East Fortune, September 2004
After three outings in Ireland I was keen to compare the R6 to the GSXR and see where they differed.
We had a bit of work to do on the R6 as it still had UGP gearing and backgrounds on, but it didn’t take long to get it all done and scrutineering on Saturday morning went fine.
Practice went well, with the bike feeling really good, although we increased the front compression in an attempt to prevent as much dive and rear end lift. This seemed to help.
In the first race it was a bit of a gamble on tyres, because it rained heavily in the early part of the morning and threatened to do so again. But on the advice of Craig (the weatherman) of Strathearn tyres, we went for intermediates, which proved the right choice.
The race start went well with me getting well into the top 10 from my second row position. I was a little boxed at the first corner, but managed to pull back a couple of places at railway Hairpin and was in 7th at the end of the 4th lap after reeling in a CBRR. Next I had Mark Ward in my sights and began to close in on him. At Esses on lap 5 I passed him on the entry and ateyed ahead to come in 6th behind Dod Spence.
Race 2 got off to a good start, and I was going well although in 7th on lap 3 or 4. Dod ran very wide at railway in front of me and I got past him and made it stick. Later that lap I passed Mark and kept ahead to come in 5th , which I was very happy with, as it was my best result yet this year at East Fortune.
That evening we came back to the beer tent after a trip to Haddington to get a Chinese meal, and there was the usual good atmosphere and banter going on. Lots of tales of this race and that crash etc until the generator ran out of fuel at midnight.
In the morning we dropped the yolks in the forks to try and stablise the front a little and it helped, so we kept it like that. We also put some more compression damping on the rear and that helped as well, although the near gale force winds were pushing the bike hard down the railway straight, that nothing much was going to help stop it any faster.
There were only a few small flurries of rain, the wind kept the most of it away.
The first race of the day was in the morning and I got a cracker of a start, getting well up with the front row. I got some clear space and got my head down, although towards the end of the race I could feel my rear tyre going off, I backed off a little, but Mark Ward showed his front wheel at the hairpin and I knew I couldn’t back off much. I cam in in 5th again……another great finish !
After lunch, the first race was for the people who finished in the top 15 of the 600 and 1,000 races on the Saturday plus invited bikes from the 400 and open classes.
It was the Steve Hislop race and the trophy was sponsored by SABD.
The race was 15 laps long…a monster compared to the usual 8 lap races.
As usualk with lottery grid positions, I was right at the back, but made several rows up at the start and even more at the first corner.
By lap 3 I had passed quite a few and just passed two big proddie bikes on the one lap.
I atayed ahead of them and had a few good dices until lap 12 or 13 when the two proddie bikes got me back again and I just couldn’t catch up enough on the brakes to get them back, as they had too much powder on the straights.
I came in a very creditable 13th (4th 600 home). What a great race….15 laps …great!!
Race 3 was a 12 lap special for the 600’s and I got a great start, staying with the lead 3 bikes for a couple of laps before they just began to pull out a little lead. The race was going well and I was in touch with them a lot of the time, but they had a bit more power.
I kept at it though and despite Mark being close behind me, I finished 3rd, which was a great finish in my first year on the 600 after missing 25% of the races at East Fortune, due to other racing commitments.
I finished 6th in the club championship, 1 point behind 5th place. But who was counting. I was so happy that even contesting 25% less than most I finished 6th in the championship.
What an end to the season.