Road Atlanta 6/27/09
Craziest weekend yet!! It all started with some trailer wiring problems that I had to work on when we were supposed to be leaving. Then we got stuck in traffic in Atlanta where it took 1 hr to go 12 miles. After 9 hrs of being in the truck, we arrived at the track and hung out with our friends for a while. At about 10:30 we decided to setup camp, and go to sleep. While setting up the air mattress, we discover a hole in it, so we had to patch it and wait about an hour before laying on it. Saturday morning we got our 2 practice sessions in, and I was feeling pretty good. Once again, I was running the solo race to use it as practice. It was already extremely hot at this point!! I started 20th on the grid, and after turn 1, I was in 6th place only to see a red flag waving because of a crash on the start. So after going back to the pits, only to be called right back up, I was already really hot. We did another site lap, and sit on the grid for what seemed like an hour, we got started. I didn't get as good of a start this time, but was still doing ok. This was a 16 lap race because its a bigger track (instead of 20) and on about lap 9, I started getting really dizzy and confused. I was exhausted and stopped sweating. Not good!!! I finished the race, but was suffering from heatstroke. That is a very scary experience!! 40 people started the race, 29 finished (because of the heat), and I still finished in 9th place. I spent the next hour trying to catch my breath and trying to get the strength to walk. After laying the trailer with the air-conditioning for a while, I woke to find that all the oil in the generator was leaking out onto the pavement. No more generator!! Being exhausted, I still worked on the generator and THOUGHT I had it fixed. About an hour later, it did the same thing. I didn't have the energy to work on it anymore, so we went and got a hotel room.
Sunday morning I was feeling pretty good after a good nights rest, and practice went great for me. In C-superbike, I got a good start, and on lap 3, I had just made the pass for 3rd place when the red flag came out again. I was not very happy, but thats racing. So the race had to be restarted since we weren't past the halfway point. I still came back to finish in 5th place. The C-superstock race was a disaster. I got a decent start, and was running near the front of the pack with a HUGE gap behind me to the next rider when the ambulance flag came out. I pulled into the pits with a pack of riders only to find that we are NOT supposed to pit with an ambulance on the track!! We are supposed to race with an ambulance on the course (which doesn't make sense to me anyway). When we pulled back onto the track, I was already so far behind that I pulled in a lap early and decided to call it a day. I'm not contending for points in that class anyway, so there was no point.
It was a very long ride home, especially getting caught in construction in Nashville that took us an hour to go 1 mile, and we didn't get home until 1am.
It was a very rough weekend, but I still love it. I am now in 3rd place in the points in C-superbike which is great considering I missed the first race of the year, and if I finish in the top 5 in points at the end of the year, I get moved to up to expert which I'm excited about. I'm planning on doing a trackday to work a little more on bike setup before the next race which isn't until the end of August. Maybe that weekend will go a little smoother!!