Gateway Event

[GSXR RACER MIKE]

     I was at Gateway on Sunday only, which had sunny weather all day (though it was a little hot for me personally). Sure was glad it didn't rain at that place, a number of people crashed as it was without rain being a factor. Speaking of that does anyone know how the guy is doing that hit the wall and was transported to the hospital? When I went by him he was against the bare concrete wall and looked dazed, I hope he is doing ok. That transition onto the main straight banking sucks! I think it's worse than the transition from the infield onto the banking at Daytona.
     I got to see K3 do some wild break dancin' on the track while I was following close behind him, impressive to say the least! Glad to see he was up and ok and racing again later that afternoon.

[K3 Chris Onwiler]

OOOOOOOH Do the night fever night fever... ;D  $#it happens!

[Super Dave]

K3?  You fell over?

Greg Kritz was the guy that fell down.  I think he was concussed and decided that taking off his helmet and sitting there was a good idea.  His wife is a nurse, and she was pretty unhappy with him taking off his helmet.  Those are the only details I know.  I'm betting that he might think that he's Batman...

Mike, I am just realizing that I saw you at the track.  Duh!  Don't know your face, but the number 58 thing is in my head now that I'm on the board.

[Super Dave]

And, yes, this transition is a bit worse than Daytona's.  As a reasonable person, one must only go so fast in certain spots at Gateway since the potential for problems exist with the walls.

And to put this very plain and simple, last year I was vocal about my concerns about the location of the hay bales and the air fence stuff.  Didn't get moved last year.  This event I made my concerns known after the first practice, three rows, about nine feet, were moved.  Really not enough, but I didn't make a stink.  I really NEEDED to be further down.

[tigerblade]

I thought the placement of protection (haybales, airfence, whatever) was woefully inadequate.  I screwed up the transition a time or two and was bouncing up toward that gleaming white wall.  Talk about pucker factor...   :-X

[Dawn]

Yep....

Chris fell down again.  A little birdy told me so.

Dawn   ;)

[cabbage996]

Gateway is a terrible track, well at least parts of it.  What's the deal with that narrow area before the chicane?  It's about 3 feet wide.  I tossed my sv in the turn going up onto the back banking, luckily I didn't come anywhere near the walls as you all have said the stinking fence and bales where definately in the wrong place.  

[KBOlsen]

K3... whaddaya mean you fell down again????

You okay?
Bike?

Geez... I can't leave you alone for a minute, can I! ;)

[K3 Chris Onwiler]

Geeze!  Guess I've gotta do a race report!  The BAD SRAD was way faster, but scary abrupt in it's power delivery.  Track conditions were muddy, and I was having confidence problems.  I still don't have the correct springs, (Terminal backorder... Dave?  E me with that phone # please.)  SD did what he could with the suspension, but the bike was very hard to ride.
I got a 4th in F39.5, then finished last in GTO.  More tweaks and a change in gasoline gave me a much better (still not right) bike to ride.  I decided to enter 2 races on Sunday.  For the first time all season, I was feeling racy!  First race, Doc Stein was in front of me, and looking just too tasty to leave alone.  I came whipping into the infield s-turn, hammered right, left, throttle on, rear gone!!!!  Thought about the broken necks and ripped off arms that  the tire wall in those esses has produced in the past as I slid and tumbled, but luckily neither happened.  I was perfect, bike needed a de-mud, a pipe re-bend and a brake lever.  Out in the second race.  A lap to ensure that the bike was OK, then I set my sights on GSXR Mike.  Turn 2, lit the rear again.  Very close to a high side.  Stayed on the bike, but I saw God for sure.    This was just wrong.  I really wasn't on the gas that hard the second time.  Parked it.  Took it to Tom Mason, and he noticed that the chain was too tight.  He said I was tying up the swingarm that way.  Oops!  I hope that adjusting the chain, new springs, (PLEASE!!!) and a stock throttle to replace the 1/4 turn model will keep the damn thing under me.  Score so far, 2 weekends, 2 crashes...

[Dawn]

Thanks for the report Chris....

I would have asked Paul, but he was pretty incoherent when he rolled in at 5:00 a.m. this morning.   :o

Dawn   ;)

PS  You will have to let me know if he was too big of a pain in the rear.   ;)  We don't let him out in public much  ;D

[r1owner]

Geeze!  Guess I've gotta do a race report!  The BAD SRAD was way faster, but scary abrupt in it's power delivery.  Track conditions were muddy, and I was having confidence problems.  I still don't have the correct springs, (Terminal backorder... Dave?  E me with that phone # please.)  SD did what he could with the suspension, but the bike was very hard to ride.
I got a 4th in F39.5, then finished last in GTO.  More tweaks and a change in gasoline gave me a much better (still not right) bike to ride.  I decided to enter 2 races on Sunday.  For the first time all season, I was feeling racy!  First race, Doc Stein was in front of me, and looking just too tasty to leave alone.  I came whipping into the infield s-turn, hammered right, left, throttle on, rear gone!!!!  Thought about the broken necks and ripped off arms that  the tire wall in those esses has produced in the past as I slid and tumbled, but luckily neither happened.  I was perfect, bike needed a de-mud, a pipe re-bend and a brake lever.  Out in the second race.  A lap to ensure that the bike was OK, then I set my sights on GSXR Mike.  Turn 2, lit the rear again.  Very close to a high side.  Stayed on the bike, but I saw God for sure.    This was just wrong.  I really wasn't on the gas that hard the second time.  Parked it.  Took it to Tom Mason, and he noticed that the chain was too tight.  He said I was tying up the swingarm that way.  Oops!  I hope that adjusting the chain, new springs, (PLEASE!!!) and a stock throttle to replace the 1/4 turn model will keep the damn thing under me.  Score so far, 2 weekends, 2 crashes...

I'm pretty sure my wife got the first one on tape.  Let me know if you want an MPEG of it.

I still can't understand why there aren't more haybales/airfence there.  When I am coming out of the last turn or turn 7 and start applying throttle (a lot later than most apparently ;)) and am most likely to crash, all I see is concrete wall!  Why is that?  Why can't they move the bales/airfence down the track a little more?

[K3 Chris Onwiler]

I'm pretty sure my wife got the first one on tape.  Let me know if you want an MPEG of it.

Oh yeah!!!!  I'd love to have it!!!  How can we arrange this?