Virginia International Raceway: August 4-6, 2017

Virginia International Raceway:

August 4-6, 2017

WERA/N2 Endurance and National Sprints

Pic 1: 3MR crew after the race.

I’ve been looking forward to VIR for quite a while now. In the past, I haven’t had much success there. I love the track, I think it’s a lot of fun, but it has always been tough for me to wrap my head around it and go fast there. With this being the last “normal” WERA National round (besides the GNF) and the final N2/WERA Endurance round, I was really hoping to put that lack of success behind me and start fresh with some good racing.

After the problems we ran into with the 3 Marines Racing endurance bike at Pittsburgh, John (our team captain) put in a lot of work leading up to this weekend getting it sorted out. I helped him replace the transmission and shift star, but he had gone through the rest of the bike and had it ready to rock by the time he showed up to VIR.

Pic 2: New transmission installed in the ZX6R.

During the day on Friday, each of the team members took turns taking the ZX6R out on the track to get used to its feel. By lunch time, each of us had ridden it and we each had some recommendations on changes that needed to be made to make it faster and more rideable, so I worked on the forks while John and Tim worked on making a gearing change during lunch. I took it out right after lunch and noticed that the problems that I wanted to fix were much better, but the rear grip was atrocious. I came into the pits and told the guys that we needed to change the rear, I think that tire had 2 hours from NJMP, plus all of the practice at PITT, plus all morning at VIR on it and it was sliding in places a rear shouldn’t be sliding. We swapped the rear for a less-worn take-off and continued practice. The rear grip level was still not what I was hoping for, so I played with the shock a little. I was hoping to get more grip, but it would be hard to know for sure until we put a new rear on. That wasn’t going to happen, though, until the race on Saturday. Everyone rode the bike in the afternoon and agreed that the changes that we made were giant leaps forward and that we could live with the slight lack of grip in the rear for now.

Once the track day was over, the team started discussing pit stops. Now that we finally had a good bike with all of the right quick change/fill parts on it, we needed to discuss roles for each stop. We practiced our tire change pit stop about 10 times. Each time we did it we found something else that we needed to discuss and agree upon. In a stop like this where 4 people are all doing something unique, it’s important to have everyone understand exactly what everyone else is doing. Our practice stops ranged anywhere from 28 to 36 seconds with the worst being about a minute because of a little confusion. After we all felt that we were comfortable, we decided that we would do the exact same thing Saturday morning in practice.

With our pit area set up on Saturday morning, everyone suited up for the practice pit stops. We decided to just practice the tire change stop, so I would go out on the track, do a lap, then pit in and practice the full stop. After Will got on the bike to act like he’d take off, he would hold the bike up and we’d switch. I’d go back out on the bike and practice the entire thing all over again. By the end of our practice, we were happy with the stops and felt comfortable that we could do it quickly without any issues.

After the endurance practice, John, Tim, and I had qualifying for our 600 Superbike race on Sunday. We went out and I tried to latch on to Tim. I knew from past experiences that Tim runs really well at VIR, so I just wanted him to drag me along. After about 6 laps, I decided to call it and settled with qualifying 8th with a 1:36.17. I knew I could go faster than that in the races, but I was happy with that time that early in the morning. Of course, Tim put in a great time with a 1:35.06, qualifying 4th.

Pic 3: The Eric Telger Racing R6 ready for qualifying.

Knowing that Tim is a monster at VIR, we decided to change up the order on the bike to give Tim the good front tire at the beginning of the race. Tim got a great start and had a fantastic battle with Sloan West of Mi Scusi SDK for nearly his entire stint. Tim and Sloan traded positions a handful of times and really pushed each other. Tim threw down an incredible pace for an endurance race, with a fast time of 1:33.67 coming at lap 37 in the race. Sloan, not to be outdone, put in a 1:33.0, but had to pit in a couple laps earlier than Tim which put Tim in 5th place overall by the time he pitted in on lap 39.

After a blazing fast pit stop for fuel and rider change, I went out for my stint. When I first entered the track, I was really out there riding by myself for about 13 laps or so which made it hard for me to push. My lap times at this point were between 1:37’s and 1:39’s depending on how much lightweight traffic I encountered. At about lap 54, my friend John Kremenik passed me as I came up on an SV. I don’t know what it is about his yellow suit, but just seeing that thing in front of me makes me lose my mind. I knew that we were a couple laps up on his Bobblehead Moto R6, so all I needed to do was manage the gap. I put a wheel on him going into T1, but I had no interest in passing him, I just wanted to let him know I was still there. He would be the carrot that I needed to get in the groove and push, so I would do my best to keep the gap between us to a minimum. He would somehow get through SV traffic faster than I could, but each time the gap widened, some faster rider from Apex or Army of Darkness would come by and pull me along to close the gap back up. After lap 76, I pitted in for a rider change with a best time of 1:34.91, which up to this point is the fastest I’d ever gone around this track, even on my own bike. It’s also worth pointing out that during Tim’s pit stop, we stayed in 5th place; we didn’t lose a position like we had done every other pit stop prior to that. I kept us in 5th place during my stint and came in ready for Will to take over.

I rolled into the pit box and got out of the way as fast as I could. This was the money maker, the most important stop of the day. We were changing the tire and fueling the bike and it was extremely important that it went well. Tim and John tackled the rear wheel change, while Rick Lind and Richie Fetter manned the fuel tank and extinguisher. From the time I stopped to the time Will started the bike and took off, it took the crew 22 seconds to do a tire change and fuel. Not only did they nail it, they did it faster than we had ever in practice, and faster than most of the more seasoned teams did it on the grid. I was so tired after my stint that it didn’t even really hit me what happened until after Will was gone, but I couldn’t have been more proud of these guys for their work. Will entered the track in P5, just where I left the track.

Video 1: #3MR pit stop #2.

Will was out for about 7 laps before a red flag came out. At this point, we were in P5 overall and 3rd in class, but the next couple of teams in our class were on the same lap but almost a lap down. We had about an 80 second lead on them. The red flag came out at the worst time for us because on the restart, those teams are basically starting at the same point in the race as us, meaning we essentially lost our 80 second lead. On the restart, we lost 2 positions but Will was able to make quick work of one of them and got us in 6th overall, but still in 4th in class. Bobblehead Moto had recruited a couple of extremely fast riders for this race and one of them was out on track with Will and one was still waiting to ride, so we were starting to think that we would have to settle for 4th in class. Unfortunately for Bobblehead, when they pitted in, they had some mechanical problems with the pit stop that put them down 5 laps on us, so we were able to capitalize on their mistake. Will came in after about an hour of riding on lap 111 in P5, right where he was when he went out for his stint. He rode extremely well and put down a fast lap of 1:37.12.

At this point in the race, there was only about 40 minutes left in the race. We gave John a little bit of fuel and told him to ride conservatively because the next place ahead of us was out of reach and the next place below us was multiple laps down on us. All he had to do was ride a good pace and keep the bike upright. After about 4 laps, they threw a red flag and called the race, so we were all concerned about John. After a couple minutes, the #163 #3MR ZX6R pulled into pit lane without a scratch on it (at least without any NEW scratches) and we told him that the race was called. We finished the final endurance round in 5th overall and 3rd in the Mediumweight class with 115 laps after 3 hours, 25 minutes, and 42.77 seconds.

Pic 4: #3MR teammates: Tim, John, Eric, and Will (left to right)

Pic 5: Mediumweight podium. Apex Manufacturing (1st, #22), Twisted Speed (2nd, #187), 3 Marines Racing (3rd, #163)

I’ve never experienced anything like endurance racing, there’s something special about it that I can’t really put into words. #3MR has worked their tails off this year for this series. There have been a lot of ups and downs, with some of the downs being extremely difficult to overcome. There is no quit in this team, though. We were able to pull off some seriously tremendous feats working through adversity. I couldn’t have picked a better team to be a part of. We are all misfits in our own way, but each of us brings something to the team that couldn’t easily be replaced by anyone else. Racing in memory of our founder and my good friend, Randy Chabot, made it hard to get through things at times because of the emotions involved, but I’m so happy we did this and so proud of this team for pushing forward even when the deck was stacked against us. We finished the season 4th in class with 238.72 points, behind some great teams with extremely fast racers. Racing with guys like Jason Disalvo, Taylor Knapp, David Grey, and Anthony Mazziotto was an awesome experience, especially when you get to share the podium with them.

With the endurance race over, I needed to focus on my sprint races on Sunday. I had already gone faster than I had ever gone at VIR on a bike I’m not totally comfortable on, so I was really looking forward to putting on some new Michelin Evos on my R6 and seeing just how far I could push.

My first race of the day was the 600SS race. I seem to be developing a pattern of having issues in my 600 races, and this one was no different. I started the race in 7th, and got a really good start. I came out of T1 in P5 and followed the lead pack under the bridge entering T7. I’m not exactly sure what happened, but I missed a downshift going into T7 and couldn’t get the bike slowed down enough to make the turn, so I had to run off track onto the pavement that connects the north and south tracks. As I did that, another rider followed me and I noticed 2 riders go down as they went up the hill. I immediately recognized one of the riders as one of the #3MR crew, Rick Lind. I was terrified that I started the domino effect that caused his crash, but apparently someone came in a little hot and took out his rear end. I put my head down and did my best to pass as many novices as I could, but 6 laps wasn’t enough time to really do much other than maintain my position in my race. I finished in P11 since there were so many crashes this race, and my fastest time was only a 1:36.00.

My second race was 750SS. I started in 4th and got a great start again. I was determined to latch onto the lead group and stay with them, which I did. I was running in P4 as we got to the top of the hill where Ryan Christian crashed, leaving Mazz and Chuck Ivey in front of me. Due to Ryan’s crash, they red flagged the race and we went back to the pits. On the restart, I got a good start again and found myself in P2 for the first lap behind Ivey. Mazz found his way through both of us and I found myself just trying to stick to Ivey. After the 3rd lap, Ivey lost his chain and I had to make a dicey move to get around him without colliding. On lap 5 I heard someone up my tailpipe coming onto the front straight. I turned around and to my surprise, I found John on the endurance bike hot on my tail. Knowing that bike and where it’s weak, I put my head down and refused to give up P2 to my teammate. I finished in 2nd with John about 2.5 seconds back in 3rd. I was happy to find that I had run a 1:33.91 and John had run a 1:34.63. Having John behind me was just what I needed to motivate me to get into the 33’s.

My 3rd race of the day was the 600SBK race. I qualified 8th for this race and I was looking forward to the 10 lap featured race because I felt I was starting to really get the hang of the track. Remember, I have never done very well here, so I was really happy with my result in the last race and I wanted to keep pushing. I got a good start and went into T1 in P6 right behind my teammate Tim Wilson. I was really wanting to finish ahead of him for bragging rights, so I was hot on his tail. He got held up by Joe Blasius for a couple of laps, but once by him he opened a bit of a gap. On lap 5, I was able to make a pass on Joe at the end of the front straight and I was hoping to pull Tim back in. As soon as I looked down at my gauges, I realized the fuel light was on. At this point in the story, I’ll go back to the night before where I was talking to my former friend, Sloan West, about riding an R6. He told me he did an entire sprint race one time with the fuel light on… as soon as I saw the light on my dash I immediately thought “I’ll be ok, Sloan said so.” I was riding in P5 and pulling Tim back in ever so slightly when on lap 9, the bike started sputtering. I made it to the top of the hill in the back section and let it coast all the way down to pit in. It was at this point in time when I decided I didn’t really like Sloan very much anymore. Instead of having a highlight for the afternoon with a top 5 finish and possibly even beating Tim, I had to settle for a DNF because of a dumb mistake on my part. I was able to push into 1:33’s for most of the race with my fastest at a 1:33.6.

The last race of the day for me was the 750SBK race. I started 7th and got a good start going into T1 in P4. I was riding behind Tim and Joe again, I was really hoping to get the better of them. I tried hard for 4 laps to keep up, but these guys turned up the pace a little, dipping into the mid 32’s and I just didn’t have it in me. I was able to get my best lap of the weekend this race with a 1:33.53, but after looking behind me on the 4th lap and seeing no one in sight, I backed down the pace and settled for 4th. I was happy with the result and happy that I dropped over 2 seconds at VIR since last year. My only regret is that I didn’t quite beat Tim, so I still have work to do.

Overall, I can’t be any happier about this weekend. I came to a place that I knew I used to struggle and I worked hard to go faster. The endurance race went really well, and each of the 4 team members walked away with podiums in their sprint races. #3MR was successful as a team and as individuals, and I couldn’t ask for much more than that.

I can’t thank my sponsors enough. Shoei Helmets and put me in the best helmet on the market, the new x-14 is really awesome. PopShadow Decals has done a great job for us for years making me and my equipment look professional. They really are top notch in quality and customer service. BD Racing has us covered with the best brake pads money can buy, Vesrah. Sportbike Tire Service is always helping us go faster, whether it’s with tires or setup advice, these guys know their stuff. Sportbike Leather Service works magic with my suit, it blows my mind how Dan can take a crashed suit and make it look better than new. Sharkskinz keep the bike looking fresh, they make the best race bodywork in the world. Vortex Racing has been a huge supporter for a long time now, their rear sets and sprockets are the best in the business. Spiegler Performance Parts has the absolute best brake lines on the market, and they’re fully customizable so you can get the colors you want. Moto-D Racing has the best tire warmers for the money, and their customer service is fantastic. They also carry a lot of cool accessories for the race track. Pilot Motosport has stepped up again this year and teamed up with us to put us in the best protective suit in the business. Sidi Boots and Motonation have some of the best prices out there on the best boots money can buy. The new Mag-1’s are awesome boots, I can’t say enough about them. The Motorcycle Factory, Inc. in Woodbridge, VA has some of the best deals in the area on new and used bikes.