The race was held during VRRA’s vintage race weekend. The endurance races were held on the Friday. Our team consisted of Pat Boyd, Alan Burns and myself. Pat was eager to try to win the Sportsman Middleweight Endurance class title. Therefore, the bike selected was a 1995 Honda CBR600-F3 ex-works factory race bike as R.A.C.E. requires Sportsman MW bikes to be 10 years old or older.
Our journey to Shannonville began at a typical early morning start of loading up vehicles and traveling to the track. We arrived around 8:00am only to discover that it was rather unorganized. RACE was an invited party to the VRRA weekend. Therefore, the majority of the activities were coordinated by VRRA. So we spent the next few hours just running around trying to find out how to get registered, how to pass tech, etc. In the end, we were each wearing 3 bracelets. One for the admission, second for pit access, and third to indicate you are a racer. Don’t ask… We were actually able to get our bike and helmets go through tech even before we registered to race.
Once we finally got our paperwork done, we headed to pit lane. Pre-weekend schedule showed that we would be an alternating practice group with the VRRA every 15mins. VRRA had no schedules to hand out so we went with that. To no surprise, the schedule was out the window before the day even started. It was passed 9:30am and no bikes had even hit the track yet. Then, they decided to run a VRRA race school in the middle of this too.
Alan finally got a chance to get out on the track. As he exited pit land and was getting comfortable on the bike, he looked up to find that we were not running the scheduled LONG track configuration. It was the PRO track which means you have to hang a left just after you exit the pits. We later found out that they changed it at the last minute because they didn’t have enough marshals. After making his way half-way around the track, Alan gets a checkered flag on the back side of the track indicating the session was over. He never even got a chance to make a full lap.
No biggy we figured as there was another session for us before lunch. So we waited 15mins for the VRRA school to go out and do their stuff. After they were done, they called for the modern class SLOW and MEDIUM speed groups to go out and practice. We didn’t go out because we had been labeled as FAST. Naturally, we expected to go out next but instead VRRA was out again. So we went to ask. Turns out they had only a single FAST group session and it was the first one in the morning. So they said we should have just gone out in the slow/medium group. They tell us this AFTER the session. Argh!!! So we didn’t even get a single lap out before lunch.
After lunch, we had two 15min sessions before we got to race. We decided to split those sessions between two riders. For the first one, Alan went out for the first half and then me. I got about 5 laps in but it wasn’t going very well. The bike was sprung very stiff and I was bouncing everywhere. Also, the clutch adjuster screw was loose and I had problems shifting. For the next session, Pat went out for the first half and I again finished the session with about 4 or 5 laps. All-in-all, I got less than a dozen laps in before I had to race. Let’s not forget, it’s been almost a year since I last got onto a race track!
So finally the race. Alan was doing the first stint. Pat was second and I was last. We had decided to do ~20min stints. For this, we figured each rider would go out and do 15-lap stints. Alan was out first since it was his bike and he knew how to launch from the starting line better than us. We called him in after 14 laps and he was pretty tired. Pat went out and did about 10 laps before he signalled us he was coming in. He claims he thought the bike was out of gas but I think he’s just a wimp! 
Unfortunately, I wasn’t ready for his arrival so I still had my gloves to put on and that causes a small delay.
I went out and push as hard as I comfortably could. As mentioned earlier, the bike was just too stiff for me. Regardless, I stayed out until they called me in at 13 laps. They were starting to have some concerns that I would run out of gas with 37 laps on that single 18L tank. I was pretty beat up but actually felt good. I was impressed that I was able to get up to speed right from when I started my stint. To be honest, this race felt much different than my regular sprint-type races with current modern sportbikes. It was much more relaxed and the riders were all spread out. It actually felt more like a track day.
So then Alan went back out and did another 10 or 12 laps before we called him in early. Why you ask? Well because they made an announcement saying they were cutting us short by 30mins due to lack of remaining track time. So we had 15mins left making this a 1h30m race instead of 2hrs. Pat went out and I got ready again. We decided he would go out and run half-dozen laps or so and then I would go out and finish the race. Unfortunately, he did only a few laps and the race was over. I had gotten suited up for nothing once again.
Luckily, it was a good thing. As I was getting undressed, with the bike on its stand near me, I noticed the bike was leaking. For some reason, the overflow tube was leaking gas all over the rear shock, swingarm and exhaust. I could have been the next flaming fireball down the back straight!
To continue with the annoyances of the weekend, we still have no lap times from the transponder used at RACE and we have been told that we won’t know the official race finishing order until later this week. — Update (2006.06.22) – We finished 6th overall. We think we’re 1st in our class but that has not been made official.
In any case, I had fun when I was actually on the track. It was also nice to spend some time with friends I hadn’t seen in a while.
Thank you to Team ShoulderCheck.
Be sure to check out the gallery for more pictures.