It felt like the incendiary pits of hell at AFM's Round 5 on July 11th and 12th. With three digit temperatures and not a cloud in site, the water never quenched the thirst and even peeling leathers off wasn't much of a relief. I am usually not bothered by such heat, but with my head full of fears, it tooks its toll. Don't worry, I didn't suddenly start to fear motorcycles. What I feared all weekend long was another complaint against my riding from some pesky little boys who don't like getting passed by a chick. I feared getting a fine I couldn't pay or getting suspended or disqualified from an AFM event.
I tried to ignore the fear that was holding me back, and I tried to focus on riding. I recently read "Twist of the Wrist", Keith Code's guide to racing, and I was trying to apply the little bits of information I extracted from that book. Mainly I worked on reference points, and since the repave, Thunderhill is seriously lacking in good reference points. My goal was at least three for each turn, hopefully six. Unfortunately, turns 4, 6 and 8 left me hanging with only one or two points for each. Though I cannot express how much glee it brought me to see the white strips recently painted in turn 8. While I did find many new reference points for the rest of the track, I was still going slow. Granted it was just practice, but come on... why no improvement?
As Friday came to a close, I was still hopeful for Formula AFemme, my weekend hadn't gone down the toilet quite yet. I even talked to rider rep, Jason Butler about the exact definition of "passing too aggressively", now it's just a matter of opinion whether or not I'm actually doing this. However, as Saturday progressed, some of my fears materialized. I was in lovely practice group 2, not getting at all frustrated with the people in front of me, and being very good at passing nicely, when all of a sudden, this guy passes me and moves right back in on my line and brakes for the corner. I almost smash into his rear tire, but luckily my ZX6 brakes are pretty badass. So whatevs, not a big deal, but coming out of the corner and dude is going slow: probably worked so hard to pass me that he messed up his line. So I pass him back. Don't think he liked that. This goes on for like two laps. Every other turn he tries to pass me, can't make the pass stick, I pass him back. It was only frustrating because he kept on coming back into my line after he passed me which would cause me to almost hit him. Quite rude, especially for practice. My soft take off was sliding pretty often at this point: through most of 2, most of 3, always over the top of 5, definitely in 8, and usually in 14... So I came in and when I came down the front straight and stuck my hand up, dude pulls in front of me and sticks his hand up too. Like he couldn't even get off the track behind me... Anyway, I went over to him to say "hi, please don't complain about me, p.s. it sucks when you cut back in onto my line" and he ripped into me! "A little aggressive for practice, don't you think?" Um, me? Don't I think? You were the one passing me, I was just passing you back cause you couldn't make your passes stick. Was I supposed to just back off and let him have the pass because he had the balls to try it? I don't think that's the way it works... but AFM does have some interesting rules. Maybe when someone shows you a wheel you're supposed to let them have the turn... If that's really the case I need to go back to Supermoto.
Anyway, this incident upset me greatly. Because if he were to complain, I'd be the one getting a fine. So more stress got piled on and my head got into an even worse state than it had been in. Furthermore, apparently one of the little mosquitos ran out of gas in 12 and caused Jenn to avert disaster by hitting the hay bails and doing a number on herself. So poor Jenn is a mess, Christie and Deb have to work, and the ladies' race is slowly fading away to nothing. Luckily we had new girl, ex-drag racer Stacy to come and play. Her start in her Clubman race was amazing, as it was in Formula AFemme, and after half a lap and one 750 down, the 600s were out of site. Every lap I came onto the front straight and saw them going into Turn 1. And it was the first time in my racing career that I had really really wished for horsepower.
Alas, Sunday was upon us and my head was still hindering my riding. I raced like I had never raced before. Not in a good way... but like I had never been in a race before. I'm not even sure I passed anyone, so great was my fear of the AFM's wrath. This left me far at the back of the pack where people are scary. Someone almost hit me going into turn 10 and the two guys in front of me were almost comical to watch. One guy really, really wanted to pass this other guy, but he couldn't get it together. Every turn he'd go for an inside pass and every time, right at the last minute he'd realize he wasn't going to make it so he'd pull all the way across the track back to the outside to get a better line and better drive out. If he had just stuck his normal line to begin with he would've a) not been in danger of smashing into me, cutting me off or slamming on the brakes right in front of me, and b) probably gotten the other dude on drive out of the corner. So I almost feared to get too near to these two because it seemed overly dangerous. However, after being frustrated and depressed about it all morning, I was determined to have a fun afternoon.
I waited for a few more hours in the blistering heat, tired, but unable to sleep, thirsty and dry mouthed, with all the water I could need. Finally, time for Open Twins. The race that can only be fun because I am so underpowered it's comical. And I was starting in front of GoGo, so that would boost my ego. Second call and I'm getting my gear on. Brian's checking my tire pressure. Check's the rear. Check's the front. What's wrong? Third call... Why is the rear pressure dropping? Go out and race? With the pressure dropping so visibly? Can I do that. I don't think so... Tire off, sprayed down, where's the leak? We can't find it. Bridgestone boys can't find it... oh, there it is. And it looks like there's something inside my tire. Something in my brand new tire with 18 laps on it. And after Brian digs it out with a knife we see that it's half of a little master link clip from a 125. And it punctured a hole in my tire. To top my weekend off and remind me how much money I just threw away.
So on the drive home when I was thinking about why I did this if it wasn't any fun, I resolved to have fun. Even if it means the AFM fines me or kicks me out. There's no point in racing if I'm not having fun. So Infineon, here I come, ready to kick some ass, pass some boys and have fun with all the girls.
