2016 Season End

I had been meaning to update my blog about what happened towards the end of the 2016 season but I haven't been able to get around to it until now.

Towards the end of the 2016 season I had two races consecutive races with a DNF result.

During the TT in June I overqualified with a time of 1:02.48 and disqualified myself from an official win.  However in the heat of the race I had an incident with another rider and could not finish.

Then during the ST600 Race 3, on the second turn of the first lap, a rider jackknifed his bike very close to me causing myself and another rider to go off course where we crashed.

I then soon after fixing the bike high-sided on the fastest corner at Tsukuba and this set me on a bad path of under confidence.

I finished the season with the ST600 Race 4 where I didn't perform as well as the previous races.

Now its 2017 and the new season has started, and soon I'll be posting about this new things to come!

Gotta keep moving forward, learn from my mistakes and move on :)

2015 Tsukuba Dream Cup Race 2 Report

Race result

Qualifiers 

34th 

1:12.311

Race 

31st 

1:12.656

Practice

I've been pretty nervous about this race since a couple weeks ago I did not qualify for race 1 and had to watch the whole race from the stands.  That shock gave me the motivation to push harder and try new things to get my time up.

It was pretty difficult to get to this point but on Friday I had a breakthrough!  I fixed my body positioning and my riding line and jumped into 1:12 zone!  Only going up from here.

Race day: Qualifers

A little nervous but excited for qualifiers.  Just yesterday I put out my best time of 12.76 and was able to consistently get under 13 seconds, so I felt confident that everything would be alright.

I pushed and pushed slowly working my way up in time until I got a 12.3! Looked down at my lap timer and thought, now I can get a 11 second lap time "let's do this!". 

Approached the first hairpin with more confidence, let go of the brake early and..... lowside!

I have a feeling my suspension bottomed out and I carried too much speed at the apex.  Need to work on my suspension settings now that I can ride at this new pace.

So I had to replace some parts and build a new windscreen. 

Mako and Key -> お疲れさまです Thank you for your hard work.

Key hard at work to fix things.  We concentrating too much on fixing the bike that I forgot about the race briefing...... which came with a $50/¥5000 fine.  Need to be careful next time because it is a pretty serious offence to miss the race briefing.  In some cases they can disqualify you from the race....

Race day: Race

The race went well in my mind.  I was able to maintain a good pace, have a close battle with another rider, and I finished safely.  I know that my racing career is only moving up from here, and I learned a lot this weekend.

Thank you to my sponsors and to everyone who encouraged me and helped me get through this!

NSR fixed!

So after the crash I went to my friend Keme's workshop and he helped me:

Change my tires to Dunlop Alpha 13's
Replaced the radiator with one from Yahoo Auction

Put on new clip-ons

Put on new rear-sets

I took the bike into a 2-rinkan Driver's Stand and got the clutch shifter linkage sawed off.  I attempted to remove it myself with a screw extractor but as you can see from the clean hole in the screw below, I failed miserably. It only cost about ¥4,000 and took about 20 minutes, not too bad.

Got my Magical Racing cowel fasteners in, and put aluminium insulation to protect the fairings from exhaust chamber heat.  I still need to put more insulation towards the back, but for now this is okay.

Finished off the work by:
Drilling holes in the fairings to affix to the bike
Setting the position of the clip-ons
Added non-slip seat pad
Attached clutch linkage
Built a stay to connect the exhaust pipes to the subframe (drilling involved)
Added tank pads for grip
Added a rear tail light for Tsukuba family license
Replace all the radiator hoses and flush the system with water (starting the engine to make sure no leakage)




I was actually planning on going to Tsukuba today but the snow storm caused me to cancel my reservation.  I guess I have to wait until next time.

Lack of tools: crash aftermath

So after the crash I fixed my bike up most of the way and probably still have 30% left to do.

Along the way I realised I was lacking tools, and luckily enough I got a friend to help me by lending me his knowledge, garage, and tools.  It was a smart move since every 10 minutes we realised either my toolbox was missing what we needed or using a different tool made things a little more convenient, in terms of shape.  Sometimes you just have those spots you can't access with a socket wrench.

Decided to go out and buy a lot of what I needed, but haven't gotten around to taking pictures of all of it, since it was a lot.  But here's a few of them.

Socket adapters, realised I needed them when I needed to set a large torque value, using 1/2" socket wrench, using a socket that was 3/8".

Most importantly the extractor to remove the stuck screw in the clutch lever!

And some brand spanking new radiator hoses.

New parts post crash

I hope this radiator works out.  I went through the listings on Yahoo Auction and tried my best to balance price with the apparent condition.  I got this for ¥5000 and I've got my fingers crossed hoping for the best.

¥5000

Bought brand new Hurricane adjustable clip ones 0-18 degrees, a new steering damper, and spare levers which I may or may not use just yet.

Hurricane clip ons: ¥11,512
Steering damper: ¥20,003
Alba levers: ¥1971

Probably the saddest part I need to replace is the rear-sets seeing that I bent up the Tyga ones.  Got these Battle Factory, Japan made, rear-sets that was recommended by a friend.  I hope the sizing for the shift lever matches that part I permanently attached to the clutch box by breaking a screw.

Battle Factory rear-sets: ¥32,025

And last but not least, Dunlop Alpha 13 tires.  I've already committed to some Pirelli Super Corsa V2's to by off a friend, but figured I should take advantage of the free shipping on Webike and get these Dunlops as well.

I used these tires on my VFR and liked them a lot, and a lot of Japanese guys say it's best to keep those old Japanese bikes on Japanese made tires.  They say the Pirellis are awesome for heavier, more powerful bikes like modern GSXRs and R6/1s but that an NSR goes well with Japanese tires.  Not sure how much I buy that, but I'd like to compare the tires myself anyway.

Front: ¥12,204
Rear: ¥18,207

Okegawa Sportsland Crash

So... I crashed for the first time at a circuit.  It wasn't too bad, just a few scrapes and muscle ache, but more like I had a good workout (if tumbling around on the ground and sliding counts as a workout).

I'm more worried about the bike which is looking to be maybe around $800 in damage, including smashing my brand new Tyga Performance rear sets T_T

We live and we learn... right?

Starting with the start to my day.  I have to ride out about 30-35 minutes on my street bike to go pick up my van which has my NSR in it.  I get there and guess what... forgot my van keys at home.  So I zip back home (made it in 15 minutes) and zip back (another 20 minutes), get to the van at the start of the first session of the day, while I'm still an hours drive away from the circuit.

So it's already a bad day.

I get there and there are tons....

.

and tons....

of mini bikes!  So at this point I'm stoked and I pay my ¥5000 for the day and ¥1000 for the lap timer and settle in.

 It's pretty lonely out here but my co-worker told me he's in the area and will stop by during his bicycle ride, so at least soon I'll have company.

I hit up the first session and run out of gas.  Well actually I had just gone below the reserve level and forgot this bike has a reserve.  So it's now a kinda more bad day.

So I tell myself "well at least there are still 3 more sessions for me to do for the group I selected to be in 大型(1)"

Originally I was practicing on smooth transitions between full banks and transitioning to full lean sooner, since I take forever to get to my full lean angle.

But my co-worker who used to race gives me some pointers and things I should try to practice, since he saw my second session out there and told me "wrong... all wrong, concentrate on braking in shorter spans and getting smoothly to full throttle sooner".  So I go back out and try just that.

Just after doing some warm up laps I pick the pace up and on my second hard braking the front tire gives.  Probably due to the fact that I'm riding tires from 2011, it's cold as hell, and well I think I was blipping the throttle and jerked the brake.

Just as I stopped sliding my head love tapped the ground and slid a couple inches.  No impact so I'm fairly sure I can keep using the helmet, but I have a spare in case anyway, might be wise to use it.  As far as I can tell the damage is cosmetic.

Most of the scratches in the picture are from me not taking care of my helmet.  Only the large grey chip center-left is from the crash.

Well I still suck at left hand turns compared to my right hand ones and this would be the first time my left knee touches the ground....

Already took the rear set off, but here is a bent mounting point for fairings.

 Ugly but functional gas tank....

 Brand new Tyga fairings damaged, but not cracked.... phew

Smashed up and bent handle bars, and brand new lever from Tyga as well.  Clutch mount is rotated but still all usable I believe.

And worst of all.... leaking radiator. A barely visible crack and probably around ¥10,000 or more to replace, still not sure of the cost, since it will be from Yahoo Auction.

And the slight, but still there bodily damage.  Thank god for leather suits.

 Got back to park my van late at night and was sad to part with the bike.  I want to fix her up and ride her as soon as possible!

If interested you can see how slow I was going since I think I was nervous about cold and old tires.  The mini bikes were getting 57 seconds on this track and big bikes getting 47 seconds.  I clearly was not in my element, not to mention it was a pretty technical course filled with my beloved left hand turns.

I didn't once think I was going fast and really came out in this cold to get a chance to ride my new bike for the second time to get a better feel for how this bike rides.

But I might've been going just a little too slow :-/

I also learned that I don't need to go snail pace to warm up my tires.

First session: running out of gas on every turn 1 minute 5 second minute pace
Second and third session: warming up tires at 1 min 10 second page, speed up to a slow 59 second pace and crash in third session.