Round 2, Oulton Park…

Sunday, May 15, 2011 0 Comments

Proper weather… Sun cream n shades and the fans were out in force. Big thanks to all our
supporters, it was great to have you all there.

The Races

The nice long practise session went well, I felt pretty quick and it didn’t feel difficult which is always nice. I was given 31st on the grid for the qualifying race, got an ok start but the elbows were out and after the first lap I was up to 19th and getting a move on. I passed a few more over the next few laps and come the last lap I stuffed it under another in the last turn to finish 15th and 1st in class, not bad and again I set a new personal best lap time. This put me on the front row in third for the championship race, things were looking good and I was feelin like a win.

The race took ages to come as there were some big multiple rider crashes and the air ambulance had to fly in twice, not good for all those guys involved, wish you all a speedy recovery, there were some very nasty injuries. Eventually our turn came and we rolled out onto the grid, the flag was waved for the sighting lap and away we went, turning left at Island Bend my right boot slipped off my foot peg, I looked down and there was oil everywhere, looked back up and the marshals were waving so I pulled off the track just before the right hander of shell oils hairpin. I was very lucky on reflection as the right side of the rear tyre was absolutely swimming with oil, had I have taken the right I’d have definitely dropped the bike. Turns out the oil cooler feed pipe had decided to burst off, soaking a quarter of the circuit and half the field following me, sorry lads!! I also managed to ruin the marshals sun bathing time, poor chaps worked like troopers with the cement dust n brooms, gave them good opportunity to take the P out of me though, not a good sign when I was recognised by a couple of them. I may get an invite to their Christmas party if I’m not careful..!

The big delay I’d caused made me realise I may have time to get back and get onto the grid on my spare bike but by the time I got back to the paddock the second sighting lap was just getting under way, damn! No points again…!! not good at all.

I managed to get track side in time to watch the boys have a cracking race and put in some real good performances. The following weekend Tommy Hill crashed on on someone else’s oil, glad none of the lads behind me did.. Tommy’s sharing my luck, he runs 33 as well..!!
Whilst loading up at the end of the day, James thought it’d be a good idea to tip my carefully sorted box of neat spares all over the deck! Twinky… “Don’t forget to shut the lid and carry it flat fella” oh well.. I’ll let him off though as he organised a BBQ at his newly renovated gaff, what a crackin’ afternoon that was.

TT 3D Movie

James had also organised for all the lads to go and watch this new movie about the Isle of man TT races featuring Gut Martin, what a film and a defo must see, Guy was absolutely spot on and made it really amusing. It was a good behind the scenes look at what goes on at the spectacular races and an insight into what goes on in the racers minds. We all thought it was mega and headed off for a cheeky pint and a chat about it afterwards, Sam was so inspired he would have signed up for racing the TT there and then.

Bit more bad luck

You may have heard on Facebook or Twitter that my garage suffered a fire, it melted my leathers, helmet, boots etc, ruined my fairings that were hanging on the wall and smoke damaged everything else that was in there, great. I thought I had some work to do after the burst oil pipe, I really could have done without this. Oh well, chin up.
Kaz and I took the nippers away for the Easter weekend in the sun for a nice chill. We were able to relax and Hayden and Chloe could run around in safety, they even went on an Easter egg hunt and scoff them little selves full of choccy, bless. Then we got a phone call of Kaz’s parents who had been informed by the police that thieves had gained access to my garage, nothing worth taking though thanks to the fire, every cloud eh. We put it to the back of our minds and got on with our little holiday.

So with round three looming ever closer and with a rook of work to do repairing and cleaning my bikes, including over spending on replacement riding kit, fairings etc it’s gonna be a challenge, but that’s how I roll. Having everything 100% ready in plenty of time is just a little bit boring, anyways, I enjoy a bit of bike fettling.

Refreshed website

As you will have guessed by now Graham has brought my website more up to date for me giving it a fresher look and making it a bit more interactive, leave me some feedback and let me know what you think. Also hit the tabs and follow me on Facebook and Twitter to keep up to speed with what’s going on.

Go to the events section to see when the next round is, it’s a Whit meeting on the bank holiday Monday so pop a reminder in your phone and head on over, if we get half the people that turned up for Oulton I’ll be well happy.

My luck’s gonna change…

Al, Racer33