[Ducati] 1st Time Racetrack Experiences part 4

[Gleeb Gliber Galactica Gavorti]

  Lecture over.  The “A” (fast/experienced) group was already on the track and the “B” group was about to begin.  Each session lasts 20 minutes, so it was time for me to prepare for inevitable eventuality that I was about to go out onto the bloody racetrack.
   
  All suited up and on my bike, I was warned that in 5 minutes the “C” group’s turn would begin.  If you did not figure it out already, that was my group.  The beginner group.  I rode out to the starting grid and just kind of sat there on my bike thinking about ten million things and nothing all at the same time.
   
  It had all finally boiled down to this very moment.  Our group is ready on the sidelines and the 1-minute warning has been called.  My bike was happily idling on the “starting grid” in anticipation and my heart was matching my motor’s cadence, beat for beat.
   
  Off we go!  Nothing too crazy is happening.  We’re being paced by one of the instructors.  The very first lap of the first day for the inexperienced is a moderately brisk exercise in warming up tires and getting into the groove.  But the 1st lap was still really, really, really cool.  I’m on a racetrack FINALLY.  Right now.  ALLRIGHT!
   
  In the second lap I place myself behind the instructor as he motions me to do.  As I follow him ‘round, he over exaggerates every movement he makes so that I will see what he is doing and follow suit.  About 3 seconds before each corner he is already hanging off.  Way off.  It’s wonderfully obvious to me what I should be doing and what lines I should be taking.  I do like he does.  Easy, Peasy, Japanaeesy :-)   
   
  After a couple laps he starts to go faster.  We start passing people.  Then he goes faster still.  I am right there with him as we pass more people.   This goes on for a while and then apparently he feels that I am getting the hang of this, so he motions me to pass him, which I do.  
   
  The plan is for him to follow me for a while and watch how I ride.  After I pass him I still feel good but it’s nowhere near the same.  The lines we took which were so blatantly apparent as I followed the instructor kind of disappeared.  Since it was all still VERY new to me I was not quite sure which way the track went.  But I did my best and had plenty of fun learning the track and leaning the bike in a way unlike anything I had ever come close to doing on the street (thank God).  But without an instructor to show me when and where to pass, slower riders became an obstacle for me.  I did not want to pass them on the inside or scare them so I tended to back off a bit when I would much rather (and perhaps should) have charged ahead.  But better safe than sorry, for sure.  Regardless, I was having one hell of a good time.  After my first 20 minutes on a racetrack I became fairly certain that whoever said “everyone dies but not everybody lives” was referring to motorcycle
 riding at the track.  For me, nothing compares to it.  Having ridden on a racetrack (if only briefly) is my definition of real living.  Screw mimosas and avocado facial scrubs.  I want action (and then maybe a mimosa ;-)
   
  So in what truly seemed like less than five minutes, my first ever 20 minutes of track time were complete.  I was elated.  I was even more elated when the instructor I had been riding with told me he thought I was a really good rider.  He said it was obvious I have a “need for speed” and impressed him with my bike handling (for a novice, of course!) skills.  Those comments put me on the top of the world.  I thanked him for his help and could not wait to get out and learn more.
   
  In no time at all it was time for our next session.  For some reason I was no less nervous as we pulled out onto the track.  This time I was the 1st rider out, directly behind the instructor (who happened to be a/the Cycle World writer on a BMW- I cannot recall his name and don’t have an issue of CW handy, but he was the fairly tall guy with dark, curly hair ;-)
   
  ride well
   
  gabriel



"There's nothing wrong with you that an expensive operation can't prolong."  -Python, Monty.
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