Page 39, some more changes...

Well, hello again! I know, I know, it's been a little while since my last entry, but there hasn't been much to report on lately, up until this week that is!

I was fortunate enough to work a shift with Traffic Management on a job site last week that the Hamilton branch was supposed to be covering, but for a lack of staff they sent myself and a couple of other guys from the Auckland branch to it for one day. Way out in the middle of nowhere, we found ourselves on an old gravel forestry road, assisting a crew who where building a set of retainer walls on the road edge to stop it breaking away and falling down the cliff. The road was nice and quiet, so rather than just stand around I decided to jump in and help the work crew out. Well, lo and behold, at the end of the day their boss came up to me and asked if I'd like a job! Pretty significant payrise, plus a few other benefits, so when he rang me back on Saturday morning I said yes! So, as of Monday I've been working on the same site, we're getting further up the road to the third wall now, it's much more enjoyable work and I'm getting paid a whole heap more now too! Plus no more night shifts, we get weekends off, travel allowance, I've got my own work truck and fuel card, it's awesome! Sure, the work is pretty physical at times, but it'll be great to get back in shape again! (FYI: I was only a casual staff member at Traffic Management, so was able to give short notice and start pretty much immediately with the new job...)

So, due to the change in jobs and the extra pay cheque, I was lucky enough to be able to attend another 'Playday On Track' event yesterday, with the bike, and despite the on / off weather conditions, I had a blast! It started off pretty wet, but then the sun came out and we had three perfect sessions with a nice dry track. I found my cornering lines again pretty quickly, and the bike ran flawlessly all day. The rain came back in force mid-afternoon, so I decided to finish up early, rather than risk an accident. Lots of people were coming over and saying how cool my bike was, and how well I was going on the track, giving me tips and advice for certain sections, and boosting my confidence! Being that I'm still only a beginner when it comes to the track, and still very slow compared to some of the others, I was more than happy for the comments! One of the guys that was helping instruct our class was from Spectrum Kawasaki, up here on the shore, he had heaps to offer, even saying we could car pool our bikes down to the track together in future as we live pretty close together. He made a point of telling me about another 'school', namely the "California Superbike School", who take all forms of motorcycle rider and teach them skills to vastly improve their riding, suited to both road and track. I had heard of this course previously, but hadn't put serious thought to it until now. So, now that my finances are on the rise again finally, I'm going to start saving up for a two day course down in Taupo later on this year. It seems to be the one course that all the experienced riders rave about, so I have to go and see for myself! Watch this space for further updates! :-)

Huge thanks of course to Ash, Gary, Tony, and all the team at Playday On Track! You guys put together an awesome day, the track was fantastic, and I had a blast! Also thanks to Tuna (yep, that's his name!) from Spectrum Kawasaki, you're a legend mate! I wouldn't have had nearly as much fun if you hadn't shared your advice and watched me on track. When you passed me with a big 'thumbs-up', that made my day! Cheers mate!

Other than that, there hasn't been much to report, as I mentioned earlier, so I'm off to give the bike a good clean, return the trailer we borrowed (from my partner's brother, thanks Barry!) and enjoy the rest of my weekend off!

Hope everyone out there in internet-land is doing well too! Keep smiling!

Until next time...!

:-)

Page 38... A very long rain check...

Well, a few of you may have noticed I've been a bit slack on the posts lately... Things here have been very quiet as of late, with only a couple of highlights in the last couple of months.

The Nightspeed crew recently held the final round of the 'dragwars' competition, which we went to support, as a friend was at the top of the points for the ladies class. I was lucky enough to win a bunch of free tickets to the event, courtesy of 4'n'rotary promotions. I decided pretty much last minute to see how fast our car would run, just for the fun of it, it's a 1996 Mitsubishi Legnum 2.5L V6 non-turbo. Admittedly, it's not made for racing, but I was pretty chuffed with the quarter mile times I got. I was more worried about breaking something, than anything else, so only ran a couple of passes. I was there mainly to support my friend in the ladies class, which she ended up winning, and taking out the season championship! Everyone was stoked for her, due to the fact that she was on a bike, racing against all the other girls in their cars! Personally, having taken both the car and the bike down the strip now, I can say it's much more fun on the bike, and if I'm allowed, I'll be taking the bike back in the future. I think if I change the sprockets to a lower ratio, I'd be able to get a high 13 at least, which would put the bike pretty close to being on par with the 400cc bikes that run... add to that a couple of other small changes that will take place over the winter, and the bike should be running even better for next season!

As I mentioned in my last post, my partner and I also took our Legnum to a show'n'shine day, organised by a local mag wheel business. A couple of my friends from NZBlokes.co.nz (insert shameless plug here!) had a bikini car-wash running as well, which was great entertainment for the day! Even the rain couldn't dampen the spirits too much! I didn't get a count of how many cars were in attendance, but the carpark was pretty much overflowing, with all sorts of cars, from hard core track cars to old school street cars, heaps of Skyline's, Evo's, and Sylvia's, even a couple of rare Honda NSX's! All in all we had a great day out, cheers to Nic and Matt and the girls from NZBlokes.co.nz, keep up the good work!

Last weekend I received an invite to go hang out with a bunch of my biker mates in the Fat Bikers Motorcycle Club, at the Riverhead Tavern, where the club president and good friend "Fatt Max" was playing in the Blues lineup. I have to say, if you haven't met him yet, you should definitely do so, he's a top bloke! I haven't met anyone quite like him in all my travels, he's just an absolute blast to hang out with! Funny as all hell too, might I add! Catching up with him and the rest of the Fat Bikers was awesome, I highly recommend anyone and everyone out there, be you a biker or not, you should go meet them! They're regulars at the Riverhead, and always out and about on rides for charities, as well as a bunch of other stuff, look them up on Facebook! (Was that yet another shameless plug? Lol) Their symbol is a steaming hot pie, you'll know it when you see it! :-)

Well, that's pretty much all I have at the moment, hope the wet weather isn't getting to you too much, keep an eye on this blog in the future, even though it's been over a year since starting it I'm still gonna keep it going! Stay safe out there!

Till next time!

:-)

Page 37... BBDO!

Would you believe it, I've had yet another absolutely epic weekend at the track! Only difference being, this time I got to ride! Hampton Downs racetrack hosted the "Big Bike Day Out", a new event organised and run by the awesome crew at Playday On Track. Two days worth of bikes doing laps, at a comfortable pace for pretty much any rider! Last weekend was the first in a new ten year venture between the organizers and Hampton's, and it was a huge success! Saturday had a reported 120 bikes, some of who continued into the 100 odd that made up Sunday's numbers. Add to that a few cruisers, some extremely quick Super-Karts (on Sunday), as well as a small contingent of classic cars, it was pretty packed! One of the countries top suspension gurus was there giving out free advice, as well as the teams from the local Kawasaki and Honda shops. There was no end of cool toys for any avid biker to admire!!!

The organizers somehow managed to squeeze in 6 full sessions for each group on both days, which I thought was pretty amazing in itself! I only had enough finances to attend on the Sunday, but I spoke with a few people that did both days and the story was the same all round - there wasn't a single complaint to be heard! From what I could gather, everyone in attendance thought the event was top notch. Even the top Superbike guys were happy to chat, share advice, and give the newbies (ie: me!) any help we might need to improve upon our skills.

First session out, I was pretty nervous, and only turned in some pretty slow laps. I'm not entirely sure, but the rear tire on my little 250 felt a bit squirmy, and I wasn't getting as much top end power as I thought I should be. So at the end of the session I pulled back into the pits to check my tire pressures, and drop a couple of PSI out of the rear. Quick check of the oil and water, anything that might have come loose, bolts, etc, then it was pretty much time for the second go! Straight away, once back out on track, the bike felt way more stable through the turns, and I was getting better power out of the turns, which kept the revs more in the "power" range, thus giving me more top end, especially down the main straight. The whole bike really felt like it was working properly, which had me smiling! I finally got the rear tire heating up enough to start scuffing it on the turns, and my leaning is definitely looking better than before. I was told the track temperature at mid-afternoon was 54 degrees Celsius!

I skipped the third session to talk suspension with the guru himself, Mr Robert Taylor! Such a worthwhile decision, he has just sent me an email following up on our discussion, detailing in specific a whole bunch of small things I can do with my setup, even though I don't have any 'proper' adjustable settings like most new sport bikes have. Simple things like filling my forks with slightly more oil, to reduce the air gap, or installing longer spacers on shorter springs to reduce the spring friction inside the fork tubes... Lots of things the average biker would never think about! Whether or not I'll even be able to feel the difference if I do slightly change anything, I don't know, but it's nice to know that I can change things up eventually if I choose to.

For the rest of the sessions on track, I concentrated on my lines through corners, focusing on things I had been told by previous instructors, and got quite a good flow on by the end of the day! My confidence in my tires, suspension, and throttle control are definitely growing with every lap, and even though I'm far from what others would call "fast", I reckon I'm doing pretty good!

The only slight issue I had throughout the day was the bike overheating towards the end of sessions, but only if I was changing gears over 14 thousand RPM. If I shifted before 14k, the bike's temp stayed in the middle, but if I got even close to the 19k redline then things started to get hot quite quickly. I think I need to upgrade to a bigger radiator, and my research has found that one off an NSR250 will fit with only small modifications, and has a thicker core for more fluid. Apart from that though, the bike is running mint!

Anyways, a huge thanks to Ash and Gary and Tony from Playday On Track, you guys put on a great event! I'm already looking forward to the next one!
Next weekend my partner and I are taking our car to a show'n'shine, something a little different to the usual I know, but bound to be fun too!

Check out some quick pictures from the track below, I've also uploaded a full set to my Flickr account...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/s_a_patterson/sets/72157632845196186/

Till next time!

:-)

Page 36!

So, now that I'm recovered from the weekend, I can share my experience with you lot! It was a really long day, with a LOT of action (mostly on the track) but heaps of fun all in all. If you haven't been keeping up to date on my posts, I was marshalling at Battle Of The Streets, one of the bigger events in New Zealand motorbike racing calendar! Held in Paeroa, it's a full on street attack, and I happened to be marshalling on the best (or worst, if you look at it that way) corner! A tight left-hander, with big hay bales on the outside and little bales on the inside, a lot of which moved a considerable amount during the course of the day! The turn probably totalled about 100 degrees, definitely more than 90 anyways, coming off a decent little downhill straight. More than a few of the bikes came in too hot and had to over-brake to negotiate the turn, of which we had a bunch of machines put into the outside bales! Suffice to say, it was a very busy day picking up broken bikes, and riders... I think I pushed a total of 8 or 9 bikes off over the course of the day, almost all from impacting the outside bales. One of the sidecars actually flipped over on top of the rider! Fortunately, he and his swinger (the mad man on the back of the bike - see the pictures below) we're okay, more just upset with the damage to their bike. However, more than a few riders we're unlucky enough to be taken away in the ambulance, after a spate of rather nasty crashes around different sections of the track. My heart really goes out to those who feel the harsher side of motorsport... I won't go on any further about that, but those who understand what I'm talking about will know I'm thinking of them and their loved ones...

Anyways, for myself personally it was a bloody good weekend - some scary moments, some awe inspiring moments too! I still can't fathom how the really quick guys can get round corners as fast as they do, it just doesn't seen physically possible to me!

Things are progressing rather nicely here at my abode, my partner Abbee has just finished her last day of work before she starts her course, which I know she is greatly excited (and more than a little nervous) about! I'm so glad she is finally out of the factory work, it was slowly eating her away... Still, one good thing came about from that job, we met each other! So I shouldn't complain too much I guess... But still, onwards and upwards, as they say, each step is merely the predecessor of the one that follows! My new (-ish) job is going great, there are already options being discussed for my future role withing Traffic Management, which is pretty cool! I've gotten the hang of it again really quickly, the simple stuff that I had forgotten since leaving the Hamilton branch is once again like second nature to me now. I'm hoping to keep rolling the hours in, keep my timesheet full, and keep things at home stable while Abbee is studying. Fortunately though, my work is hugely fun, so I'm happy to keep pulling long hours for our households sake. And I get plenty of time to keep my new found track addiction content, so really I haven't lost out at all! Come winter, and a decline in track days, I'm sure I'll go at least a little crazy, but that's almost the norm anyways with bikers, right?

Next weekend I'm off to do some aforementioned track riding, at Hampton Downs once again, for the "Big Bike Day Out". The aim is to take my time again, get used to the bike, and try to get a better feel for what's happening around the corners. I'm only gonna be in the slow group, so I won't feel bad holding anyone else up. The weather is looking like it's gonna be a mint weekend, so hopefully the next post you'll see will be full of pics of me on the track again!

Till then!

:-)

Page 35, more of a "what's coming"...

Well, it's looking like a pretty busy month ahead, I've been invited to events pretty much every weekend in March! Not that I'm complaining, though! I'm not really looking forward to winter, this year, having the bike parked up in the shed for months before I can play at the track again... So, I figure, may as well enjoy the sun while I can!

This weekend I'm off to the infamous "Battle of the Streets", Paeroa's annual motorbike raceday, which promises to be an amazing experience! I'm not racing, only marshalling, but it'll be my first time going to the event, and from what I've heard it's one not to miss. A bunch of my friends are going as well, to add to the fun! (I'm actually finishing this post from the hotel just down the road from where the racing is happening tomorrow, sorry about that! Lol)

Next weekend I'm attending and riding at an open track day, organised by the nice people at "Playday On Track". The event is called Big Bike Day Out, and it's the first in a new ten year venture between the organizers and the Hampton Downs racetrack folk. It's actually a whole weekend worth of bikes on track, but I only plan on going to the Sunday sessions. In any case, it should be huge fun all round, and I hope to see a bunch of friends there again! I'm looking forward to getting more seat time on my bike, more practice and experience with my cornering skills, as well as just the chance to go for a blat again!

On the 3rd of March I've booked my car into a show down the line at an event organised by the same people that did the drag day a few weeks ago, I've entered to run down the drag strip again, but in the car this time as they aren't holding an open group for track bikes. Otherwise I'd take the bike for sure! I'm not going to thrash the car though, being that it's my daily driver, I don't want to break anything, I'd just be keen to see what it can do in an open environment. But again, it's more for the enjoyment of attending, and catching up with friends, that drew my attention to wanting to go.

The weekend after that I'll be another year older, my birthday is on the 10th, and I'm thinking about having some friends over for a few (or more!)drinks. No bike or car events that weekend, but never the less, this year is turning into a bloody good one and so I wanna celebrate! So if you're not doing anything, feel free to come celebrate with me!

Then, on the 16th and 17th, Hampton Downs will come alive again to the sound of superbikes! I've put my name down to Marshall again on the Sunday, we'll see how things are going, but I might be convinced to do the Saturday as well (if my loving partner doesn't mind me disappearing for yet another full weekend, that is!) It was this event a year ago that I first started marshalling at the bike racing, and pretty much a year since I started writing this blog! Wow how the time has flown by, I can't believe how much things have changed in my life since then. Initially, I started writing this thinking it was going to be mostly about my escapades with riding, but plans have a tendency of changing without us even noticing sometimes, huh! Funny how that happens, and even funnier when we end up in a much better situation than we could have hoped for... I've been looking back on some of the stuff I've written, and remembering back to those days is pretty cool, knowing how it all turned out with only minimal input from myself! I do have a lot of people to thank, of course, and you all know who you are. So Thanks guys, you're the best bunch of mates a guy could ever ask for! :-)

Anyhow, I have been doing some internet-ing lately, and a friend forwarded a link to me about a guy in London that does a video log (vlog for those in the know!) about his musings while riding his bike. I thought I'd share it for my readers, I've watched a few of the videos on YouTube, and found them quite enjoyable! He has a pretty funny take on life in general, as well as some fairly interesting thoughts on the whole "being a biker" mindset. Feel free to have a look and decide for yourself!

http://www.youtube.com/user/BaronVonGrumble?nomobile=1

Till next time...

:-)

Page 34... Mates Matter!

Today saw an unusual turn of events: a good friend asked me to help him out with putting his bike back together. Now, while this may not seem strange to some, I'm just not very used to being asked for my help! Of course I said "no problem!" but it has led me to wondering, how many of you nice folk out there are indeed 'home garage handymen' (or handywomen)? I wonder if anyone else out there realizes that they can call me anytime for mechanical (or electrical) help? Well, may as well put it out there, those of you that know me, or anyone else for that matter, if you have something on your mind to do with your motorvehicle, contact me! Either through here, or my Facebook, or if you are lucky enough to have my phone number, call or text me! I am trying to get as many hours as possible at work at the moment, but I'm always available (after consulting my little black book of course!) to help out mates. In my mind, and especially when it comes to bikes, mates do matter!

I may not be fully qualified or greatly experienced in the motorbike field, but I do know a little bit, and I'm more than happy to share what I do know. My background, for what it's worth, is mostly in cars, I have worked in the automotive mechanical and electrical fields in the past, as well as having several other positions of employment in various other automotive roles (grooming, service driver, fitting audio and alarms, even tires...) but if you've been following this blog, you'll know that I've just finished a full rebuild of my own bike, bringing it back to better than new. I have also previously 'freshened up' a Ducati 916, 'ground-up' rebuilt a 1975 Morris Mini, and spent more days than I can count working on my own (and my mates) various cars and bikes.
Basically, if it needs fixing, servicing, adjusting, or even maybe a complete rebuild (cringe!!!) then I'd be more than happy to render assistance! If it's a nice easy small job, I don't ask for anything in return, to me mates helping mates is way more important than anything. Although, if anyone decides to send me their machine for a rebuild (complete or in pieces!) I'm sure we could work something out. I doubt that'll happen, just putting it out there of course!

To be honest, I wouldn't mind another project to keep my days off busy, so IF anyone does have something in mind, feel free to send me a message!

Till then...

:-)

Page 33 :-) Drags!!!

Hi again to my faithful readers, glad to see you're all still with me! Amazingly I see my view counter is picking up again, even after such a long time of no posts! Last weekend was a long weekend here, and I went to one of the countries biggest automotive shows for two days, the first being a show 'n shine day, followed by a day at the drag strip.

I decided last minute to take my bike to the drag strip after talking to the officials at the show, and I'm really glad I did! Late registration was at 6am, so we (my partner and I) had to get up at 4!

Arriving at the drag strip still in darkness, I got my registration forms filled out (thanks to Adele from the 4nR crew!) and got set up. Because my bike is now a dedicated 'track' bike, I was put into the exhibition class, with other race bikes and cars. My first pass was held up a little bit due to a technical fault - the starting lights were playing up - so I had to sit on the start line for about an hour waiting for the problem to be fixed. Once that was rectified, I ran a 14.39 second pass! Friends had told me before the event that I'd be doing well if I got into the 14's, so as you can imagine I was pretty stoked! All in all I didn't really stand much of a chance against much higher powered vehicles, but my best time of 14.263 wasn't too bad I thought! Remembering that my bike is 23 years old and only a 250cc! Anyways, after all the classes had finished, we were allowed to run a few grudge match passes. I was lucky enough to meet a few other bikers there, who gave me heaps of encouragement throughout the day, and I was even luckier to be allowed to have a few races against a Repsol CBR600RR in the grudge matches. Of course, I got my butt kicked, but I wasn't stressing nearly so much by then and managed to get my launch sorted a little bit better. All in all, I had a blast, definitely planning on going back again once I have a proper drag racing license, it's so much fun! Oh, and the bike ran pretty much faultlessly again, apart from one minor incident of a sticky throttle (easily fixed with some cable lube.)

Huge thanks again to all the 4nR crew for putting on an awesome event, and the fellow bikers that calmed my nervousness and shared their knowledge, as well as my lovely partner Abbee for putting up with me despite the sunburn!

Next event, Big Bike Day Out, on the 24th of February, can't wait!!!

Till then!

:-)

Page 32 and a half...!

Sorry about that, had to go pick Abbee up from her work. Things are going really well on that front too, by the way!

Now, where was I... Oh yeah, progress of the last couple of months... I've applied for a 3 year degree course at Uni, looking forward to hearing if I've gotten in! Abbee has been accepted to the vet nursing course she applied for, it'll do her good to follow her dreams... Everyone has been telling me for ages to get into something to do with "writing", so now I can finally say Thank You to everyone for pushing me to follow my dreams too! Bit nervous actually, it's been a long while since I've been in any classroom type situation, I hope my brain hasn't deteriorated too much over the last few years!

Other than that, I've successfully completed my very first Advanced Rider Training (or A.R.T. for short) day, and I have to say, I had the best time ever!!! Only had a couple of very small issues with the bike, nothing I couldn't fix between track sessions. The chain was fractionally tight, and the clutch was a bit tight too. Basically, at high revs, the motor was over riding the clutch, causing too much slip. Loosened it off at the adjuster on the lever, problem solved! And the chain, obviously, was easy enough to loosen slightly too, with the help of a friends rear stand. Went back out onto the track for the second session, and Bazinga! no more problem. :-) So yeah, very proud of my little 250, and the fact that she still hasn't let me down, even after more than 20 years of service! And to anyone interested in riding on the track, I say Do It!!! You won't regret it, that's for sure!

On the job front, I've started back with Traffic Management NZ again, working for my old boss that used to run the Hamilton office. Today was my first day back on the truck again, and I loved it! Being outside, working with a really cool bunch of people, makes the factory work I was doing seem like hell! The story with that was, the pay department wasn't going to pay out our holiday entitlement, so arguments ensued, then I got accused of "threatening behaviour", and dismissed for serious misconduct... Long story short, they didn't follow proper conduct in the way they fired me, so now I'm talking to a lawyer about it. Early days yet, but from what I've heard, I've got quite a strong case! So glad to be out of there in any case, it was doing my head in. I mean, the work was fine, and I enjoyed the technical side of the factory work, but certain individuals made it unbearable... Why is it that some people just feel they have to act all queenly, and make others feel like crap every day? I'm glad Abbee only has 4 and a half weeks left before her course starts! I feel guilty for leaving her to cope with the old hags on her own, but I'm sure she'll be fine, especially knowing that she's gonna be handing in her notice soon enough. I know she'll be happy once her course is underway! :-)

So, as I said, things are progressing very well so far for 2013, despite small tedious issues, the cloud is parting ways to show it's silver lining more and more every day...! Sorry again for the lack of posts, hopefully that will change for the better from now on, now that my head isn't stressed out with dramas. And I've discovered an 'app' for my phone (Samsung Galaxy S3, sooo much better than my old Sony Ericsson!) that plugs me straight into my blog too, even though I got a new laptop for Xmas I still haven't quite got it up to speed just yet. Blogspot, some free advertising for you here, good work on your app! Nice and easy to use, 5 stars from me. Thanks!

To everyone out there still reading my dribble, thanks for bearing with me and keeping me on the right path. Look forward to seeing you all out there on the road or at the track sometime soon!

Till then...!

:-)

Page 32, a long time coming!

Wow, I never could have imagined how things would change so quickly in my life, seems like only yesterday I posted up here saying sorry for not posting for so long! Well, things as I said have changed, I've just started another new job (after being fired from the factory over the Xmas break... long story, don't ask...), the bike has been completely transformed into a track bike, with new parts galore, been to my first proper track day, and I've applied to university for a journalism degree!

Haha just typing that, I'm still amazed myself at the progress I've made in life in the last couple of months! Anyways, the bike is finally finished, completely rebuilt from the ground up, with powder coated frame, swing arm and sub frame, the motor has been pulled down and given a good going over from top to bottom, balanced and put back together to the exact manufacturers specs, front shocks stripped and rebuilt, new bolts front to back, new paint on all the bits that needed it, fairings, tires, brake pads, cables, hoses, lines, etc etc etc... I'm really quite proud of how it's all come back together, if I do say so myself! Only problem is, now I've got nothing to do with my free time! It got to the point that every day I had more than a couple of hours to play with, I'd go down to the garage (my workshop) and no-one would see me for the rest of the day! Now I don't have anything else to do on the bike, I'm struggling to keep myself busy with my free time! Lol well, if that's all I have to complain about, things can't be too bad, huh?

Whoops, just realized I've gotta go pick up my partner from her work, will post more in a few minutes...

Till then...!