SCminiGP Race + Star School!
Hey Everyone,
Had a fun-filled 4 days of riding this past weekend.
I feel like I have sun stroke though as I spent the entire 4 days as support crew for the kid.
We started the weekend off with practice at California Speedway and SCminiGP. They had a rough time getting their program started in the beginning but now everything seems to be pretty smooth sailing. If I had one complaint, it would be a lack of track time as we have to share the day with the Go-Kart guys and it eats up our time a lot. They have made a decision to start doing some events at The Grange circuit which is fine with us. A much better facility and we do not have to share with karts. Our next race will be held there and it is going to be a three day event. Javelin and I are both stoked with that since it was the track we ran the endurance race on and we both know it pretty well as you can imagine.
So Saturday practice went smoothly and Javelin was running pretty consistent 1:06 laptimes. They changed the configuration of the track slightly and this made it a bit faster. We spent the entire day working on cornering speed and getting the most out of corner exit. The 1:06 is still down quite a bit from what the fast guys but neither Javelin nor myself are concerned about it for now. We'll see how the rest of the series unfolds. Javelin can do with his own talents and his own bike so on to practice. The bike ran flawlessly all day and thats saying something since the motor is still running on the same topend that was on it for the endurance race. My personal schedule with work made it so that I had no time to change it out prior to the weekend so we just had to keep our fingers crossed that it would hold out ----- and it did. So it was 1:06's for the day and we both felt a little frustrated that we couldn't get anything more. I always have to remind myself that he has only been riding street bikes for 8 months and the GP bike for only about 2 months.
So we got a hotel room for the evening and crashed out pretty early. The heat of the day takes the wind out of your sails pretty quickly and 8:30 - 9PM comes around pretty quick............ZZzzzzzzzz. The next morning we got there about 8AM and got our pit setup. We have made some good friends already and a couple of them provided parts for us that got broken after the crash at the endurance race. Our fairings, upper fairing support and brake reservoir cover were all provided by friends at the track and we are totally grateful. Morning practice was yielding similar lap times to the practice on saturday so we more or less got over the times and focused more on technique. I was reminding Javelin to work on his reference points around
the track and to stay focused on the job at hand. The bike was still running great and we closed in on the heat race.
Heat Race:
The heat race went alright. The one thing Javelin has going in his favor right now is his starts. I guess this comes from his dirtbiking experience and he can get a launch as good as anyone on the grid. The green flag dropped and he got a great start into the first corner. There were 7 bikes running in the heat and Jav got a 4th into T1. He was doing a great job of holding his position but the 2 riders behind him took advantage of a couple of spots where he is weak and relagated him back to 6th. Sixth was what he brought home which put him in pretty good shape for the main. So not last place but still stuggling to find the pace of the much more experienced riders up front.
Main Event:
The main was pretty much a carbon copy of the heat. He got a great launch again and held a 4th place position for 3 of the 7 laps. Eventually, he got worked over but it was different this time. You could definately see a more aggressive pace coming from Javelin especially after the first rider got around him. I started timing him and he was laying down 1:03 laptimes with a smokin' hot lap of a 1:01! This was "really" fast for Javelin and I think we broke down another barrier in his riding. He hung with the pack almost till the end and came across the finish line in 6th place about 2-3 seconds behind the 5th place rider. Much better than the heat and much better pace than he was running all weekend. We'll see how this translates at the next round. He told me after the race that he was determined to not let the pack get away from him and thats what got his laptimes down. He is starting to develop mentally now and is able to push himself beyond his comfort zone. This is important as a racer and is something that all racers face each time they get on the track. The ability to be able push yourself beyond what feels comfortable is definately something that takes time. What I have always been impressed with in Javelins riding is his smoothness. He has very good bike control and always appears to be in control of what
the bike is doing.
Star School!!
Well, Monday and Tuesday were dedicated to Jason Pridmores Star School. Javelin told me he was more excited about Star than the race at SCminiGP. He loves learning from Jason and his team but also says that The Streets Of Willow is one of his favorite tracks to ride. We got there pretty early on Monday and set up our pit area. Javelin headed into class and I stayed outside getting his bike ready. We brought the Ninja 250 as well as the GP bike to the track but Jav wanted to run the GP bike mostly. The Ninja stood silent as a backup in case the the GP took a dumper but that never happened. He did however run the Ninja for about 4 or 5 sessions over the 2 days to stay familiar with it. He is obviously more comfortable with the GP bike even though it is down on power from the Ninja. Since he had already done the school before, the classroom and track lessons were the same as before. The difference this time was all down to details. Mark and his coaches worked Jav pretty hard this time around and were constantly giving him advice and direction. Roger, one of the coaches, said that Javelin has all the big stuff worked out but now needs to focus on the little things (well, they are all big things I guess) like consistency, braking smoothness, body setup from corner to corner, etc. The boys did a fabulous job with the kid but day one was staying consistent at 1:41's. This is about what he was doing there before and he had wanted to hit a 1:39 at least this time around. I told him he has to have patience and it will come.
On day 2, it did come as he started running consistent 1:38 laptimes. Star Schools instruction was starting to show dividend on day 2 as Jav's smoothness and cornering speed just kept getting better. You could see it. As a matter of fact, I would go out on a limb and say that he had one of the fastest cornering speeds of anyone in the advanced group on Tuesday. They could catch him on the straight sections but no one was on his tail through any corner on the track that I could see. It was really fun to watch and we ended the day on a high note with his 1:38 laptimes and a pair of completely toasted knee pucks. Now I have that as a new expense to add to all the other expenses......lol
BTW - For those of you who weren't aware, Jason has gotten a fantastic ride in World Superbike! This is amazing for all of us Pridmore fans as Jason will be running the rest of the years races on a Honda CBR1000 RR. Now we have a World Superbike rider as a coach and that ain't a bad thing by no means!!
A special thank you to Mark and Jason for supporting Javelin and his efforts. Javelin feels a special bond with you guys and is always proud to tell his friends that he is a Star School rider. Looking forward to helping you guys out in return as his career in racing starts to develop more and more in the future.
Javelin is currently on holidays with his mom and brother in Canada. Dad had to stay home to continue working so .........here I am!! Our next event is in July so I will update everyone after that.
Stay well and thank you all for the continued support. Its all gonna pay off!
BTW - Enjoy the quick video snipit. Jav is on 814 which is now black and yellow (Hey, just like Jasons superbike!)
Best To All
Bernie and Javelin
Number 814