4/28-29 track day in the rain, and one cancelled

[marko138]

What kind of camera is that? Takes good pics.

[ceo012384]

Originally Posted by marko138

What kind of camera is that? Takes good pics.

It's a nikon D70. It's a couple years old but a very nice camera. I snag it from work whenever I want to dick around with it.

I'm getting better with my manual photography... I'd like to get into it myself but at least for now the funds aren't allowing it.

[r!der]

That sucks, but ateast you got to ride...some...and brought the bike back shiny. I've never ridden track in the rain, I'm actually a bit curious. Any oh shit moments? Obviously you have to back off a bit, but do you feel like you came out learning anything from riding around the wet track? Would be interesting if the first day was wet and the second dry. Probably enhances your feel of the track and what the tires are doing, in other words, in the long run....it prob makes you a better rider.
Sweet pictures!

[ceo012384]

Originally Posted by r!der

That sucks, but ateast you got to ride...some...and brought the bike back shiny. I've never ridden track in the rain, I'm actually a bit curious. Any oh shit moments? Obviously you have to back off a bit, but do you feel like you came out learning anything from riding around the wet track? Would be interesting if the first day was wet and the second dry. Probably enhances your feel of the track and what the tires are doing, in other words, in the long run....it prob makes you a better rider.
Sweet pictures!

Yeah, I was a bit nervous, but I learned a LOT.

It's all about being smooth, controlled, weighting the pegs, hanging way off, combining the braking and rolling off, combining the getting off the brakes and rolling on, etc etc. ... All things you should be doing in the dry anyways... but more so.

I feel like a lot of moments in the rain on the street that formerly would have caused me to crash, I could now handle very nicely.

And yes... had some oh shit moments... but I was gradually increasing each lap so I knew I would get those moments and made sure to be prepared/relaxed for them and the bike takes care of it. The characteristics of each turn are amplified in the wet. I found that turn 2, which is normally a fairly high speed turn with knee down the whole time is a BITCH in the rain. Rear sliding around all the time. Had to take a different line through it, and still had the rear moving around every lap, but I came to expect it to happen and being relaxed, it was fine.






Oh, and I forgot to mention this, and I know some other dudes did this that day.... I did a rolling burnout at around 90mph by mistake .... on the main straight I went to rip through the gears and as I got into the powerband the rear just started spinning. It was pretty sweet.