National Motorcycle Racer - OliverJervis.com

 

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Dan with a 20oz Soy Mocha Latte - NO Whip a.k.a. (liquid personality)

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The 600
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Kevin Pinkstaff
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Brian Pinkstaff
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Amy Moe :O)
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The rides
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One Twenty Five
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One Twenty Five
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Them Bones
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GPR
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Dustin
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Mike - (He rides a HAWK)
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Drain that tank Dale
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QuickShifter
"Shrift Oli Shrift"
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Brian Moe


 


OMRRA Round 2

 

Series: OMRRA
Date: May 11th

Classes raced and results
600 Supersport -
3rd
650 GP Twins - 1st
600 Superbike - 5th
MW Superbike - 1st

 

Happy Mother's Day to all the Mom's reading this.

It's about 1:20 AM on Monday morning. I'm driving home from Portland in an effort to catch the first Ferry home to Victoria. Yes, living in Canada's Western paradise does have its costs. (Beyond the monetary ones that is) About the only thing I enjoy with driving during these late hours are the talk radio shows, specifically, the Dr. Drew Show. Basically, the Jerry Springer show of Radio. I don't get the chance to watch much TV, if any, so I guess this is my consumption of "reality". I'm just thankful it's not my reality. And now as I sit back and read my last paragraph I realize I must be rather tired and not completely coherent to be writing about a talk radio show in a race report. Oh well - It stays - You'll read about everything that goes on in these repots folks. Well almost everything.

Notes on practice:
Practice went really well as the weather system that was supposed to come in never evolved into any precipitation. These days the bikes spend more time warming up than do on the track in practice as I'll only do two to four laps and come in. If the bike is working as well as I think it can, we park it for the races. We did make some changes to the 600, specifically, to address my challenges from the first round here. Things were working really well with my practice times almost equaling my race times from the last round. Bodes well.

Race 1
600 SuperSport
Weather conditions - wet & cold
Tires front / rear - Rain, soft front &Med rear
Total laps - 12
Result - 3rd

Sometimes Mother Nature just messes with you. Here we were bathed in sunshine right until they blew the horn for us to go out for this race. We looked up and there was one little cloud, in a sea of blue sky, which decided to open up on us. Literally a sun shower! GREAT…. The team sprung into action as the field went out on the sighting lap. The guys hustled and managed to get the rain rims mounted on the bike just as the field started to return to the grid for the start. And I have to thank everyone for doing such an amazing job of getting the bike ready in record time. Now, this meant that we had to start from pit lane, but with the track now completely soaked, we figured it was worth the gamble. A few other riders decided to take the same chance we did and, for the first time in my career, I started a race from pit lane after the entire field had gone by. Now I have to tell you that I had a few things on my mind. This was my first sample of the new Portland surface in the wet, and the rain tires I had on were stone cold. Those two reasons were more than enough for me to tentatively sample the available traction as the Pirellis came up to operating temperature. By the end of the second lap I was in third and pretty much alone. I don't think I have ever passed that many people in a race ever. I just put it on cruise control as there was no way I could make the gap to the leaders and I managed to hold onto third.

Race 2
650 GP Twins
Weather conditions - wet - dry - wet again & cold
Tires front / rear -DOT soft - soft
Total laps - 12
Result - 1st

Did I mention Mother Nature can be a beast? Sure enough, the track was 90% dry as we headed out for the sighting lap. I could see another cloud approaching that certainly held some precipitation and even had a few rain drops splash on my visor as we went through turns two and three. OK - I was on DOT tires, as was most of the field. I knew I had maybe one, or two, laps before the rain came destroying anything that resembled a decent lap. I got a good start and led the field into turn one which was now completely soaked. Turns five through nine we're, however, still dry. So with that I really pushed on the opening laps in these sections and managed to get a gap on the field. For the rest of the race I just worked on maintaining the gap something I luckily managed to do despite the now wet conditions.

Race 3
600 SuperBike
Weather conditions - wet & cold
Tires front / rear - soft Rain front - med Rain rear
Total laps - 12
Result 5th

I have to say that I was disappointed in my performance in this race. I had the package to do much better than I actually did, but I just didn't get the job done. In hindsight I didn't get into a rhythm that allowed me to do consistently fast laps. I would do one lap and think, "OK, just a few more of those and we'll be up the order". Only to get into some lapped traffic and make a mistake, etc etc. No excuses though, as these are not the results I should be having with the equipment and tires I'm on. We'll remedy this shortly.

Race 4
Middle Weight Superbike
Weather conditions - cool & damp
Tires front / rear - soft rain front - med rain rear
Total laps - 12
Result - 1st

I feel I equaled my best start on the SVZR in this one. The bike wheelied ever so slightly as I slammed it into the second ratio and it carried the front tire a few inches in the air until I notched it into third. Cool! At this time dry lines were appearing all over the track and I was starting to think about tire management. Luckily for me, I had a medium Pirelli Turbine rain on the rear. These tires are almost an intermediate rain. They work well in these conditions as they hold up phenomenally well as the track dries. With a small gap earned on the start I managed the lead to the end.

Again, thanks to everyone that's involved in our race program.

I now have a few weeks off from racing, so it's time to get to all those household and property chores that have been backing up. Looks like I get to build a shed. Also, my trainer Dawn and I are going to work on some stuff with the time off. And, I think it's time Carter caught his first fish. Some fly fishing on Elk Lake or the Cowichan River with my kids is definitely on the agenda.

I'll be at the PSSR track day in Seattle on May 29th and the next race is in Seattle on June 14th - 15th

Stay tuned

Oliver