Bit of a mixed bag at the track yesterday, I had a lot of fun and it felt good to get out there again after a couple month layoff.
The bad was that I was having a fantasy of jumping on that bike with the new tank setup and dragging knee with 20% more roll speed all the way around the track
The reality was that I felt pretty rusty from a 2 month layoff and had to relearn the line after not being at that track for about 4 months, and I only had half a day to do it because I got there at 12:30 lol
Also under estimated how much the change in tank and seat setup would require me to adapt my trained neuro muscular responses on body position and lean angle on the bike.
After I knocked off the rust a bit, got the tire pressures where I felt comfortable with them, and got enough laps in to ‘remember’ that track a bit, and could focus on how the seat and tank really felt, I realized that my body position needed a lot of correction.
This because the seat is so much wider that when I scooted my butt out to where it should be (one ass cheek on the other off like I normally do and feel comfortable at) I found that because my ass was further over I was now crossing myself up on the bike, because I was keeping my upper body in the same position as I did on the wider tank and narrower seat while my ass was more off centerline, so my inside elbow was way to high, and my body was crossed up. This was causing me to miss the apexes by about 5 feet, I simply couldn’t get the bike to ‘close down’ on the apex.
After several laps of that I realized the issue, and tried just riding loose and natural and let my train neuro muscular response take over, but that was a mistake too, because now I wasn’t getting out off the wider seat enough and my weight distribution felt uncomfortable.
Finally I realized that the ergos were different enough that I needed to slow way down, and just work on retraining my automatic neuro muscular responses to good body position ON THE NEW SETUP. But by then my half day was nearly over.
So my fantasy was that I’d jump on the new setup and immediately set new PR’s lol, the reality is that I’m probably going to need an entire full track day, maybe two to adapt my automatic responses to being in the right body position on this setup.
Some other notes, even when I slowed down and started getting in the right position, the setup puts your body so much more to the inside of the bike that you FEEL like you are at a much higher lean angle than you actually are, because you are farther off the bike. Only to come back to the pits FEELING like I was leaning the bike MORE than I use to with the old setup, but I now have 1 inch chicken strips at similar roll speeds where I was using all the tire. Ultimately that will be a good thing, but it’s another small bit that I have to retrain myself into. i.e. that the lean angle I’m feeling with the new setup is way less lean angle than i think it is because I’m further off the bike.
The positives, I’m getting further off the bike with WAY less physical effort that it took to get less off the bike with the old setup…and because I’m further off the bike I will eventually get better traction at the same roll speeds and coming of apex in the drive phase…
But…im probably gunna need a 100 laps or so at a familiar track to adjust myself to this new setup and get full benefit out of it.
Shout out to Kev for getting me on the track at all yesterday…I did something boneheaded, was on the waitlist for yesterday, and got an email saying I was off the waitlist and registered that I just glanced at while driving, but that was for Sunday Feb 4 not Sunday Jan 14…but Kev was kind enough to go ask the track day admin on the day of the event if there were no shows and if I could come anyway…and that got me out there for a fun half day…thanks Kev!
