Thursday to Sunday, 16th – 18th February 2007
Official Launch, Triumph Cup – Calafat
Due to Ryanair only flying into Reus on Wednesdays and Fridays we had to fly out on Wednesday morning as otherwise, we would have missed most of Fridays practice.
We found the hotel fairly quickly with a bit of luck, checked in and decided to go find the track so we knew where to be going in the morning. After a few phone calls to ‘Stabby’, the organiser of the weekend, we found the track and briefly watched a Porsche 911 race car do a few laps. It was blowing a gale so we decided to head back to the hotel and get an early night.
On Thursday, we arrived down at the track for 11am just before the truck arrived with all the bikes. We helped them unload and we got to see the first glimpse of the Tri–Colour Triumph 675. And I was gleaming from ear to ear with how gorgeous she looked. We took her out of the crate and set up in one of the garages with James Wainwright.
We were disappointed to see our spare wheels weren’t at the track so that was going to make tyre changes more difficult. She also didn’t have any crash mushrooms, no engine protectors and still had the standard rear shock, when I ordered and paid for the WP competition shock. The gearing was also for the road and the rear sprocket we were given wasn’t machined properly and didnŐt fit onto the wheel.
Up nice and early Friday morning and got to the track for shortly after 8am. Signed on and got the tyres warmers on. Spent the first couple of sessions finding my way around the track. First thing I noticed was how abrasive the track was and that it was going to chew tyres up if we didn’t find a decent set up. Asked a few guys what they recommended for the rear shock and set it up to match. Made a few changes on the forks but still wasn’t as comfortable as I was on my Absol Racing Triumph 675.
The new bike was completely different as I don’t have a slipper clutch or quick–shifter anymore and the engine was completely standard.
My aim for the weekend was to take it easy for the first two days and didn’t see the point in going out for every session destroying the tyres and risk tiring myself out.
During lunch time, we had the Official photo shoot with the TDG rig as the back drop. All the racers present behind six of the Cup bikes. My Irish bike and the Scottish one were in the centre, with the remaining ones being the English colours.
On Saturday we woke up to a very wet and cloudy day. Got to the track and we whipped off the wheels first thing and got Tony to put the wets on. In the second session in the morning, everything went wrong. I was going at a comfortable pace when I saw a group of 4 bikes ahead. I caught the first one just before the last right hand turn before the home straight, she had stayed out very wide and when she tipped in, she didn’t use the race line. I thought it was safe to hold my line and clipped the apex on the inside but she changed her line and was heading straight for my left side. I straighted the bike up and tried to brake but because of the wet I couldn’t scrub off enough speed and we touched. My clip–on got caught in her wet suit and as she accelorated, pulled my bars right and down I went sliding to a stop. I quickly picked up the bike and got her back to the pits to access the damage. Luckily the corner isn’t as fast as some others so the damage was minimum. Small scuffs to the side fairing, scratches on the engine casing and the bar end from my clip on broke off. I’ve ordered a new nose cone, clip ons & footpeg so she’ll be back to her previous glory by the end of the week.
I went straight back out after that and finished a twenty minute session building my confidence with the Michelin wet tyres. They didn’t move around on me at all and I was lapping consistant 1.46s without pushing myself on the brakes or mid corner. Pleased with that, I called it a day as the track started drying up. It looked as if it could go either way and without my spare wheels, would of made it difficult in changing tyres quickly.
Sunday morning and the weather had picked up a bit. Was a bit cloudy and started spitting every now and again, but improved as the day went on.
I wanted to push myself more today as it was the last day and the bike was already ‘christened’. I made a few more tweaks to the front suspension and it improved my confidence on the brakes a lot!
James and I also wanted to get some good onboard footage so we agreed to help each other out by showing each other our lines, which helped us both improve on our times. We had a couple of great sessions lapping consistant low 1.36s but we came across traffic on each lap so we were confident we’d be in the 35s with a clear run. My rear tyre started sliding around so I decided to come back to the pits and call it a weekend. I had gotten everything I came for! Confidence in the wets, decent lap times in the dry and found a base setting for the front forks. Tony Scott says he’ll have my spare wheels, engine proctectors and WP shock by the time we collect the bike next weekend and bring it back to Ireland in time for the Bike Show in the RDS. She will be on show at the Bike Buyers Guide stall all weekend.
Next outing will be in Mondello Park for the Training Day on Saturday, 10th March. Followed by the trackday in Mondello Park on Monday, 12th March. After that I plan on entering the first National round in Mondello Park to get some race miles under my belt before the Triumph Cup kicks off in Snetterton on the weekend of the 14th and 15th of April.
I would like to thank Mark aka Stabby for organising a fantastic weekend for all of us! I really enjoyed myself and made a lot of new friends! Cheers to the lads from TDG for bringing the bikes down for us, unloading everything and then loading back up on Sunday! I look forward to seeing you guys on Saturday when we are over to collect her.
Big thanks to James and his family for all the help! It made the weekend that bit more worthwhile and Im sure James and I will have some great dices throughout 2007!
Thanks to my dad for taking the time off work to come over with me, as always, he has taken excellent photographs which will be available to view in the gallery very soon. He also set up the bullet cams perfectly so we got some brilliant onboard footage. Video will follow soon.
AJ