bikerchris

Hi Admin - as no one has responded to this thread, you're more than welcome to delete it in the interests of a tidy forum!

kawdude636 - lol thanks for the info on what you do, sounds quite a bit for me! I'd love to be lean though, not just my diet! Thanks again document, I did clutchless upshifts on the straight - mainly because it gave me a break from the massive vibration it suffers! bellevuetlr - lol that's how I've felt recently (flooding the forum!). Interesting you mention your heart rate, I'm sure mine doesn't go over 100, but i've been told that my blood pressure is quite low (at rest it's around 50). Is Jason Statham that Brit actor in transporter? Good report though matey, cheers!

Ahoy Cali Superbike school members of the choir! Well Round 1 is out the way, with only a few marks on the fairing and errr...a slightly bent rear sub-frame! Easily resolved with a pry bar or 3 :-D DAY OF TRAVELLING THERE So, last Sunday myself and my two fellow riders made our van journey to the camp site LOCATED HERE (email: mairie.fere @ wanadoo.fr) , this was the nearest and most decent looking one I could find. Nothing to report on that journey, all went smoothly via SeaFrance (Van = £120, Car = £95 through Nutt Travel)! Our pit crew and photographer followed us all the way in a separate (and probably comfier) car. Setting up the camping was done pretty quick and food was cooked within the hour :-P Everyone but me was on the booze, just wanted to have a relatively clear head for the racing - aren't I a good boy! Err...they also didn't have my favourite masculine drink, or ice! Us Set up at the camp site THE DAY BEFORE Next day we awoke chilled and having had plenty of sleep (very little traffic noise or noise from fellow racers leaving early - much respect). In our own time we left for the track (Circuit Des Ecuyers) via a supermarket, which I found on my phone's GPS. I guided us there nice and easily...unfortunately I completely buggered the journey from there to the track as illustrated below. You see, I hadn't taken into account that junctions on a toll-road are few and far between! Despite the track being criss-crossed by 3 main roads, none of the bastards had junctions. Note to self - zoom in to potential junctions before relying on them! Blue is route taken, green is the route I should have taken having checked actual motorway junctions, red is the race track So after that amusement we watched the big cc class and witnessed some quite serious accidents - knocking the riders unconscious and requiring an ambulance. It's never nice to see someone not get up and just get tossed around like a ragdoll. Fortunately I heard they were both OK in the end, just a few broken bones. After that we (directly) returned to the camp site via the small village adjacent to it. I bought some local ###### upon the request of Kerri (I scored highly, woo hoo!) and by the by, if you ever need an English speaker, there's shop that sells tatt and the guy in there is very fluent! We then rinsed and repeated the previous night only with much less alcohol! I also went for a jog for a few miles to get myself prepared for a long time in the saddle. RACE DAY It was decided that we had to get a good spot, although most of the pit is either on a slight left to right gradient, or a slightly more left to right gradient. Nevertheless we got up at around 5:30am, everyone was up and ready, myself included. We then packed up the tents ASAP and jumps in the transport, where upon I managed to ###### up the directions yet again...this time it was because I didn't zoom into the map enough, a real map will be used next time! It wasn't so bad though and only wasted 10 minutes or so...for a 15minute journey. We arrived at the track (Circuit Des Ecuyers) and unpacked quickly, getting everything ready while it was lightly drizzling, remarks from our neighbouring teams were in the region off, "you english brought your weather with you, go home". As expected! Once English briefing of rules and stuff were our the way, we went out in medium drizzle on dry tyres, we quickly decided to use racing wets. MY GOD, it is the strangest feeling to be able to lean over enough for getting your knee down, while spray is coming off the bike in front! The oldest/most experienced member (Stuart) of the team was sent out to scrub wets and drys, then the youngest (Jay) went out and binned it at a very low speed on the first lap. We were hoping that by doing that so early, he'd got the crashing out the way! Nothing serious was done so he went straight back out again after a quick inspection. Then it was my turn, I actually quite enjoyed drizzle and we were doing between 2:12 and 2:22 laps - nearer two minutes is the dry lap time. To show the quality camera work!: After the 3 hour practice/qualifying time (we got 4th position!) it was already 12pm, we then had nearly 2 hours of debating whether to use wet or dry tyres as well as another briefing. It was decided by the organisers that a rolling start would be cancelled and a timed release from the pit was best. Jay went out and did some good laps and then crashed, doh! He came back and had done the other side, but again, very minor damage and nothing was hanging off! He then did some good laps during his 'shift' of 1hour and 20mins. He then came in and it was my turn, nothing to report there really, just went round the track for an hour and 20 minutes. I chose to go fast but not balls out so that I could last the distance and to lower the risk of binning it. Next up was Stuart, unfortunately he had two accidents, one of which was rather bad. He was fine though but the bike needed a new upper fairing, clip-on, screen and top yoke. The bike was started and it immediately redlined, after killing the engine and unsnagging the throttle cable, it was fine and Stuart went back out having lost only 8minutes. He then did the rest of the race without incident. We ended 18th but at one point we held 7th for quite a long time. AFTER THE RACE Now, for some reason we thought the ferry was at 9:45pm, we were packed easily by 7pm...errr....leaving quite a close call as it was around a 3 hour drive! We arrived at the port and found out that the ferry had been cancelled, having VERY speedily arrived at 10pm. Next ferry was at 11:35 with P&O Ferries (no charge), so we waited around drinking very good vending machine hot beverages - no bloody tea though! We arrived at dark 'O' Clock in Dover and got back to the main destination at around 2am. I have a fun autopilot ride home and was in bed by 2:30 writing a bit on facebook for everyone, mainly thanking the superb team we had. So that's it really, in a nutshell. Massive thank you's to: Darren Stolton, Dave Chillingworth - Pit help, fire safety, fuel fillers. Darren Whittaker - Photography, driver. Stuart McIvor, Jamie Kelman - Riders and (extensively experienced) mechanics. Jackie Cannam - refreshments, lap timing. None of them frequent this forum, but I feel they do deserve it! ------------------------------------------ Forward thinking that was helpful: Pre-packing meat / english milk and having an in-car fridge, bought for around £70 from Halfords. Having a booster pack/air compressor for pumping up tyres, charging phones, etc. Practicing pit stops and having everyones job arranged. having plenty of lighting and an adaptor for the electric socket in the camp site. Having 4 tents for 7 people Borrowing one of those blow up airbeds, quality. Getting a medium/long wheel base van even though there was too much room! Buying cheese for the burgers Having a saw to cut down dead trees for the fire Having a Aserbis quickfiller (over 1 litre per second) Taking plenty of lock-wire and cable ties Having a spare fairing and almost spare everything Taking euros Things for next time: Make an A frame to hold the barrels of petrol for easier filling. Take electrolites after race to avoid cramping (me) Do exercises to strengthen fingers and inner thigh (ooh err!) Take a broom to sweep up the fag butts in the non-smoking pits (ha!) Use the euro-tunnel, bugger ferries! Take more tea bags Look after the time-keeper more.

Hey lucky, that's certainly not your average life story! Welcome to the forum

Well I tried again and got, "Sorry, but you do not have permission to use this feature. If you are not logged in, you may do so using the form below if available.". I've a feeling it's post dependant, i.e. you need to post at least X times in order to be able to download it? Hope you don't mind Cobie, but I'm going to email you too. To avoid even more spam I would advise you edit your displayed email address to cobie 'at' such and such or something similar. Just a thought

Cobie's right, really depends on who you're talking about - the racer, streetbike or a bike used for both! Most service manuals (for road use) suggest changing the fork oil every 2 years I believe, although personally I'll only change it if I've gotta replace a fork seal. Like most gradual wearing items like wheel/head bearings, suspension, etc. , it's hard to tell if you ride it all the time, as you will be getting used to it as it's very slowly gets worse. For a quick check get a competent rider to take it for a spin - another (good) rider will always comment on something. So far I've only had one rear suspension unit collapse on me, only cost 2 broken ankles and 6 broken ribs....typical that it would happen on a corner! In fairness it was 15 years old and at the time my money went towards keeping the engine running! That's probably not a fantastic help, but something to read while the real suspension guru's get back to this thread!

Oh, one problem I have suffered during my vigorous new exercise, is what feels like bruised lower ribs? Has anyone else ever had this? So far I've net-searched and found that I may have bruised them by breathing so heavily - having not been entirely fit for 6-12months or so, what do you think about that? I must admit though, even though it's really tiring, jogging really pumps ya' up!

Hi acebobby, Thank you very much for your tips, by chance I have randomly started jogging - possibly not 5k but not far from it (i hope!). There's not a convenient local swimming pool near me, so to replace it (and don't laugh anyone!) I'm trying yoga instead - because of the flexibility side of it. That's a really good idea about martial arts, never thought about that and will research. You're right though, I don't want to bulk up but more strengthen up and lean up at the same time! So far I'm just doing press-ups, weighted squats and curls - but not with heavy weights, only 20-30KG or so. A friend said to focus on number of reps rather than large amount of weights...hope that's right! Hi documented, That's very kind of you to mention that my post was deleted - these things happen I suppose...and I was mentioning a chemical the body uses! I would like the longer answer if possible though - or if you don't wish to re-type (i hate doing that!) then by all means point me to a source you consider to be correct ;-) I sweat like a ho', so based on that I'm guessing I definitely need the salt? Thanks Cobie, I'm mainly eating salad at the moment because it's so easy! Muchos appreciated though :-)

Thanks Cobie! Well we've (hopefully) planned our pitstops - one of our sponsors has bought us a acerbis quick filler, an amazing bloody thing! Thanks for the tips though mate, much appreciated ;-) speaking of the fuel stops though, it's a 4hour enduro and originally thought we'd get 45minutes a tank, but after testing we've (not me) have decided to opt for staying on the bike for 1h 20m's. It seems that for us, this event has gone from 'a bit of fun' to, 'we must win' - I preferred the first way of thinking! Chris

And so you should! (look forward to it!) Yeah fingers crossed for the weather to be as good as today...I feel waterproofs could have been left at home today lol!

Thanks Cobie, a friend recommended cycling - better on the knees than running apparently. hubbard - thank you very VERY much for your comments and the link you provided...kept me reading for some time! Incredibly helpful, seems the right person read my question at the right time :-) A useful 'sub-link' is this one: http://www.mensfitness.com/sports_and_recr...reme_sports/112 It was provided by stevo and refers to an article in Men's Fitness magazine about what Nicky Hayden does. Thank you so much, I'm going to get cracking - last night I went jogging/running, only took 5minutes before I had to go to walking pace...I'm quite unfit. I am eating salad though instead of the usual errr...500g of chocolate I usually eat per week, cut that down to 50g now. I've been doing random 'weights without a clue' for a month now and it does motivate you when the blood starts pumping! Well it's lunch here in the UK, so I'm going to get a sandwich! Cheers again, Chris PS I'm 32 by the way

he he, I'll make ya proud You can probably see I've asked a few spurious questions around these parts, but thanks for being prepared to help me out with anything knowledge voids! 'The team' is doing a pit practice this Thursday - might even see if I can get some photos for the amusement of others here For sure, I'd hope to stick around, my ambition is to become a school instructor

Hi jim! Welcome to the forum - I've a feeling I'll be the first to say that! (again) That's a strange progression, normally it goes sportsbike and then easy rider lol! From experience, when you use a school bike you pre-approve a payment of up to 1000 dollars which is used in the event of an accident. Of course if you walk away from the day with no injury to the bike, the payment is torn up, so to speak. It's incredibly rare for it to happen though and provided you follow instruction and don't make up your own rules, that 1000 dollars will stay firmly away from your credit card! My memory is sketchy about 'excess protection', but I've a small feeling (of about 10%) that you can pay extra to reduce your liability. Your best bet is to ring them and check. I'm sure you should be able to find the sliders for your ninja, perhaps check some well known online auction sites. It's quite easy to get bits for old bikes over here (UK), I guess there are more new bikes in the US! Good luck!

Hi slaveunit! Welcome to the forum - I've a feeling I'll be the first to say that! Well with a RoSPA Gold grounding you've got plenty of potential in my books! You probably know but from what I gather (NOT being a CA Superbike staff member!), being smooth on the track = fast, and doing advanced on the road certainly makes you smooth. Just my two pence :-) For the American contingent: CBT = Allows you to ride up to a 125cc bike (in the UK) DAS = Allows you to ride any size bike provided you are over 21 (in the UK) IAM = Advanced riding/driving RoSPA = Very Advanced riding/driving Enjoy yourself on Friday!

Fair point bpez, that's the problem with the internet these days - all content looks new!