Paeroa BOTS F3 race 1 2009

Well, this was the first time I'd ridden my new (to me) 1992 VFR400R. Everything bog standard, used Dunlop GPRA10 front tyre, and used Bridgestone BT090 rear, yay, no tyrewarmers required. Grid positions were as far as i could tell pretty random, there was no qualifying. And somehow I'd got put last on the grid out of about 35 bikes. Still was good for making it a fun non-serious day which was good cause I'd just got my right wrist out of a cast on Friday, and I've got a couple of evulsion fractures, and as it turns out the bike wasn't up to much anyway.

The lack of thrust out of corners was partly due to the lack of power but mostly the extremely tall gearing, with it getting over 110kph in first gear, others on the same model were running a one inch smaller rear wheel, with 2 less teeth on the front sprocket. This circuit had a couple of sweeping corners, but mostly straight with a few tight corners, so the only place I could make up ground was on the brakes which I did as best as I could, but due to being trapped in the pack I was often unable to maintain any corner speed in the tight corners to keep the bike in the power range I was often having to slip the clutch in first gear out of a couple of the corners just to keep the bike moving (clutch was losing traction too when I forgot to do clutchless upshifts). Still had a lot of fun, and just wish I could have got more laps. Next year I might get a bit more serious with my ride.

Really thought I would be more competitive on a standard VFR than I was, wrong circuit for it I suppose, needed more corners and a wider track for overtaking on the corners. Was six seconds per lap slower than the front guys!!!

Had more fun in race two, as this one I was still learning my way around.

Thanks to:
The organisers
The spectators
Paully 3 fingers
Leong Goh - Pakuranga Dental
Keith and the lads - Victorian Motorcycle Wreckers
Peter Carbines - Carbines Engineering
Cycletreads - www.cycletreads.co.nz
My parents and family, and all the other racers, this stuff is cool.

Music by Geggy Tah - Whoever you are

Category:

Autos & Vehicles

Tags:

• Paeroa
• BOTS
• Honda
• VFR400
• F3
• BOS
• Battle
• of
• the
• Streets
• 09
• 2009
• Zealand
• onboard