The first ride - A day of function

Eh up,

So yesterday i rode for the first time since September. We decided to take the plunge and risk an Oulton park trackday to test out the new bike and get back into the swing of things for 2011, and unsurprisingly for an early Febuary trackday, the weather wasn't on our side!
An early rising saw me arrive at about 07:30 to the FE ran day, with a wet tyre shod bike set up in the garage with MexicoPaul, Ryan Myler, Tom Meehan and Luke Tansley, and my Dad and Claire Domoney pit bitching, it was an almost entire Thundersport garage.

My goals for the day were to make the bike comfortable. I'm extremely pedantic when it comes to ride geometry, and it turned out i spent pretty much the whole day adjusting bars, levers, rearsets, seat foam, and gear lever position, so that i could go out and have none of them on my mind at all. It's no good tipping in to meet your apex and having "these bars feel wide" entering your head!

Also, the red numberboard showing through on the inside of the screen lit up like a traffic light when the white shift light came on, which was extremely off putting, so that got the black tape treatment too!

I guess new bike, my longest ever lay off, of five months, a rainy day and a notoriously difficult Oulton, culminated in my first ever day where i was nervous. It's never ever happened before, but i was nervous setting out to ride. I initially forgot the aims of the day. It wasn't a day for fun, rather function. To make my bike comfortable and make sure it worked as it should, not to battle anyone who overtook me and see red when i was passed!

Ryan reminded me of this before i rode, and by the end of the day, with a thousand and one adjustments, i was extremely happy with how the day went. The first session highside attempt on the crest of deers leep was a massive moment i'd be happy not to repeat, although the wntire pit wall seemed to love it!

So, a very wet day at arguably the best track in the country to start things off for 2011. The bike feels natural now to sit on, and it feels fast! Tuesday and i'm out again at Oulton. Cross your fingers for dry weather and i'll be working on getting the suspension something like right, to make a 40+ second dint into my best of 2:27 lap yesterday!!!!!

Thanks to my Dad and Claire for their work in the pits, and to Ian and Martin at www.pipewerx.com for the baffle that got me through the frightfully quiiet 102dB day. Also a big thanks to Darren Ross from Aberdeen, who travelled down for a ride and lent me a helmet!

More updates soon! Bongo x x x