A few years ago, after several track days on the FZ6, I realized that track riding was really what I wanted to do on a motorcycle. The next summer, I bought a bike that was up to the task and I’ve never looked back. Here are a few thoughts on my first full season of riding track days between September 2015 and May 2016.
Tours are fun. Group rides can be a blast. The longer I ride though, the more riding on the street seems like a roll of the dice; a wager with the hazards that exist there. Like all bets, there is a good chance that you’ll be on the losing end at some point. My personal view of this problem is severe. I have been a party to, or witnessed directly at least ten or more motorcycle accidents. The majority of these totaled the bike and four of which were serious enough to involve a hospital stay. Within my circle of riding friends I've heard of many more. The formal numbers don’t lie: The Institute for Highway Safety’s latest figures from 2014 indicate that motorcycle deaths accounted for 13 percent of all vehicle fatalities. When you consider that motorcycles account for only three percent of registered vehicles in the US, this number seems even more staggering.
Safety aside, the full range of a performance motorcycle simply cannot be experienced at legal road speeds. The desire to push a superbike to the level which they are designed to perform will quickly have you doubling, even tripling posted limits. The two official “riding awards” I have received as the result of said doubling could have landed me in the slammer and impounded my ride. Thankfully, both officers saw fit to let me gingerly cruise on, scolded, tail tucked between my legs. The financial consequence of these tickets seriously changed my outlook. If I am to enjoy my bike as it was meant to be enjoyed, it isn’t going to be on the street. It can’t be on the street.
For these reasons, I made the concerted choice to take my yearly bonus from work and stash it away, earmarked for track use only. I was determined to create a full schedule and stick to it. Locally we have several tracks and organizations that put together track events, and choosing who I would ride with over an entire season all at once was great fun. I was like a kid in a candy store. I picked five different places within driving distance from Tucson: Muscleman Honda Circuit, Arroyo Seco Raceway, Arizona Motorsports Park, Inde Motorsports Ranch, and the crown jewel of my schedule-Chuckwalla Valley Raceway. I wanted to experience a variety of courses and try and develop the skills that are important to going fast at each one.
I signed up for a September Musselman track day first as an “appetizer” for the season to come. It’s a great little track designed primarily for kart racing, so the layout is tight for motorcycles. Speeds tend to be slower, though it demands accurate braking and cornering. Within two laps of the circuit I suspected that something wasn’t right. The front end felt vague in the corners. I was having to really muscle the bike around the track. While I was loving the engine of my new Daytona, I wasn’t feeling the sharp handling that the bike is so famous for. Not a total loss though. Within a week, I had the bike over to Evan Steel Performance for basic suspension setup. We set the sag, dialed in the compression and rebound for a more sport-focused ride. This would turn out to be the best $30 I’ve ever spent in my riding career. Not only did it transform the bike, but I learned a thing or two about setting spring preload that I’ll use over and over again and can help other riders with.
My next outing would be at Arroyo Seco Raceway in November with a couple friends. It’s about a four hour haul to Deming New Mexico to get to the track, but well worth the effort as I would find out. This would also be the first of many events that would test my groveling skills. With no method of transporting the bike of my own I encountered the first reality of getting serious about the sport: begging for a trailer. Lucky for us I was able to borrow a 18 foot double-axle trailer from work. Far too much trailer for the job of hauling three bikes as we found out, but beggars can’t be choosers… Riding Arroyo Seco for the first time was incredible. Being a ASMA race weekend, the open track day was my first ever experience riding with racers tuning and practicing for their upcoming qualifiers. Traffic was fast! For the first half of the day, I felt like a speed bump waiting to get rolled over. The Daytona was feeling great though, and after several conversations with a few of the seasoned Arroyo racers my lines tightened up and I was able to hold my own. As much fun as the track is, the overall experience was really cool. I enjoyed seeing some seriously fast guys rip around that place and got my first taste of the life club racers lead. Honestly, I don’t know how these guys afford it. Most pits had multiple bikes on stands, stacks of tires and generators roaring away in the background. The scene is one of camaraderie and trash-talk. Competition and genuine support for each other in what can be a sport that is unforgiving of mistakes.
I took December off but was back at it in January in Phoenix at Arizona Motorsports Park. Another friend volunteered to trailer my bike up, so I would be all alone for the drive up from Tucson. I arrived an hour ahead of the rig and secured a prime pit location, trackside in the shade of the carport. I was feeling saucy as I had just purchased a new Dianese leather race suit, and was eager to try it out. The fit of the new suit was incredibly tight, but I was assured by the sales person that it would give with time. I was also feeling good because the last track day at Arroyo had gone so well, and it felt like my riding was getting somewhere. I was itching to get out there on this new playground and see what I could do. The pace in “B Group” was no joke. If I was to ride mid-pack I would have to step up my game. I have been told that the best way to improve at anything is to find someone better than you to emulate. As it turned out, that day I was pulling up the rear in my group, so I had a bunch of choices. I decided that I would focus on two things: being more aggressive in the braking zone and trying to run a bit more radius in the corners for more speed. Again, as the day progressed, I felt my lap times improving and my lean angles getting deeper. Pictures proved that I was mere inches from scraping my brand new knee pucks.
I spent the entire month of March jonesing for another track fix, but was saving my dinero for what was almost guaranteed to be an epic event. I’d worked out a ride to Chuckwalla Valley Raceway in southern California just outside Joshua Tree National Park. I had seen and heard of this place in countless magazines and videos. It is a legendary desert destination for track riders. I was beyond stoked that I would get my chance to rip through the famous “Bowl,” a 10 degree banked sweeper that I was told you could accelerate through and slingshot out of. Again, the trip proved worth the wait. We arrived the day before we were to ride, so we had plenty of time to let the speed culture out there soak in. As I looked around, I wondered what the next day would bring when I saw the huge semi trucks of the race teams there for practice. I would be on track riding next to these pros. After a windy (and somewhat sleepless) night in the paddock we attended the rider’s meeting and set up for a session-free day of unlimited, balls to the wall plowing around the circuit. My first few laps were tentative as I got comfortable with the layout and let my tires come up to temperature. I remember thinking how enormous the 2.68 mile course felt and the odd sensation of feeling the suspension load up as you round the Bowl, giving you far more traction than you would have around the same turn if it was flat. I continued to make lap after lap, and no one was telling me to haul it in for the next group to come out! It was awesome! I must have swung 20 laps in that first hour before my arms were so trashed I couldn’t crank on the bars any longer. I pulled it in to the pits with a classic shit-eating grin plastered on my face. The day continued to get better and better until the wind picked up and the dust rolled in. The storm came in suddenly and in moments riders were packing up and taking cover. We had been told that this was a common occurrence here, and that if we were to choose to stay out on track as the sand was blown onto the surface that you would maintain traction. This seemed impossible, but not wanting to lose any precious time at this temple of speed, I headed back out for a few recon laps. Apart from what was blowing up into my helmet, I wasn’t bothered much by the sand. It was visibly filling in the cracks in the asphalt, and still wafting across the race line in waves but my tires still stuck. My lap times continued to get faster and faster until I felt confident to ride without hesitation. By this time most of the locals had packed up for good and headed home. I had this unbelievable, albeit dusty, track mostly to myself! The wind began to die off around three o’clock that afternoon, and the sky cleared of sand for some of the best riding I have done to date on a motorcycle. At the end of the day, I spoke to the track photographer who said he was surprised to hear a single bike out braving the elements as the sun was going down. Luckily, he was able to hike out to the first corner and take two of my favorite photos ever.
My next event was just a few weeks later at Inde Motorsports Ranch outside of Willcox, Arizona. This track, although perhaps not as well known as Chuckwalla, is quickly becoming a must-experience destination for both riders and drivers in the Southwest. Inde is unique in that it is a members-only road course; a country club for the moto-inclined. The track, the facility, and the surrounding desert landscape is truly second to none. Any opportunity to ride Inde is a “drop everything and go” situation. I was pleased to hear that one of the largest racing organizations would be putting on another track day/race day weekend out there, and I registered as soon as I could and started looking around for another trailer to borrow. I’d ridden Inde twice before on the FZ6, so I knew the track and felt reasonably comfortable from the start. What I didn’t plan on was the crowd. The vibe was fast and aggressive from the beginning of the first session, and got more intense as the day wore on perhaps due to the impending races that afternoon. I noted to myself how much more comfortable I was in those conditions than just a few months earlier surrounded by club racers at Arroyo Seco. This was B Group though, and most of the riders who would be on the grid later were running A Group. Bikes were crashing out almost every session that Sunday, causing big delays in the schedule. I rode only four twenty minute sessions before the last checkered flag called us in. Somewhat disappointed in the amount of time on the circuit, we packed up our (borrowed) trailer and found a place to watch the races before heading home.
As luck would have it, I was able to get back out to Inde again for a private day of riding just a few weeks later. With just myself and my host out there, this time I was able to make some real progress. I had the time and the space to work on technique an body position that I hadn’t gotten before, and my lap times showed that I had improved greatly through the season. I set a personal goal to break 2:25 there. A fairly soft goal, but one that I surely would not have been able to achieve on the FZ6 a few years earlier. I ran a 2:24.5 as measured by a less than accurate GPS app. Although I can’t be certain, I’m feel that my laps were probably quicker than that. Next time I’ll mount a transponder and get an official time.
A few of us decided to take advantage of Arroyo Seco’s reasonable rental rates and do a private track day with instruction from Roger Heemsbergen, track owner and all around fast guy. Arroyo is interesting in it’s layout. The eastern half has 11 tightly linked corners, and the western half is formed by two straights with one lengthy sweeper called the Carousel. Because it’s so fast at one end and technical at the other, I find Arroyo Seco to be the most Challenging of the tracks I ride, but also the place where I tend to learn the most. On two occasions while following a faster rider during my first track day there, I came close to tucking the front and balling up a brand new bike. I’m glad that lesson didn’t come with a painful blow to the wallet, or worse. I did manage, entirely by accident to scrape my knee puck on the tightest corner of the course: the “Bus Stop.” In the moment, the foreign sound and transmitted vibration through my leg scared me a little. Then as I stood the bike up out of the turn I thought to myself, “That’s it?” All I needed to do was change my foot position on the peg and stick my knee out farther. Sometimes the most obvious answer to a problem is the simplest one. Roger’s critique of my riding at the end of this last day of my 2015/2016 season was that I’m doing it all pretty well. Body position looks good, braking’s fine, lines are where they should be. I’m just not pushing it hard enough.
I’ll have to wait until September of this year to push it again. But looking back now on this past season, I have nothing but good things to think about. This year will probably be my year of most consecutive improvements, as there will be fewer and fewer bad habits to break and new techniques to incorporate from here on out. Where am I going with all this? The short answer is, I’m not sure. I would like to get to a point where riding in A Group wouldn’t pose a big problem for me. I would also like to try racing sometime, although I am realistic about the cost in both money and time. I'd honestly be happy with exactly the same number of track days next season and letting the gains come naturally. I'm already practicing my groveling technique in preparation.
