Wade's First visit to Willow Springs for the WERA 24 hour Endurance Race, September 1999
My journey started Wednesday, leaving Boston at 7:40pm. At 2:15am Thursday,
I arrived at Evans' doorstep. I can't say I was knocking on a stranger's
door, but that's how we meet for the first time.
We got to the track Thursday midday, and I met Andre & Allen for the first time.
We finished a few details on the bike (fiberglass the bellypan, install &
wire the taillight, etc.) Through the day, I also met fellow riders David
Chowenhill-Ladd (who was accompanied by his wife Janet and her parents with
a motorhome), Brian Osborne (who brought his Mom along as our team
Masseuse), and Art Ferdinand.
A trackwalk with Evans helped get me acquainted with the lines, but having
not ridden there yet at all, it was hard for me to keep it all straight.
After a restaurant dinner, Evans and I went back to his house to sleep.
Friday, up early, and at the track by 7am. McDonald's out in CA have
"Latte" (when their machine isn't broken) for those with palates too
sensitive for their regular coffee. It made me laugh. Finally it was time to get
some practice on the first track other than NHIS that I've ever ridden.
My first impression was that what I had learned about racing a motorcycle
around NHIS in Loudon was almost useless at Willow Springs. Average speed
at WS is about 60% higher, with brakes really required at only two turns, if
you're running an EX500. It took me only about 10 seconds longer to
traverse Willow's 2.5 miles than it takes me to traverse NHIS's 1.5 miles.
It took me a while to adjust to that speed, and to trust that I could indeed
keep the throttle pinned from the exit of 5 all the way to the entrance to
9, but once I got there, it was really cool. Turn 8 was something like 8
seconds leaned over, throttle pinned at 10,500 RPMs, in top gear. Because no
braking was required at the entrance, I could occasionally pass the bigger
bikes when they slowed a little too much for the entrance. Friday night
was the time for everyone to get some night practice in, as well. By the
end of Sunday, I was just starting to drag my toe a little in 8. Something I
never did at NHIS.
Also, I found myself dragging the heck out of my left kneepuck in T5, and to
a lesser extent in T3. Another thing I almost never do at NHIS. It's easy to
see how racing at Willow would chew up kneepucks fast.
The Race started at noon on Saturday. Evans had the first hour, and things
went without a hitch. Then Brian was up. About halfway through his hour,
the crank broke. The engine ran, but had no connection to the clutch. On the
plus side, it would probably spin up pretty fast %^) But it meant we had to
swap motors.
We replaced that motor with the spare 94 motor I sent to Andre. He had
fitted it with a set of slightly domed 1mm over pistons I got from Chip
Hillier and the remachined head I got from Bill Martovitch. The combination
of the pistons and the severely decked head (the valves appeared to have
been slightly tagged by the cutter during the decking) gave us a compression
ratio that was unsuitable for the fuel we had. We decided this after about
four laps, when the motor started to overheat badly. So we got busy
dropping the motor out of David's race bike, which he had brought along as a
practice-mule. Since his engine was a pre-94, we had to swap out the rotor
from my engine to get the electronics to work. Ugh.
About 6:30pm we got back on track, 130-odd laps behind our nearest
competitor. We tried to be optimistic because "It's still early in the
race!" But we had some fears because "It's still early in the race."
Racing at night was a rush. The HID lights from Baja were Fantastic. It was
easy to find our bike on the track at all times, because of them. One other
team had a single HID. We had one on each side for turns, and another
pointed forward. They lit up the entire hillside around T4. Very cool.
The engine-swapping debacle cost us all one turn in the saddle, and we
picked up the rotation where we left off. My first time in the saddle during
the race was 9pm-10pm. My lap times were in the mid 1:40's I think (We will
eventually get our official laptimes from WERA, but I don't have them yet.).
For reference, the fast laptime with this bike this weekend was posted by
Brian in the mid 1:35's. Racing in the dark on a barely known track was an
amazing rush. So much more intense than any night riding I've ever done, and
I thought I had pushed the envelope pretty far. Street riding just doesn't
compare.
Early on, I sometimes got a little too hot into 9, and once during my first
session, I got my juices flowing to pass a bigger bike there, and ran wide.
I wasn't sure that I could make the turn without dropping off the edge of
the pavement (in retrospect I almost certainly could have just leaned more
and made it), so I straightened it up and rolled off the throttle a bit, and
did a little dirt-tracking into the hot-pit, racking my brain to recall if
there were any big ditches between T9 and the Hot pit entrance, because I couldn't see the gruond at all, really. I hoped not. It turned out OK. I shrugged at everyone as I went by, and kept going. I was later told that the dust cloud scared the hell outta everyone, and that the bike looked all out of shape as I traversed the sand. It didn't feel all
that bad. I think I'm the only one who tried going off-track the whole weekend. %^/
The lights had been positioned by Evans and Brian, who knew the track,
during the night practice on Friday evening. David commented that as he
came into T3, he couldn't see the track at all until he tipped it in, when
suddenly the whole track was lit up. I clearly was early apexing the turn
the whole night, though, because when I tipped it in, all I saw was the dirt
6 feet to the left of the track. But between the full moon and the
back-lighting from the Budweiser balcony, I always found the track.
After my 9-10pm stint, my next saddle time was 2-3am. Still all dark. Still
an amazingly intense experience. Each session got a little better, with a
bunch of 1:40's in this second night session. The chassi and lights Andre
set us up with gave us the confidence to run faster than lots of the big
bikes in the dark. Some of whom were very slow at night. At one point, I
passed one bike which was passing another bike,mid-turn since I was carrying
the same corner speed around T2 as I could in the daylight. Man, this ROCKED!
As someone else has already mentioned, the other bikes were all courteous. I
had one fellow wave (no finger, he looked like he was just waving) as he
went by me in five. He pulled off that lap, so maybe he was just trying to
signal his intention to do that, I don't know. Otherwise, pretty much
everyone knew they could out-horsepower us on the straights, and waited
until it was an easy pass. Occasionally someone came up on the inside of
three pretty hot, but I never felt imposed upon. Much nicer than the "gotta
pass NOW" attitude that sometimes accompanies sprint races. FWIW, there
were 22 teams entered in the race.
My 7am-8am stint saw me get a bunch of 1:38's, which are mid-pack times for
the local EX-riders. I couldn't have done those times on a stock EX, I
don't think, but I was pretty happy.
I took Art's 11-12noon slot. As soon as I got out there, I noticed that the
temp gauge was hovering right below the red zone. I didn't know if it had
been like that, but I worried about it blowing up on me, so I short-shifted
everywhere, and stopped downshifting to 5th out of 8, instead taking T9 in
6th. I was able to carry about 8000 to 8100 RPM at the exit there in sixth,
which made that my fastest times on that corner all along, I'm pretty sure.
In general, though my riding was a little less smooth than the earlier
stints, and I felt slow, but I was doing ok, until T4, about 10 minutes
before the end of the race. I had been struggling to find a decent line
through there, especially 4B (near the top of the omega) ever since I got to
Willow. I had dragged the bottom of our exhaust pipe several times there,
despite feeling like I was hanging way off, making me the only one to grind
the pipe anywhere, earning me the nickname "Graunch" for at least a little
while. So anyway, with about 10 minutes to go, right after the little bumps
past the corner-worker station, the rear tire stepped out, and I was either
too hot on the throttle, or too out of position, or whatever, and it just
slid out from under me. What a sinking feeling to watch the bike sliding
away ahead of me in the gravel. The fairing came off immediately, and slid along just to the side of the bike. I just stared in disbelief, until I started tumbling a bit, and lost sight of the bike. I jumped up when I stopped, and ran to the bike, but no brake lever, and an
apparent lack of useful throttle controls pretty well signalled the end of
my ride. While I rode beside the bike in the crash truck, I noticed that
the waterpump cover had been holed, so it was probably a good thing that I
didn't run that 1 mile back to the pits under power.
We got the bike off the truck at the pits, and Evans had suited up, and
drove it under its own power across start/finish after the other riders came
by to officially finish the race. No major damage to me, and only minor
damage to the bike. We wound up 4th of 4 in our class (Middle Weight Super
Bike, I think), 30-odd laps behind #3, Team Scream. If only one of the
engines.....Oh well. Next year. I, and the rest of the riders as well, I
think, learned a lot about endurance racing. Our nighttime laps were better
than many other teams, and our daytime laps were not the slowest on the
track. Considering the HP we and they had, I guess that's a victory for us.
The Michelin Pilots donated to the team by Michelin worked great. I will
have a hard time going back to my 16" EX tires.... Thanks also to Airtech
for the bodywork, and Baja Designs for their lights. They made the
difference in the night racing! I know that the people who were ahead of me
at night (before I went by them in T2 or T8) must have wondered what the
heck type of UFO was following them!
This entire adventure would not have been possible without Andre's efforts:
fabulous bike preparation, attention to little details, and diligent efforts
at organization. Thank you Andre.
The weekend would not have been nearly as positive and successful without
all the wonderful support of the people who came out and volunteered the
most important thing: their time. Thanks to all of you: Vivek (for your
hours and hours of help through the entire event in the pits and
timing/scoring), Janet, her parents (whose names I ashamedly admit I've
forgotten), Karin, Elisabeth, Chip Hillier, Greg, Brian's Mom (the team
masseuse. That was fantastic!), Alan Webster, and everyone else who I have
missed because I'm still toasted from the trip home. Special personal
thanks go to Alan who drove me back to LA, fed me, let me hang out in his
hot-tub/pool/spa, and got me to the airport for my 1:30am flight. I owe you
one.
This was a great bunch of people. I feel so lucky to have been part of this
team. We worked well together through good and bad situations. Supported
each other, didn't lose our senses of humor, stayed fairly positive, and
kept the whole thing fun, even when any rational person could clearly see it
shouldn't have been any fun at all.
So. Would I do it again? In a heartbeat. I sure hope WERA runs this again
next year, and I find a way to be part of it. Any of the guys on the team
know that they can come up here any time, and I'll see to it that they have
a bike to ride at NHIS.
UPDATE: The Feb 2000 issue of Sport Rider has a nice article by teammate Evans Brasfield on this event....FYI.
