So we are all jonesing to get back to normal life and racing on the track. I thought I would write a short story of what I have been up to since all the weirdness began and what I have been doing to keep sane and kinda in shape.
** THROUGH ALL OF THIS I AM SOCIAL DIS. AND FACE MASK**
This is the configuation more or less I rode it at the Sears test day in Feb.
Just before the lockdown we did the season opener track day with PTT at Sears. This would be my maiden voyage on the race track with the bike I will be racing this year. My friend Robert Leuer has taken a Suzuki RGV250 and shoehorned in an Aprilia SXV450 twin four stroke. You can see the archive story about the bike in Roadracing World magazine. I think a lot of former 250cc GP fans have always looked for the modern version of what a 250GP would be after the demise of the class. Moto2 is really cool, but for a lot of us it didn’t capture the essence of the 250GP bike…. Very light… so I think what we are trying to capture here has been referred to as GP2. Another bike that starts to grasp this concept is the German built Kramer motorcycles.
Our track day went well. This was mainly a reliability test for the engine. We were limited in pushing hard on this first day as the track was very green, people were crashing left and right. We also had on some older slicks that I was not familiar with. The bike was still very much in street form, lights, and not stripped down from unnecessary hardware. At this point the first race was a month away.
This is the bike today, TZ250 bodywork and we installed the SPS forks
The first weekend of lockdown I went riding with my buddy Steve E at Cow Mountain. It was a little cold, sprinkling when we got there, as we rode higher in elevation it started to snow. I was warming my hands on the exhaust at each stop. After an hours ride in we decided to call it quits because we were frozen. We went back to the truck, ate lunch and decided we could do another ride. We had no map and ended up on some of the more technical trails, we both fell a few times and then got stuck on a double black diamond trail and in came a blizzard, a big wet snow dump… Steve started to have rough time and at one point thought we would have to leave his bike behind and get rescued. We pressed on, remained positive and got back to the truck around 5:30pm ( before daylight savings )
Despite the rough conditions at Cow Mt. the week before I really enjoyed the riding part, the conditions were awesome and I was feeling the flow on the single track. I came back the following weekend for more.
Here is Steve E in the snow!!!! This my moto weapon CRF250R....
The next week they closed Cow Mt. due to covid19….. where to go…. The national forest at Stoneyford was still open.. kind of… all of the staging and camping was closed, but you could park on the side of the road next to the trail and ride in. The trail system was open. After two good rains, conditions were epic, there was very few people there and was a serious release being out in the forest in such a beautiful place.
The next weekend we went back this time with a couple of friends, some people will recognize the local fast guy and AMA national winner and podium finisher Dave Devo here in the pic. Again we had an awesome day ripping up the single track. I know that some of my fellow AFM racers do not ride dirt, I have to tell you your skills would be so much sharper when you come back to the pavement. Right now it is really how I am coping the best way possible with our current situation.
Sadly a week later they closed the trail system in all of California because some riders went into the staging and camping areas and disobeyed the rules, Thanks a lot jack asses…. So where do we go now.. this has become an obsession to find a place to ride. A fun obsession none the less..
Off to the motocross track
I hadn’t ridden or trained on a proper, prepped motocross track in years, up in Yuba City( Marysville there are two tracks that are run 6 days out of the week. We went to the E Street track. One of the tracks is of AMA outdoor national quality, huge berms, table tops, doubles. That track was fun in morning when it fresh with no ruts, these are sand tracks so a little more forgiving when you fall. On the other side of the property there is what I would call a vintage track, natural terrain, mild jumps, elevation changes, again sand, so super fun. They water these tracks multiple times during the ½ day session. I will always ride trails but have once again found a love for the moto track.
In addition to riding dirt bikes I have been riding my road bicycle in my newly relocated Novato…
I hope everyone is staying safe and I would like to give a shout out to all my 2020 Sponsors: Robert Leuer, BARF Racing, X-Lite Helmets, SPS Suspension, Z2 track days, Hotel Biron....
** THROUGH ALL OF THIS I AM SOCIAL DIS. AND FACE MASK**
This is the configuation more or less I rode it at the Sears test day in Feb.
Just before the lockdown we did the season opener track day with PTT at Sears. This would be my maiden voyage on the race track with the bike I will be racing this year. My friend Robert Leuer has taken a Suzuki RGV250 and shoehorned in an Aprilia SXV450 twin four stroke. You can see the archive story about the bike in Roadracing World magazine. I think a lot of former 250cc GP fans have always looked for the modern version of what a 250GP would be after the demise of the class. Moto2 is really cool, but for a lot of us it didn’t capture the essence of the 250GP bike…. Very light… so I think what we are trying to capture here has been referred to as GP2. Another bike that starts to grasp this concept is the German built Kramer motorcycles.
Our track day went well. This was mainly a reliability test for the engine. We were limited in pushing hard on this first day as the track was very green, people were crashing left and right. We also had on some older slicks that I was not familiar with. The bike was still very much in street form, lights, and not stripped down from unnecessary hardware. At this point the first race was a month away.
This is the bike today, TZ250 bodywork and we installed the SPS forks
The first weekend of lockdown I went riding with my buddy Steve E at Cow Mountain. It was a little cold, sprinkling when we got there, as we rode higher in elevation it started to snow. I was warming my hands on the exhaust at each stop. After an hours ride in we decided to call it quits because we were frozen. We went back to the truck, ate lunch and decided we could do another ride. We had no map and ended up on some of the more technical trails, we both fell a few times and then got stuck on a double black diamond trail and in came a blizzard, a big wet snow dump… Steve started to have rough time and at one point thought we would have to leave his bike behind and get rescued. We pressed on, remained positive and got back to the truck around 5:30pm ( before daylight savings )
Despite the rough conditions at Cow Mt. the week before I really enjoyed the riding part, the conditions were awesome and I was feeling the flow on the single track. I came back the following weekend for more.
Here is Steve E in the snow!!!! This my moto weapon CRF250R....
The next week they closed Cow Mt. due to covid19….. where to go…. The national forest at Stoneyford was still open.. kind of… all of the staging and camping was closed, but you could park on the side of the road next to the trail and ride in. The trail system was open. After two good rains, conditions were epic, there was very few people there and was a serious release being out in the forest in such a beautiful place.
The next weekend we went back this time with a couple of friends, some people will recognize the local fast guy and AMA national winner and podium finisher Dave Devo here in the pic. Again we had an awesome day ripping up the single track. I know that some of my fellow AFM racers do not ride dirt, I have to tell you your skills would be so much sharper when you come back to the pavement. Right now it is really how I am coping the best way possible with our current situation.
Sadly a week later they closed the trail system in all of California because some riders went into the staging and camping areas and disobeyed the rules, Thanks a lot jack asses…. So where do we go now.. this has become an obsession to find a place to ride. A fun obsession none the less..
Off to the motocross track
I hadn’t ridden or trained on a proper, prepped motocross track in years, up in Yuba City( Marysville there are two tracks that are run 6 days out of the week. We went to the E Street track. One of the tracks is of AMA outdoor national quality, huge berms, table tops, doubles. That track was fun in morning when it fresh with no ruts, these are sand tracks so a little more forgiving when you fall. On the other side of the property there is what I would call a vintage track, natural terrain, mild jumps, elevation changes, again sand, so super fun. They water these tracks multiple times during the ½ day session. I will always ride trails but have once again found a love for the moto track.
In addition to riding dirt bikes I have been riding my road bicycle in my newly relocated Novato…
I hope everyone is staying safe and I would like to give a shout out to all my 2020 Sponsors: Robert Leuer, BARF Racing, X-Lite Helmets, SPS Suspension, Z2 track days, Hotel Biron....
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