Witchkraft Racing: The Search for Speed

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Choose Your Own Adventure

Wrobel snubbed me. Well, not exactly. We were planning to head down to Road Atlanta this weekend, but he's been riding so well – he got himself a seat on the Team Velocity Racing R6, running in the WERA National Endurance Series. The existing conflict is that they're racing this weekend. It's not a big deal, but a sincere congrats on the ride for him though. He did a stellar job at Grattan in his first race with the team.

So that left me with a few options. Driving down to Road Atlanta at twelve hours solo wasn't exactly appealing (I've done it before and would rather not repeat). Putnam Park over in Indiana at six hours was another option, but since we don't race there, the only benefit would be added seat time on the bike. The third option was Mid-Ohio at just under four hours for the AMA Vintage Motorcycle Days, which in addition to running vintage bikes, also offers races for twin-cylinder machines. The only problem is that I don't have a twin. My dad does though. Hmmm. "Dad, want to go racing this weekend? If you don't, can I ummm, ride your bike?"

The two of us were thinking about Mid-Ohio. If he wanted to race, I'd be happy going down there to help him out. The races there are for National Championships after all. However the biggest deterrent in all three track options is that the weekend forecast is calling for rain – in Atlanta, Georgia; Greencastle, Indiana; and Mansfield, Ohio. I don't even know the weather forecast here, but have tabs on the weather everywhere else it seems. And the weather forecast makes the decision an easy one.

So rather than venturing out and finding a race track, we're going to stay at home and work on the bike. I'm sure we can find something to turn, click, fix, clean, cut, bend, align and/or diagnose. Actually, one of the things we need to do is have the forks revalved. Given the direction we've gone with the suspension recently, we've stiffened up the bike – enough that we're approaching a state which isn't good. More wear, heat generated and potential harshness out of the bike occurs when running settings as tight as we are. This goes beyond my knowledge of suspension, but valving, shim stacks and other items will likely be changed and adjusted. It's probably time to freshen up the fluid inside anyways.

Cheers,

- eddie

Thursday, July 23rd, 2009 | POSTED AT: 11:21 AM
FILED UNDER: General