Round 1 and 2 Cadwell Park 15th – 16th March

As usual for Cadwell in March the weather was going to play a major factor in the races – especially with the longer half hour races this year tyre choice would be all important.

Colin Leader from 100 % Suspension had kindly managed to help me with some fork difficulties and had got together with K-Tech to supply some amazing forks for the bike, we had tripped to Cadwell the weekend before to get some settings and unfortunately blown up the engine so we had spent all week slotting a standard engine in and getting Stevo on the SeaStar dyno to pop us a map in that would make the bike run to its best! Cheers Vince for the Dyno and cheers to Steve it made all the difference!  The only problem we had was making the bike tick over as to adjust the tick over on the triumph you need bits that we didn’t have available in the time so it was a bit hard at times especially in the slower corners.

Sat morning and we are praying for rain as the horsepower difference shouldn’t make such a big difference – the standard engine wasn’t a particularly fast one and we knew we would be up against it, qualifying was damp and we managed to pull a 5th place out of the bag so we were happy enough with that.  Unfortunately it had dried out for the first race so we knew it would be hard, I got a bad start – this being the first race start ever on a 600 but managed to hold on for a few laps, but then I started getting swamped and dropped down to around 8th place, I think this kick started me a bit and I managed to hold station and then pulled the gaggle of riders back in and was all over their tale, only the leader had cleared off so I was in the thick of it, I found it very hard to pass as all the ground I made up was lost again on the straights and putting a hard move in was hard as the damp patches were always waiting off line.  The bike was handling amazingly with the K-Tech forks really proving their worth. As it turned out I didn’t have to worry too much about passing as most of them jumped off and left me in 4th place with a real chance of 3rd as I was all over him in the twisties but just couldn’t make a move stick, but we crossed the line in 4th so we were happy enough with that.

Sunday night was a rough night, very windy and rainy and at 3am an awning from further down the paddock was blown over a couple of vans and hit the front of our caravan hard! So we were up in the night trying to dismantle the awning from the front our caravan before it all got blown away!

Racing was cancelled Sunday  morning and it looked like we would not get out at all, but at around 11am practice started.  First practice was scary with very hard side winds and a wet track with lots of lying water making it very difficult.  On the first lap of the race it was clear that the high wind was drying the track very quickly and my tyres were going to struggle, I was running in 4th when my tyres started moving and making the bike vibrate so hard I could not keep my feet on the pegs – luckily the pace car came out and slowed us down for a few laps otherwise I would not have finished the race, however in the last few laps I was completely swamped and limped home in 9th place – not happy but at least we finished as many didn’t.

For the second race it was dry mainly with a few puddles and streams across the track but we were back on dry tyres and expecting to get swamped again – however I managed to hold on to another close 4th place.  Not the best weekend racing we have ever had but we were one of the only riders to finish all three races so it wasn’t all bad.  I feel like I am in touch with the bike now and with a fast engine we can challenge for the win so role on Oulton!

By my calculations which have been known to be wrong on many occasions I think we are in 4th place in the championship.