Should Have Ridden to Torrey

[BobFV1]

My wife and I had been planning to ride up to Torrey together for months and had our route planned and hotel reservations made, then week before last I was asked to attend an air show in Europe and make a conference presentation. In exchange for more time off later in the Summer, I accepted and spent the week in London and Geneva while you all were in or on the way to Torrey, Would rather have been with you all, but it wasn't a total loss, I was able to get my hotel deposits back.

So in order for it not to be a total loss, I got home Friday night 5/20 and spent the day Saturday tweaking my ADG (that's my Ducati's nickname) for the track on Sunday (yesterday). Well, off to the track I went at 0530 on Sunday - the one time a year my group goes to Firebird's main track and my personal first time on that track.

http://www.aztrackday.com/tracks.asp#FB_main

Firebird Main is a quarter mile dragstrip with a comeback of sweeper turns set up in the partking lot behind the grandstands. The drag strip is a quarter-mile strip which gives the main straightaway a length of about 5/8 mile of wide-open asphault and concrete with cement walls and grandstands on both sides. Since the beginning of the drag strip is slick concrete to facilitate the dragsters, coming out of the final turn is particuilarly technical because you go from sticky asphault to slick concrete at speed while accellerating into a wide-open drag strip with nothing but concrete on either side. Cool.

So in the pre-race briefing they were very emphatic pointing out that the track is very slick, that you join the drag strip/straightaway from a hot pit lane with bikes passing you at 130+ miles per hour, and they made especially clear that we all would hit max speed on our bikes on the straightaway and we would all have to face a decreasing radius turn at the end.

Now - I've spent a lot of time in nerve-wracking scenarios. During my time in government service my stints included two years in Beirut during the civil war there, and I have done consulting work with companies in high-risk areas who have had their facilities bombed and personnel kidnappped and assasasinated. I was arrested by the Panamanian authorities once during the revolution there, and another time eluded their guardia nacional on a high-speed chase through Panama City. Ride a motorcycle around a track, no problem.

I was signed up for the full day - eight sessions, in the "Superstreet" group, which is a faster group which allows passing at all points on the track. I am running my ADG pretty much stock, with extremely sticky Michelin Pilot RACE tires and some modifications to the sprockets to beef up my low end.

So first session. No problemmo. We had a little briefing from the chief instructor, an experienced and mature MSF instructor and racer - very nice guy. Out on track. It's warm and my Pilot Race tires heat up quickly. I take about three laps to get the feel of the turns, especially the slick concrete at the start of the drag strip - no problem, in fact my caution found me hitting the limiter in 1st and 2nd gear the first couple of times around.

In the back of the grandstands is a sea of asphault laid out in a big, sweeping turn called the "carousel". I went in to the carousel good and hot, but within my capabilities. Right before the apex, a kid on a liter riceburner made an very close pass and then rolled off the throttle. I leaned over all the way and took an inside line on him and I suddenly heard one of the most sickening things I had ever heard. A dull thud of plastic and metal on asphault, sounding like it was right next to my left ear. Someone was on the track in a spectacular high-speed crash within inches of my left side. I could not look down or back, because my bike was all the way over and I was using all of my "traction $10.00" right then. The sickening thing was the plastic and metal thud continued. The bike and rider were on the ground sliding next to me for the longest time. It was so strange - you think of a wreck as a sudden smash and an impact - this was a long accident - it kept evolving. I just kept going - never looked back. In the next turn the track was red-flagged and we came off. Apparently the lead instructor had been coming up behind me in to the carousel and lost his front end while braking and low-sided it, dislocating his shoulder and ending his day on the track. From my perspective, I was sure someone had died and thought that I hadn't come that far from being the one.

I wouldn't lie, I was fairly shook up, especially when I found out that the most experienced guy on the track had just bought it within inches of me. Nonetheless, I went out for my second session next hour - not too bad, got up to 120-125 each pass of the dragstrip (hey - it's just a 2 valve, air-cooled twin, what do you expect?) Most of the Jap bikes passed me in the straight and then held me up in the turns. Second session was red flagged near the end of the session when a guy ran wide into the hay bails near the finish of the back curvy part.

It was heating up. On the third timed session, about less than half way through, two bikes collided in one of the rear curves - as I passed through under a waving yellow, one rider was flat on his back and the ambuance ws rolling and the other rider was sitting up.

At this point it was well over 100 degrees at about 1130. I decided that I would just run the last of the morning four timed sessions and forego the afternoon. Out we went. I figured all the bad luck we could have was already behind us. Boy was I wrong.

Out we went. I started towards the back of the group and had a few serene laps all by myself on the track. After about 5 or six laps I started my braking at the end of the 125 mph straight section. Right as I started my braking, about eight riceburning literbikes came by me in a pack and all tried to out-brake each other going in to the decreaser. Suddenly, I was at the rear of a pack of hot dogs going on to a crowded, technical turn with too much speed. Of course the inevitable happenned. It happenned right in front of me - a blue literbike was not leaned over far enough and his front wheel clipped the rear wheel of the guy in front of him, who rode on. The blue bike went down.

It all seems like slow motion to me as I think back on it. The rider and the bike went in opposite directions, the rider to my left and back, the bike to my right and continuing forward. The rider's limbs flailed wildly as he tumbled with dull thuds on the track. Oil leaked out of the bike as it continued straight across the curve and the oil ignited from the sparking - there were actual flames on the track and below the gas tank of the bike - it went all the way in front of me and accross my path to the dirt infield and I planned my escape up on the dirt to the right of it, but I was able to slow enough to get around the oily mess to the left - I was already well past the fallen rider.

Red flags, ambulances, tow trucks. Then we finished the session - careful where the oil spill had been.

As I said - I decided to forego the afternoon sessions. I'm 47 years old. I came home, took off my leathers, jumped in my swimming pool, and just spent most of my afternoon there - thinking about what lessons I could take with me from the day. I have ridden many years and all kinds of bikes and had all kinds of training, but I definitely learned even more about motorcycling yesterday. About as much as I ever want to learn in a single day.

[UHGORDO]

I guess that puts a new meaning to the words...CRASH COURSE.

See my post in the Member's Section about selling my R...your descriptive words really spell out what I don't want to have happen to me.

Now imagine that crash taking place on the road somewhere with traffic all around????

Scary and not very pretty.

Thanks for the post...

Dave

[1MPH]

Nice write up Bob. Either your guardian angels were working overtime or
your own experience and skills were. Nice that you came out of it O.K.

[wncbmw]

I have never gone to a track day or a riding school. I would like to some day. Friends of mine are at one as I type. But your experience confirms my gut feeling that I need to go to a controlled school and ride with the slow riders!