Karl Rehpohl CRA #910, 6/21-22/2003, BIR Track practice is key, a reliable race bike comes in handy too. This is my new motto for racing. I opted to skip the Edge trackday Friday mostly due to cash shortage, will try harder to not let that happen again. Only getting 6 laps of practice Saturday morning isn’t enough to get back in the swing mentally, physically, and doesn’t leave enough time to fix major bike problems before racing starts later in the morning. Race #1 Supersport UL: Good start, I’m in second place and gaining on first thru the infield. Exit turn 9 with first place three bike lengths in front of me, I’ll try and out brake him into ten and take him inside. He hits his brakes between 3 and 4, I go for 3 and am a bike length behind him when he starts his turn. His front end washes out with the bike going towards the outside and the rider backspinning like a breakdancer right into my line. While on his back and sliding the rider is looking over his shoulder at me with these HUGE eyes mentally pleading, “PLEASE DON’T HIT ME!!!!!!” I’m on the brakes hard as I can, thinking I can outbreak his slide, not true. He’s decelerating faster than I and I have to abort the inside and go outside, running off the track and into the gravel. Kept it upright, missed the downed rider and lost 5 positions. Back onto the track and shaken. Two more laps and the engine starts sputtering. I pull off on lap 4. Re-torqued the head bolts to try and control my slow oil leak and fiddled with the coils, plug wires, carbs, and throttle linkage in attempts to improve all the above and fix whatever ended my previous race prematurely. Race #2 Supersport Trophy Dash: Pull up to grid and the throttle is sticking at 8 thousand RPM. Note to self: never start another race with a sticking throttle!!!!! Terrible start and I’m off. At first I think the throttle isn’t that big of a deal because you’re usually full throttle on a racetrack anyway. True, but not in the corners and more importantly not when approaching the corners and trying to downshift. I would downshift and instead of engine braking it would accelerate HARDER! I was able to cope with this for three laps. I’d just pull in the clutch and “coast” thru the corners, letting out the clutch at the corner exit to start accelerating. With this method I’d drop to 5th on the infield and get back to 2nd coming thru turn one. Lap four I manage to hold off my competition thru the infield. A quick glance behind before turn 10 and all three of them are parked four bike lengths off my butt. “If I can hold them off thru 10 I should be able to gain a cushion down the straight and turn 1” Brake late, enter fast, start the turn, let out clutch, HOLY SH!T!!!! I shoot straight off the outside and into the same gravel trap I had visited earlier in the day, but much faster this time. Feet out and Fred Flintstone would be proud of my stopping ability. Keep it upright and point it back onto the track having been passed by EVERYONE. Lap five: crappy cornering speeds. Lap six: I’m gaining on someone in front of me, so I get a little more “effort” installed in my brain. Turn 9 is the slowest corner on the track, thank god. I repeat my cornering action described above. Let out the clutch to soon and ZOOOOOM I’m launched off the burm and manage to get both tires airborne. I see grass and think “don’t brake, too slippery”, then I see trees and think “screw that, I’m braking!!!!”. Brakes come on, tires touch grass, bike and rider go boom. Birch was corner working 9 and described it has a Superman to front flip. Bike cracked it’s windshield and bent the brake lever. I just bruised my left thumb when my hand smacked the ground. My first crash is finally out of the way and it was a gentle one. Thank you powers that be. Upon fixing the fairing and brake lever I notice that ALL six of my front brake rotor mounting bolts are finger tight and two are a couple turns out!!! If I hadn’t of crashed I’d have possibly gone 11 more laps and vibrated them out further. Ugly thoughts of what might have happened. Race #3: Superbike UL: Grid up to start, left hand up since I’m starting in second wave….engine dies. Attempt to restart it, no luck. Green flag waves and I’m sitting on the start line on a dead bike. I get it started just as everyone else goes out of site around turn 1. Nothing like a 20 second pause to start your race with. Needless to say I’m FUMING at this point. I manage to catch and pass one rider. My back tire is sliding out like crazy on right hand turns and is scaring me to push any harder. I start rolling off on turns 1 and 2 thinking my back tire is not going to hold. I finish the race thinking there’s no way I’ll be able to run my last race of the day on that tire. Kent and Drew (thank you both for all your help and advice this weekend!!!) determine that it’s not my tire. The exhaust can is hitting my rear brake caliper when the suspension is almost fully compressed, not allowing it to continue and thus forcing the tire to make up the difference. Pull out the hammer, bang and bend the mount back and up about two inches and I’m “hopefully” back in business. At this point my confidence in my bike is REALLY low. Until yesterday I felt my skills were the limiting factor and I trusted the bike to just do what I told it to do. Now I was feeling like part of my journey around the track each time was out of my control and that didn’t feel real good. Race #4 GP UL: Bad start, back of the pack. Passed three people on the first lap and then ran the remainder of my race all alone. Fairly consistent times, but could do better. This was my first race to put my knee on the deck and keep it there. What a great feeling and it put a smile on my face that is still there right now. Made it home in one piece. The bike will make it till next months round of racing. And as usual I had a great time with all the great people that make up the CRA and especially the MN-Sportbike gang. Congrats to everyone that had a great weekend racing and thanks to the corner workers who make it possible!! As always thanks to Bridgestone for keeping me upright and Lockhard Phillips for the support. Ride fast, ride safe, Karl Suzuki GS500 CRA #910 Copyright TeamPoop 2003