GDRacing Canada Motorsports Team Blog

With the 2010 season long over (and heading into the 2011 season), we would like to thank everyone that made our 2010 season a resounding success.

We formed a partnership with WrapArt Racing for the 2010 season and by the end of the season most everyone in the RACE SuperSeries knew who the WrapArt Racing bike and rider were.  The GDRacing Canada Motorsports Team – aboard its Honda RC51 SP2 1000cc V-twin racebike – proved to be a very solid contender.  After well-fought battles in the 2010 RACE SuperSeries, we are very proud of our strong 2nd place overall finish in the Masters Heavyweight class, 5th place in RACE Thunder-Liquid (2nd highest-ranked amateur), and 7th place in Sportsman Heavyweight (3rd highest-ranked amateur).  Particularly in the Masters Heavyweight class, nearly every weekend was a podium finish!

It was a pivotal year for us… proving that we had the skill, drive, and determination to successfully compete in most classes.  A few times there were some astonished faces from competitors, who asked “Wow… where the heck did YOU come from???  Who lit the fire beneath you?”.   Far from buckling under the now watchful gaze of other competitors, it pushed us to do better.  And we did!

For the 2011 season we are collaborating with UK and American companies & teams to further develop our RC51 into a stronger and sharper weapon.   In addition to running regional classes in the RACE SuperSeries, we also plan to compete in the new Amateur Superbike class in the Parts Canada Superbike Challenge.  Booooyahhhhhh!!! 

Stay tuned for more announcements of plans for the 2011 season!

It had been a VERY long time since I had competed on the Shannonville Fabi circuit.  The last time was back in 1994 when I was racing in the FAST Championship series on their Yamaha FZR600 school bikes.  Back then I downed the bike in the rain in corner 1 at the end of the straightaway and wrote it off… then consequentially quit biking altogether for 11 years!  So here we were 16 years later to do it all again.  (Race, I mean… not crash.)  Ahhhh memories.

Arriving early Friday morning, I found my racing friends had saved a pit spot for me along pit row.  One good thing about Fabi is that there would likely be no mud if it rained.  To my left was my friend and new Novice racer Vince Rea with his family, to my right was another Novice racer Doug Backwell with his girlfriend Sheri (very nice couple)… as well as my other friends Sam, Cindy & Dave… and John Savoy (who was the previous owner of my RC51).   It was setting up to be another great, fun race weekend!

I went through tech with Mark Bell and after some pointers was all set for the weekend.  My intent was to get my braking points set up with corner 1, and also learn the best line through corner 3…  the ultra-tight, ultra-late-apex RH corner before the high-speed left sweeper Corner 4.    The practice sessions throughout the day proved very interesting, though I found that the suspension was… “off.”

At the end of the day Friday, an experienced Pro rider (ex-RC51 racer) took my bike around the track to see how she was.  Coming in 1 lap later he declared the bike “unrideable” and said it was talent alone that was getting the bike around the track as quickly as it was!  While sure that was an ego boost, it confirmed a growing suspicion that I had about the bike’s ill-handling manners. The bike would not hold a line, and kept pogoing and trying to pitch him (and me) off mid-corner. With advice from some of his tuners, we bumped up the rear compression & rebound to full (for comparison) and also increased the front rebound a fair bit (since the front rebound damping was almost nil).  One more lap later he brought it in again and said it was a little bit better but still felt the rear was very soft even dialled up to max settings.  It felt like there was no nitrogen charge left in the rear shock. The rear shock is a Fox Racing twin-clicker with piggyback reservoir that is rumoured to have come off of Steve Crevier’s RC51 from “back in the day.”  So ended the Friday.

Saturday morning I consulted with Kevin Graham of Orion Motorsports, and we decided to try an SC3 rear 180 tire instead of the SC2.  I was initially skeptical as I thought it was purely a harder tire and would take lots of warming up to make it work.  That was not entirely true; it would have the grip of an SC1 but would be much more durable.   So I went through practice sessions and found that the SC3 is a marvelous tire, and I will likely be “sticking” (haha) with it for the rest of the season.  Thank you again, Kevin!    Unfortunately, throughout the practice sessions I found the bike to be very unsettled… with the front now tracking better it exaggerated the issues with the rear.  After getting through 1 of my 3 qualifiers I made the tough decision to pull out the rear shock and get it rebuilt.  Problem was… no-one had a nitrogen tank to recharge the shock.  My alternatives were to go into town to hunt for a shop that would recharge the shock… or drive all the way to Calabogie Motorsports Park to have the shock rebuilt by John Sherrard of Accelerated Technologies.  That’s what I ended up doing, arriving at Calabogie at 6PM.  John had other work to do so he started the rebuild at around 9:30PM.  I was fortunate enough to help him with the rebuild.

It was obvious that the Fox shock was in bad shape… and turned out it had only been rebuilt 2 times.  The disassembly was “interesting” and a bit difficult.  Turns out one big issue was the reservoir assembly was not tight on the shock body… likely leading to loss of oil & nitrogen as well as allowing air to enter the shock body. When John finally got the shock apart and poured out the oil, it looked like a frothy chocolate milkshake.   The rebuild took about 1 hour and he increased the stiffness of the compression and rebound valving as well as fitting a slightly stronger spring to better suit my weight.  (But honestly, I AM quickly getting down to my summer fighting weight, John!  LOL)

I learned a lot of valuable information from watching the master in action.  His suspension tuning course is definitely on my list now, as I enjoy and get a lot of good working knowledge from those sorts of courses.  I want to learn the “dark arts” of suspension tuning. 

The 2-hour night time drive back to Belleville was in the rain but uneventful… though with deer, foxes, raccoons, and other assorted critters making appearances along the various highways.  I arrived back at my Belleville hotel at 1AM.

Sunday morning I was back at the track at 7AM to reinstall the rear shock (which went easier than pulling it out, believe it or not).  After setting the rear sag, I had 2 practice sessions to get used to the near rear end.  And it certainly was much better than it had been previously!

The first final up was RACE Thunder with mixed air-cooled and liquid-cooled classes combined.  For the first half of the race I chased down a Pro rider until I was finally in a position to make a pass under braking at the end of the straight going into corner 1.  I showed a wheel and had the inside line and made the pass.   I immediately saw my error… my line forced me wide on the exit onto the turtles and I had downshifted 1 less gear than normal so I had no drive out of the corner.  My long sought-after pass evaporated in an instant as the other rider took a tighter line and re-passed me again.  Now that he knew I was hunting him down, he rode very defensively and I didn’t give me another opportunity to pass him. Checking my times I had done a 1’09.2”… nearly breaking into the 1’08” which would have been a very good time for the heavy RC51.

The other two finals were Sportsman Heavyweight and then finally Masters Heavyweight. Sportsman Heavyweight has a lot of talented riders and some VERY fast machines.  That final I experimented with different cornering speeds while hunting down riders ahead.  For many of the laps around Corner 4, I swear I was leaned so far over that my left elbow was kicking up pebbles!

In the Masters class, my friend John Savoy and I were nose-to-tail battling for position. Just after the halfway point we saw a dust cloud in Corner 6 (first right hander after a series of lefts) as one of the racers went off in a major way.  The race was red-flagged and we were done.  It turned out that John and I had finished 2^nd and 3^rd respectively… a podium finish!   We checked that the downed rider was okay… and he was, though very sore after his massive highside.

At the end-of-day awards ceremonies I happily stepped onto the podium to accept my 3^rd place finish in Masters Heavyweight.  But the thing that really surprised me was the Thunder class; the rider that I had passed and was re-passed by had taken 3^rd place (I had finished a close 4th)!!!    In hindsight if I had known I was passing for a podium position I would have planned the pass a lot better and tried much harder to make it stick.  But such is racing, and I applaud my competitor for a job well done.

Overall it was a well-fought weekend with good results, but room for improvement as always.  Next week will see a track day at Calabogie to sort out the suspension on the RC51.

Looking forward to long track again in mid-July!

Going into RACE Round-2 (long track) on May 14/15/16 we were very excited as this was the first “big track” outing for the RC51. We were expecting this to be an absolute treat to allow the big twin to stretch its legs on the big track, as opposed to the tight Nelson circuit of Round-1.  

Friday practice day saw a relatively good turnout and fair weather, and we pitted near our race friends on the end of the infamous Row-1.  Practicing for the entire day saw a lot of good laps, and of course some not so good laps.   All part of racing!   The full body ache at the end of the day was expected, and it showed up with a vengeance.   The RC51 is great fun to ride and has lots of torque, but it takes a concentrated effort to throw it around any track compared to a lightweight modern 600 or Ducati.   This weekend I was registered in 4 classes:  RACE Thunder – Liquid, Sportsman Heavyweight, Masters Heavyweight, and Amateur Superbike.  LOTS of tracktime, to say the least!

After consultation with a few ex-RC51 racers, we made the decision to switch to a 180 rear (instead of the current 190) to make the bike turn in better.  (And believe me, ANYTHING that makes an RC51 turn in better is highly desireable!)     With good advice from Kevin Graham at Orion Motorsports, we shod the rear with a Pirelli Diablo Supercorsa 180 SC2 (a bit harder but more durable than an SC1).    The result?  The word “astounding” comes to mind as I dropped 2 seconds off my best lap time — down to a 1′57″ then!    I had struck gold with that tire, and looked forward to the mains on Sunday!

Sunday morning started off very nicely with good weather and a clear forecast… so it was off to the morning practice sessions.  During the practice sessions, things started to go amiss with the transmission.  I noticed that I was hitting a lot more false neutrals between gears, having difficult shifts, and sometimes the transmission would jump down a gear unexpectedly.  After practice was over we had a few hours before the first final, so we decided to tear down the clutch to see what the issue was.

With the clutch apart, what we found ended the raceday right there and then before turning 1 lap in a final.  In the slipper clutch we were using lightweight Hyperplates hardened aluminum plates along with OEM friction plates and Barnett race springs.  ALL of the alum metal plates were scorched in 3 places (both sides), and most were fractured right through in the same 3 places.   No wonder there were transmission problems!   Left the way it was, there was a good chance that the metal plates would have shattered, come apart, and grenaded the clutch and/or transmission.  With no spare metal plates available, we were forced to call it quits.  Very unfortunate to say the least, although we’re sure we avoided a tragedy of bigger proportions.

So ended Round-2 for us on a sour note, though we gained a bit more knowledge of tires and setup, and MUCH more knowledge about clutch do’s and don’ts.  First thing on the agenda would be a complete clutch rebuild and oil change, as well as a thorough examination of the oil drainpan to check for any other nasty surprises.

Onward to Round-3 on June 18/19/20 on the Fabi circuit!

RACE Round 1 was held on April 30/May 1,2 at Shannonville on the short Nelson circuit.  Considering the weight of the RC51, it is not well suited to such a short, technical track.  This became obvious throughout the weekend as laptimes were slower than my more modern, lighter, and more powerful competitors. However, we were trying out a brand new Yoyodyne slipper clutch for the first time EVER. Any initial nervousness was soon forgotten and soon I was enjoying the benefits of going into tight corners harder without fear of the rear tire locking up under downshifting. This was of great benefit going into tight corner 5 at the end of the back straight. That corner ate alot of racebike plastic that weekend.

Friday practice went well, Saturday saw rain so out came the Pirelli Turbine rain tires.  For anyone who knows these rain tires, they will agree that their performance and grip is nothing short of astonishing.   I like rain riding and so qualified fairly well in the wet.

Finals on Sunday really drove home the shortcomings of the heavy twin on the very short, tight & techincal track. Hoping for better results in Round 2 on the long track.