09-17-2006, 11:29 PM
First off big thanks to JRay for riding out there with me on Sunday to help me out. Second, thanks to Paul for letting J and I borrow the trailer.
Like Jason I signed up for the Intro day as well so I only had two sessions to work with. It was an absolute blast and I got a lot of good feedback from the course riders I worked with. While riding I got lots of thumbups as I was going through the turns, but the one thing they kept tellng me is to get more comfy on the straight and to use the full throttle.
I did have a few "pucker" moments throughout the day. During my first session there came a point where there was a couple of trains that all got bunched up in turn 1 which caused the pace to slow drastically and very suddenly. It happend so quickly that I didn't have time to get my hand up to signal the riders behind me and a bike went screaming by me on the left and actually grazed against my knee and elbow and made even more contact with the bike in front of me. Thankfully everyone continued.
The 2nd one was when I was making a pass coming out of the last turn onto the front straight and the rider in front of me tracked out to the right (the exact opposite of what he'd done the previous two laps) and forced me off the track into the grass. I just kept on the throttle, kept the handle bars straight and rode it out and eventually got back onto the paved surface. . . . . . but I did make the pass!!!
The final "pucker" moment was when the throttle stuck open against my glove because of my hand position as I was coming down the front straight. As I went to brake I didn't slow at all and blew by 6 riders (including a course rider).
All in all a truly amazing experience and IÔÇÖll be doing it again very soon.
A things I know to work on:
1) stop covering the brake like I do on the street (it was preventing me from getting a full throttle pull)
2) work on my confidence to use as much throttle as possible on the straights
3) be comfortable with knee dragging (got really close a couple times and backed off)
Oh and thanks to JRay for taking the pics
![[Image: 2006_0917MattNESBA0062.JPG]](http://msleech.net/gallery/d/17630-2/2006_0917MattNESBA0062.JPG)
![[Image: 2006_0917MattNESBA0063.JPG]](http://msleech.net/gallery/d/17633-1/2006_0917MattNESBA0063.JPG)
![[Image: 2006_0917MattNESBA0072.JPG]](http://msleech.net/gallery/d/17660-2/2006_0917MattNESBA0072.JPG)
Like Jason I signed up for the Intro day as well so I only had two sessions to work with. It was an absolute blast and I got a lot of good feedback from the course riders I worked with. While riding I got lots of thumbups as I was going through the turns, but the one thing they kept tellng me is to get more comfy on the straight and to use the full throttle.
I did have a few "pucker" moments throughout the day. During my first session there came a point where there was a couple of trains that all got bunched up in turn 1 which caused the pace to slow drastically and very suddenly. It happend so quickly that I didn't have time to get my hand up to signal the riders behind me and a bike went screaming by me on the left and actually grazed against my knee and elbow and made even more contact with the bike in front of me. Thankfully everyone continued.
The 2nd one was when I was making a pass coming out of the last turn onto the front straight and the rider in front of me tracked out to the right (the exact opposite of what he'd done the previous two laps) and forced me off the track into the grass. I just kept on the throttle, kept the handle bars straight and rode it out and eventually got back onto the paved surface. . . . . . but I did make the pass!!!
The final "pucker" moment was when the throttle stuck open against my glove because of my hand position as I was coming down the front straight. As I went to brake I didn't slow at all and blew by 6 riders (including a course rider).
All in all a truly amazing experience and IÔÇÖll be doing it again very soon.
A things I know to work on:
1) stop covering the brake like I do on the street (it was preventing me from getting a full throttle pull)
2) work on my confidence to use as much throttle as possible on the straights
3) be comfortable with knee dragging (got really close a couple times and backed off)
Oh and thanks to JRay for taking the pics