hot, hot fun

My Dad and I spent the weekend at the kart track just north of denton racing with the TMGP guys. Overall the weekend went really well, but saturday was downright brutal. I believe the news said the air temp was about 105 and the heat index well over 110. Someone at the track with a heat gun said that the track temp was 128, and the ambient air temp was 108. Those are some nasty numbers when you're attempting a 4 hour endurance race on a 2 man team. Originally i was suppose to be running on two different teams in one race, but lucky for me one of the bikes broke early in the race. Theres no way i could have done both and i was feeling bad that i had over committed.

I ran with Alan on Stuart's KX65 powered ysr (65cc water cooled 2stroke, pictured above). It was crazy fast and lots of fun. unfortunately it was just too hot out to enjoy it and start pulling good lap times. i was averaging 51-53 second lap times, and alan was doing around 47 seconds. the original plan was for alan to do 1 hour stints and for me to do 30 minute stints, but neither one of us could stay out for more than 25 minutes before we had to come in. Every time i got off the bike i thought i was either going to throw up, or pass out. It was one of those days where you wonder why you're even out there and just want to give up. In the end we wound up with a 3rd place, so we did alright.

Sunday was much better. The temps were probably about the same, or worse, but sunday is sprint day. That means you only go out on the track for one 8 lap race at a time, which works out to probably about 12 minutes per race. I had about 30-40 minutes between each race, so i had plenty of time to drink fluids and try to cool down. My bike was running great and i did fairly well. I finished 4th in a couple races and managed a 3rd in another, but the highlight of my day was passing and beating "Fast Frank" in the backwards race after he made a small mistake. I was running 15:44 gearing and it was perfect. no topping out between turns. Tires were at about 20 and 21 psi cold. My lap times got down to the 49 second range according to dad's stop watch, which is about 2 seconds faster than i've ever done before on that bike. actually, thats the best lap times i've done out of all the bikes i've run there, even the faster kx65 and 60! not bad.

I did have one good spill during one of the sunday races. I was going through turn 3 (tight right hander) and lost the rear on the exit. It came all the way around and i found myself spinning on my belly down the middle of the track. at one point i managed to look up and saw an XR100 coming straight for me. I knew he was going to run me over, and i felt him hit me, but i didn't know where. Its weird what you remember and don't remember from crashes. I had no idea where he had hit me. It must have looked pretty dramatic because everyone was a little worried that i was hurt, but i was fine. I got up, picked up the bike and continued racing. The guy on the XR came and found me later to see if i was alright and told me that he hit me right in the chest. he had to choose between that and my head.