 6th
Rain-shine-rain-shine-rain! Today was a road-racers’ worst nightmare. Conditions were changing every hour. The morning qualifying sessions were mostly wet which made it impossible to improve upon Friday’s times. Unfortunately that translated into most of the American crew ending up a bit farther back on the grid than we would have liked.

The GP2 (basically everything but 1000cc machines allowed) race was held in what I would consider mixed conditions. Still a little too damp for DOTs, but not really standing water enough for rains. Then again, judging from my finish wets could have been the way to go. Cy and Vinny were on DOTs and after the warm up lap decided it best to not participate. Eli lined up with rains and I took my spot on row 7 with DOTs. Again, my reasoning being, I was taking a gamble that the track would dry during the long race and full grid of bikes, allowing me to make a push later in the race with the DOTs. I thought it a fairly safe bet based on the previous weather scenarios. I didn’t count on most of the grid not bothering to show up for the race and the skies to stay cloudy!?!?! Ultimately I lost the gamble, read on to find out how.

I got a fairly decent launch but couldn’t really do anything with the positions I earned off the line as the DOTs were moving around a bit under me. I managed to hold off the pursuing traffic for a few laps, but eventually my pace was not fast enough for the rain mounted competition. I was losing positions every lap. Eli rocketed by early on in the race, only for me to pass him later after he lost it on the brakes into the hairpin and he had to retire back to the pits. Eli was on pace for a very decent finish. I found myself eventually getting engulfed by the lapping leaders and got sucked into the hairpin a bit faster than I had previously. I got on the hooks a bit more than usual and felt the front cross up as the tire hydroplaned over the pavement. It was a split second after that realization, before the bike was on its side sliding from the 150m marker and through the corner grass and gravel to come to rest near the wall. A bit frustrated with my own mistake, I ran to the bike to try and continue, but the throttle cable housing had broken forcing an early retirement and loss of championship points.

Rich’s comments for the day:
“I took a gamble on the weather during the GP2 race and just lost out. My mistake, but I’ll try to ‘man-up’ for the next GP2 race in the Czech Republic, so bring-it!”

Sunday June 7th
Sunday brought more of the same weather conditions. The ESC600 sprint race was scheduled for earlier in the afternoon and the weather was breaking. At this point most of us in the American camp were actually wishing for rain, since we hadn’t gotten much dry time on the track. Mother Nature disagreed with us (again) and pulled the clouds to let the sun shine down. The 600 race will be a dry race! Once again, due to the poor qualifying sessions from Friday afternoon, I found myself 3 rows from the back of the grid. Starting position is usually irrelevant to me as I normally find a way to squeeze into the top 10 by turn 1 from anywhere on the grid.

Waiting in my box for lights to go out was a bit tricky after a long delay caused by a straggling front qualifier. Eventually everyone was set and we all watched the red lights. The lights dimmed and the bulb filaments probably still had a tiny bit of electricity in them, as the entire grid leapt forward. I managed to find a few holes heading into turn 1 and a few more in the transition between 1 and 2. A few of the front runners got tangled in the brake zone for the hairpin and I muscled through the low speed corner on the inside claiming a few more spots putting me up into 8th place! Man, if ever race were a Superpole, I’d do pretty great!

Finding myself in the top 10 I was trying to match pace that I had not run all weekend. It was a bit of information overload trying to learn lines, brake points, and turn-in points from the leaders, while trying to maintain momentum. I just couldn’t find the pace needed to hang on and lap by lap I lost positions until finally ending up 11th. I did secure 10points toward the ESC600 championship so hopefully I can ‘man-up’ for the next ESC600 race as well and build on those points!

After reviewing the onboard from the weekend, I was able to identify my weak points and strengths. We’ll get some testing/training done to work on the weaknesses and build on our strengths before the Czech Republic round next month.

Thanks to everyone who participated and/or helped during this weekend. It was a challenging weekend for sure, but we all came out much better having survived it! A special thanks goes out to all my sponsors for helping to keep us competitive:

• Tachyon – Best extreme cam on the market!
• PowerStands – Racing Inspired, built for performance
• Traxxion Dynamics
• Vortex – Trusted by Champions
• Leo Vince
• DynoJet
• South Central Race Center – the best source for Bridgestones
• On Any Moto

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