Thumper Club Forum
Club House => Chatter => Topic started by: OMEGAMAN on April 17, 2008, 01:06:07 AM
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Had a sweet & sour weekend at Snetterton Supermonos on 12th & 13th. I finished my tzr/xt640 at about 2pm on Friday afternoon (early this year) & Simon & I made our way down.
Up early on Sat morn for scrutineering & both bikes past with no problems. Went out for practice/qualifying (all one session) & to my pleasant suprise, the bike ran well, handled well & braked well, as well as being quite a good riding position. Got in about 8 laps & steadily improved my times (still not great though!), so was looking forward to the race later. Simon didn't fair very well though (on his first visit to the track) as he only managed to do 1 lap before going wide at the esses & sitting in the gravel for the rest of the session.
Race time.
We both lined up alongside Andy Duncan on the back row (my clutch feeling very woolly?), the lights changed & off, everybody zooming off except me, chronic clutch slip meant a slow getaway & also slow pickup out of all the corners, so for me it was a case of getting to the finish as best I could, which I succeeded in doing, so I personally was happy with the result even if it was last place!.
Simon on the other hand was having a good run, having past me down the straight & slowly pulling away all the time until I couldn't see him. Then, after about 5 laps he had to pull off with a flat tyre (huge piece of wire thru it), so he was well miffed!.
Put the bike in the trailer to work on it in the dry later in the day & stripped the clutch, finding the inside half of the metal plates a nasty blue colour (the actual friction plates looking fine). Anyway, I had a complete spare clutch with me (Don't ask me why I bought it along?), so on Sun morning I fitted the best looking parts off both & managed to finish fitting it all together in time to get out for the main race. Started the bike on some rollers, clutch felt ok, got down to the grid (with 30 seconds to spare!) & away on 2 warm up laps (found the track had a massive oil spill on it covered with dust which was very unnerving). Lined up as the previous day (but Simon was missing), I found out later that he had stalled it on the warmup lap & had to start from pit lane. Got a reasonable start but couldn't cope with the oil/dust line & lost far too much time avoiding it, finding myself in the last position again after Simon had blasted past. Again, just wanting to finish but managing to run out of fuel two corners from home (forgot to top up tank!). Simon faired a lot better, managing to pass both me & Andy to get his first Supermono finish & well deserved.
All in all, I was pleased with both my bike & my performance (confidence returning) & enjoyed the weekend (as did Simon eventually)
Only got a few small niggles to sort out & looking forward to the next races. Will keep you posted!!!!