We were looking forward to this weekend, as we knew we had the package and I was confident I could get a good result. In fact I think really we all expected a win in at least one of the three races. Friday Testing The GP250’s were put in the same session as the 1000’s and this was the worst class for us to be mixed in with. The GSXR’s and R1’s were missiles down the straight but carried absolutely no corner speed and their engine braking made it dangerous to predict a pass. I had a few near misses every lap due to them flying passed down the straight beyond sight and then stop dead at the turn in point for each corner. Once I had to move onto the grass to avoid a collision. The day was unfortunately completely wasted. I had a total of about 6 clear laps all day and that was the first couple of each session having waited in the holding area for all the diesels to disappear and then it took me 2 laps to catch the slowest of them. Not fun and no lap times could be gauged. I did however feel confident on the bike and thought I could pull out some quick laps for qualifying. Saturday 1st Qualifying It was very hot again and we weren’t out on circuit until 10.45 which would have been a nice change if it wasn’t for the heat. Any way I pulled into the collection area and managed to pull out onto the circuit behind Gary May and Lee Dickinson. First lap was just used to scrub the tyre in and the two in front started to pick up the pace. I was finding it quite easy to follow them and after a while I saw Gary look behind to see that Lee and I were still right behind so he sat up and let us passed. I followed Lee for a lap and realised that he may not have been up to full pace yet either. I was currently holding pole position! Then on lap 4 I moved passed Lee and thought I’d have a go on my own at putting in some fast laps I turned into Park corner opened the throttle and kept it nailed. My mistake was I’d turned in slightly too early for Chris Curve however and on the run out I was running wide. Instead of closing the throttle slightly I kept it nailed and tried to pull the bike back in squaring the corner off slightly. Something I’ve done on the RGV thousands of times, unfortunately the GP bikes have a little more peak power and the slicks aren’t quite as predictable. The result was that as I hit peak torque in 5th gear at maximum lean the back end of the bike let go rapidly. It caught grip again sending me skywards...... |
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