I'm not gonna post too many pics.. hehe I'm stealing them from the picture taker guys site at the moment. I have the CD ordered so I don't feel too bad for takin' em. If one of those guys happens to float by.. the checks in the mail so don't sue me! haha.
If you haven't done a track day yet you really need too.. I do recommend Aaron's also (cornerspeed.net) it's the only one I've been too.. but I feel safe in saying that he will teach you atleast as much as anybody else can.. and I'm betting more really.
he does all the classes himself, and the instructers aren't just out there doing their own thing. They will follow you, lead you, and if they see you doing something wrong they will look for you in the paddock to tell you about it.. in a constructive critisism way.. if you can't take somebody telling you how to do something better than you are.. you'll probably not like them... but hey.. thats what your paying for.. so anyways..
I think I've figured out the big phobia of hayabusa's at tracks.. It's something you don't typically notice on the street because well... .. just read you'll figure it out. And yes.. the weight is to blame.
They tape over the speedo's so i can't say with any certainty what actual speeds I'm talking about here.. just what it feels like.. and where the RPM's are in a certain gear (when i had time to look down to check it anyway)
imagine coming out of a turn at approx. 100-120 mph... now imagine you have damn near a half mile of wide open track in front of you... "hehehe" you think so you nail it up thru the gears.. .. hit the rev limiter in fifth and realize that the 1st turn after the straight is coming up .. VERY FAST (what speed is the rev limiter in 5th anyway?) Apply brakes... apply brakes more.. start praying.. apply brakes harder... damn near stoppie the damn thing while clinching your butt cheeks in fear because your not slowing down (well you are.. but not nearly fast enough) Downshift like a mad man as soon as the R's drop sufficently enough not to blow the damn motor when you shift down again... do that atleast 3 times to get to second.. hell do it in first too!!.. every bit of stopping power is needed at this point!!!! squeeze everything you can out of the front brake to the point that the front end is diving like a startlet on ron jeremy's casting couch. you've been sqeezing the rear.. but it's not enough.. squeeze it more.. lock the rear wheel .. release it to just before it started getting squirrly.. lock it up again because it just ain't working!
now it's decision time... let go of the brakes, trust your bike and dive into the turn, or hold tight and release em just before you go dirt biking into the grass...
what do ya do?
haha I went with the first option.. scraped the #### outta the peg, and went wide.. but made it. Was a helluva thing...
and there is your problem.. at very high speeds.. it takes FOOOOREEEEVVVVVEEEERR to slow the 550 pound sled down to any resonable speed for a sharp turn.
Other than the brakes basically sucking the 'busa does pretty good at track days. I could ride with most anybody at my skill level (i'm putting myself at average/slightly above average) in the turns.. of course the straights I annihilated everybody... as would be expected.. but I pretty much lost interest in that after the first few time.. yeah it's fun to go reeeally fast down the straight.. but I'm trying to get faster in the turns here.. so bear with me.
Oh.. it was sorta funny to talk with my instructer after the above fiasco in turn one.. he asked what I was using as a braking point. (they had 6 markers before the turn.. I started about 100 yards before the first one I came too.. thinking that would be ok) I told him that.. and went on to tell him that I thought I would start using the tree just past the start finish line though.. he laughed, I laughed.. all was well.. no more problems outta turn one the rest of the day. Course I really was lifting the throttle at the start finish and drifting down to about the #4 marker the rest of the day. (didn't much matter because by then. Anybody that was anywhere near me coming out of the last turn before the straight away was atleast 1/8mi. back except the really fast guys on the liters. They would sneak around me while I fumbling with the brakes.. but ahh.. whatever.
hmm.. other than that not too many scary moment as far as "ego damn near did something bad" anyway. The hole day was an adrenaline rush for the most part.
Had an instructer come up to me right before the mock race (i finished 2nd out of 12 riders in my group.. finished about 5 seconds behind a guy I ride with occasionally.. he was on a 600, beat 2 other guys I ride with .. both of them were on 600's.. and I didn't cheat down the big straight too badly.. kinda ran 3/4 throttle so none of them could say they never had a chance anyway)
Another riding buddy finished 5th in his mock race.. but in all honesty.. he was riding faster than all of the guys I went with that day and was riding with a group that had some reeeeally fast riders. I would have finished like 7th in that one.. maybe.. hehe )
anyway.. the instructer.. sorry got off on a rant there..
this instructer comes up to me and is like.. I followed the last few laps of that session. Your doing well. You could maybe hang off a bit more and etc. just little pointers (turns out he was right.. I found a little more speed thru the corners once I started reeeally hanging off the bike. It's amazing that one second you think you are already about to fall off.. and you realize you can still get off the bike another 3-4 inches.. makes a huge diff in the bikes clearance issues (which are annoying.. if I take it to another track it will have atleast the factory pegs back on instead of the Buell pegs.. or new rear sets one) ..
anyway.. after we talked about that he told me the cool part.. a running commentary is needed of the conversation
"Your leaving the biggest effin' darkies I've ever seen coming out of 17 into the straight.. thats awesome man!"
*ego thinking.. holy ####!.. thats so cool!*
"No sh*t? hmm.. I couldn't tell the rear was spinning at all."
"Yeah man, it's wild. Your not smoking the tire, it's just about a 3-4 inch wide black mark every time you come out of the turn."
*thinking.. that is so damn cool.. now if only it doesn't wreck, and kill me*
"Damn, is that bad?"
"Nah, not really. If it was smoking the tire it could be bad, but it's not spinning too badly. If you start to feel it spin just ease out of the throttle a touch. Don't chop it or it'll highside though."
*holy crap, i'm on the edge of death here!!!*
"Cool, thanks for the heads up!"
I looked on the next session and sure enough there were several big black lines coming out of the turn that pretty much followed the line I had been using out of the turn all day.. and oddly enough they started just about where I started rolling back into the throttle
ENTER.. EGO-Darkie Machine
ahhh.. anyway.. track days are hella fun. Nobody in my group ate it so it was damn near a perfect day.
No knee draggin for me.. although I was aware that I could have fairly easily... I have no knee pads so I wasn't exactly trying to put them down.
The only casualty of the day.. was my boots.. this goes back to the lack of cornering clearance (i believe in hind site that even if I put new rear sets on i'm only going to accomplish is scraping the exhaust canister, or the fairing.. either way.. it's not something I want to do.. cool as it would be .. I like my paint.. and the wife told me If I messed it up I couldn't re-do it custom like again.. haha)
just a pic or two until the CD with all the pics gets here.. should be about 80 pics total.. so I'm sure i'll have another deluge to show off sometime in the next week or two.
oh.. just for the curious.. haha this cracked me up..
The worst mileage i've ever noticed the computer saying was about 34mpg and I thought i had been running it fairly hard then... we did about 150 miles on the track.. and the computer showed the fuel mileage to be 19.8 mpg.. hell.. my tahoe did that towing the trailer with 2 bikes on it on the way there!! haha.
Anyway.. it's the most damn fun I've ever had on a motorcycle.. and well worth the money if your interested. Hell if your interest hit me up and we'll get a group together and go.. I won't guarantee i'll take the 'busa,,, (the ducati would be alot of fun there also) but I'm more than ready to go again.. as soon as my muscles stop kicking me for being lazy and then expecting them to work their asses off all day.
If you haven't done a track day yet you really need too.. I do recommend Aaron's also (cornerspeed.net) it's the only one I've been too.. but I feel safe in saying that he will teach you atleast as much as anybody else can.. and I'm betting more really.
he does all the classes himself, and the instructers aren't just out there doing their own thing. They will follow you, lead you, and if they see you doing something wrong they will look for you in the paddock to tell you about it.. in a constructive critisism way.. if you can't take somebody telling you how to do something better than you are.. you'll probably not like them... but hey.. thats what your paying for.. so anyways..
I think I've figured out the big phobia of hayabusa's at tracks.. It's something you don't typically notice on the street because well... .. just read you'll figure it out. And yes.. the weight is to blame.
They tape over the speedo's so i can't say with any certainty what actual speeds I'm talking about here.. just what it feels like.. and where the RPM's are in a certain gear (when i had time to look down to check it anyway)
imagine coming out of a turn at approx. 100-120 mph... now imagine you have damn near a half mile of wide open track in front of you... "hehehe" you think so you nail it up thru the gears.. .. hit the rev limiter in fifth and realize that the 1st turn after the straight is coming up .. VERY FAST (what speed is the rev limiter in 5th anyway?) Apply brakes... apply brakes more.. start praying.. apply brakes harder... damn near stoppie the damn thing while clinching your butt cheeks in fear because your not slowing down (well you are.. but not nearly fast enough) Downshift like a mad man as soon as the R's drop sufficently enough not to blow the damn motor when you shift down again... do that atleast 3 times to get to second.. hell do it in first too!!.. every bit of stopping power is needed at this point!!!! squeeze everything you can out of the front brake to the point that the front end is diving like a startlet on ron jeremy's casting couch. you've been sqeezing the rear.. but it's not enough.. squeeze it more.. lock the rear wheel .. release it to just before it started getting squirrly.. lock it up again because it just ain't working!
now it's decision time... let go of the brakes, trust your bike and dive into the turn, or hold tight and release em just before you go dirt biking into the grass...
what do ya do?
haha I went with the first option.. scraped the #### outta the peg, and went wide.. but made it. Was a helluva thing...
and there is your problem.. at very high speeds.. it takes FOOOOREEEEVVVVVEEEERR to slow the 550 pound sled down to any resonable speed for a sharp turn.
Other than the brakes basically sucking the 'busa does pretty good at track days. I could ride with most anybody at my skill level (i'm putting myself at average/slightly above average) in the turns.. of course the straights I annihilated everybody... as would be expected.. but I pretty much lost interest in that after the first few time.. yeah it's fun to go reeeally fast down the straight.. but I'm trying to get faster in the turns here.. so bear with me.
Oh.. it was sorta funny to talk with my instructer after the above fiasco in turn one.. he asked what I was using as a braking point. (they had 6 markers before the turn.. I started about 100 yards before the first one I came too.. thinking that would be ok) I told him that.. and went on to tell him that I thought I would start using the tree just past the start finish line though.. he laughed, I laughed.. all was well.. no more problems outta turn one the rest of the day. Course I really was lifting the throttle at the start finish and drifting down to about the #4 marker the rest of the day. (didn't much matter because by then. Anybody that was anywhere near me coming out of the last turn before the straight away was atleast 1/8mi. back except the really fast guys on the liters. They would sneak around me while I fumbling with the brakes.. but ahh.. whatever.
hmm.. other than that not too many scary moment as far as "ego damn near did something bad" anyway. The hole day was an adrenaline rush for the most part.
Had an instructer come up to me right before the mock race (i finished 2nd out of 12 riders in my group.. finished about 5 seconds behind a guy I ride with occasionally.. he was on a 600, beat 2 other guys I ride with .. both of them were on 600's.. and I didn't cheat down the big straight too badly.. kinda ran 3/4 throttle so none of them could say they never had a chance anyway)
Another riding buddy finished 5th in his mock race.. but in all honesty.. he was riding faster than all of the guys I went with that day and was riding with a group that had some reeeeally fast riders. I would have finished like 7th in that one.. maybe.. hehe )
anyway.. the instructer.. sorry got off on a rant there..
this instructer comes up to me and is like.. I followed the last few laps of that session. Your doing well. You could maybe hang off a bit more and etc. just little pointers (turns out he was right.. I found a little more speed thru the corners once I started reeeally hanging off the bike. It's amazing that one second you think you are already about to fall off.. and you realize you can still get off the bike another 3-4 inches.. makes a huge diff in the bikes clearance issues (which are annoying.. if I take it to another track it will have atleast the factory pegs back on instead of the Buell pegs.. or new rear sets one) ..
anyway.. after we talked about that he told me the cool part.. a running commentary is needed of the conversation
"Your leaving the biggest effin' darkies I've ever seen coming out of 17 into the straight.. thats awesome man!"
*ego thinking.. holy ####!.. thats so cool!*
"No sh*t? hmm.. I couldn't tell the rear was spinning at all."
"Yeah man, it's wild. Your not smoking the tire, it's just about a 3-4 inch wide black mark every time you come out of the turn."
*thinking.. that is so damn cool.. now if only it doesn't wreck, and kill me*
"Damn, is that bad?"
"Nah, not really. If it was smoking the tire it could be bad, but it's not spinning too badly. If you start to feel it spin just ease out of the throttle a touch. Don't chop it or it'll highside though."
*holy crap, i'm on the edge of death here!!!*
"Cool, thanks for the heads up!"
I looked on the next session and sure enough there were several big black lines coming out of the turn that pretty much followed the line I had been using out of the turn all day.. and oddly enough they started just about where I started rolling back into the throttle
ENTER.. EGO-Darkie Machine
ahhh.. anyway.. track days are hella fun. Nobody in my group ate it so it was damn near a perfect day.
No knee draggin for me.. although I was aware that I could have fairly easily... I have no knee pads so I wasn't exactly trying to put them down.
The only casualty of the day.. was my boots.. this goes back to the lack of cornering clearance (i believe in hind site that even if I put new rear sets on i'm only going to accomplish is scraping the exhaust canister, or the fairing.. either way.. it's not something I want to do.. cool as it would be .. I like my paint.. and the wife told me If I messed it up I couldn't re-do it custom like again.. haha)
just a pic or two until the CD with all the pics gets here.. should be about 80 pics total.. so I'm sure i'll have another deluge to show off sometime in the next week or two.
oh.. just for the curious.. haha this cracked me up..
The worst mileage i've ever noticed the computer saying was about 34mpg and I thought i had been running it fairly hard then... we did about 150 miles on the track.. and the computer showed the fuel mileage to be 19.8 mpg.. hell.. my tahoe did that towing the trailer with 2 bikes on it on the way there!! haha.
Anyway.. it's the most damn fun I've ever had on a motorcycle.. and well worth the money if your interested. Hell if your interest hit me up and we'll get a group together and go.. I won't guarantee i'll take the 'busa,,, (the ducati would be alot of fun there also) but I'm more than ready to go again.. as soon as my muscles stop kicking me for being lazy and then expecting them to work their asses off all day.
