Well, my first ever “proper” race weekend has come and gone – I raced the Laguna Seca round of AHRMA with two bikes: my CB175 in the Moto Le Mans class (more on that later) and my Kramer 690 in Sound of Singles 1. Here’s some footage from one of those races so you can see how it went…
With regards to the Kramer, I ended up placing 4th in both the Saturday and Sunday race – I missed the podium by .4 of a second in the 1st race and .055 of a second in the 2nd race. Pretty heartbreaking, but I truly enjoyed the experience and can’t wait to get back to it…once I save up some money because racing is expensive. So here’s a condensed (5-minute) version of my second race in Sound of Singles 1 (Unlimited-displacement single-cylinder four-strokes):
With the benefit of hindsight, here’s some thoughts for you (most with timestamps to refer to the video):
- I’m wearing an orange t-shirt as that’s what AHRMA requires new racers to wear. I did the “New Racers School” on Friday to get my AHRMA license and because of that I had to wear an orange shirt (provided by AHRMA) so that other racers knew that I was a potential liability.
- 0:04: the race start was done in multiple waves. The 1st wave is Sound of Thunder 1, which is bigger/faster bikes: “Unlimited-displacement four-stroke single-, twin- or three-cylinder machines; twin-rotor rotary engines and any eligible Open Two-Stroke machine. Turbocharging or supercharging is permitted only on single-cylinder machines.” You can see someone in Wave 1 (orange KTM straight ahead of me) jump the start and I let that get into my head, I wanted to make sure I didn’t make the same mistake and I ended up coming off the line timid, then over-correcting when I realized my mistake so the front wheel comes up a bit and I lose some acceleration. I started in second position but by the time I got into the first corner I was in fourth (I would eventually find out there was another reason for the better starts of some of my competitors, but more on that later). Either way, I definitely need to practice race starts more as it’s something I had never done prior to the weekend.
- 0:34: I end up settled in behind my buddy (and track/racing mentor of sorts), Nic de Sena of Ultimate Motorcycling. Nic has been a wonderful friend through this process of getting into road racing – he took me to my first track day after I bought my Ninja 400 track bike (which I eventually sold) and showed me the ropes, and he’s always had advice for me at the different tracks we end up meeting at for press events. I definitely would be worse at this if it wasn’t for Nic.
- 0:53: the faster guys in Wave 2 start catching up to slower guys in Wave 1. It’s an interesting experience because optimal race lines go out the window – you’re just trying to make split-second decisions on where to go based on what the person in front of you is doing. The image below is from Turn 2 at 1:45 – I hate that line but as you’ll see in the video I had to go outside earlier to pass someone else and I wasn’t going to dive on the inside of the Ducati 1098 so I just kept it on the outside (where there’s patches in the pavement) and tried to make the pass stick.
- 2:10: I see now that I have a bad habit when I try to pass bigger bikes. I frequently try to run it wide to get a peek but that only makes sense if you can outdrive someone out of the corner and there’s no way that’s happening against a Ducati V2, especially when it’s equipped with a Termi exhaust which costs about half of my entire bike. I need to learn to stay right behind and then make the pass on the brakes as I do a few seconds later.
- 2:35: I think this was my favorite move of the race, being able to pass a twin-cylinder Kramer on the outside of Rainey and then sliding in through the inside of Triumph 765 (which sounded amazing) before the next corner.
- 2:53: this is where it gets weird a bit. This was a six lap race and someone starts to pull off at the end of lap 5 (I assume they had a mechanical issue). I make a pass around someone in a different class in my attempt to stay with the gentleman on an orange Kramer who is third in class, but he got distracted as someone else in front of him coincidentally came in a lap early as well. He may have thought that the race ended early but he let off the throttle and briefly signaled that he was coming into pit. I let off the throttle a little bit to make sure he didn’t come across the track and take me out, but once I saw he realized his mistake I had enough momentum to snag third place.
- 3:20: for a very brief moment in time, the orange Kramer shows me a wheel (I didn’t see it while racing, I only noticed it watching the video footage back later)
- 3:30: As soon as I was in third place, adrenaline took over and I got jittery. I was so amped about the possibility of getting a podium that I lost my cool a bit and started running wide on some corners (especially Turns 3 and 4). I was so annoyed with myself after 4 that I forced myself to relax just a bit, which helped. But my inexperience was definitely showing and I’m pretty embarassed about it. I know that practice will make perfect, I just need to put myself in that situation more.
- 4:13: orange Kramer shows me a wheel again, and I have a brief moment of “am I going to let him have this (knowing that I likely wasn’t going to be able to pass him before the end of the race) or am I going to not be a wuss and try to outbrake him?” I was rather proud of my response. I also know I’m pretty good around 9 and 10 so I felt like the only other shot he’d have to get me was Turn 11, which I know I is a weakness of mine. So I intentionally tried to hang out in the middle of the track approaching 11 with the hope of preventing him from getting me on the inside – this pushed me out a little wider on corner exit than I would have liked.
- 4:48: Approaching the finish line, I start to think that I’ve made the podium when I start to hear another bike coming up on me…and then I get passed right before the line:
Fuck. I couldn’t believe it, and saying I was devastated would be putting it mildly. I didn’t think I had screwed up the last corner that badly – what did I do wrong? I stewed in my incompetence for the cooldown lap but I was excited to give the orange Kramer a thumbs up when I passed him in the pits. He raced fairly and made my experience much better. I didn’t have time to talk to him as I was up soon for my CB175 race, but later in the day I was able to track him down and have a quick conversation.
He started by asking why I had the “newbie” shirt on, which I found flattering. I explained that it was my first ever race weekend and he had kind things to say about that. It became immediately evident that this gentleman (Jay K. out of Louisiana) was a very nice guy, which made it much harder for me to be upset about him kicking my ass. But I thought I’d stretch my luck by asking if he had any advice for me: what did I do wrong in the last corner, how did I lose the podium? He sort of chuckled and told me that it wasn’t a skill issue…he had a big bore kit in his Kramer! That softened the sting of defeat quite a bit, though of course I’m now wondering if I should order a big bore kit for myself. Did I mention that racing was expensive?
To wrap things up, I’d just like to say that my first experience with AHRMA was wonderful, and I’ve definitely been bitten by the racing bug – I’m hoping to be out at Barber in October to race again with the series. AHRMA is pretty fantastic as there’s lots of cool machinery but the most important thing is that the people are wonderful. Every single person I met was incredibly kind to a newbie who looked like a goof with an orange t-shirt on, and I sincerely hope that some of you get inspired to try this for yourself. If you have any questions, PLEASE let me know as I’d love to see you out on the track with me.
Finally: special thanks to my friend and Iconic’s technician, Olly (who raced his Honda NSF250R and his Yamaha TZ250 and ended up placing 4th in Sound of Singles 3 and Open Two Stroke respectively). I was woefully unprepared for certain parts of racing as this was my first time and he sacrificed some of his own time and mental health to make sure I didn’t screw things up too badly. I’m very lucky to have some amazing friends.
See you at the next one!
