CMP 2/6

bacolmm · **Posted:** Mon Feb 07, 2011 7:36 pm

Since Pat and I traded our trucks in for cars, and my wife totaled her SUV and replaced it with a car, our plan was to each take our own cars to CMP. Per the forecast it was looking like it would rain all day Fri, then the rain was supposed to end around 9 AM on Sat, and Sun was supposed to be in the mid/upper 50's and sunny. We figured we could probably get the after lunch sessions in on Sat and then all day on Sun.

Pat arrived at my place at around 10:30 AM on Friday and we hit the road. Pat had his trailer hooked up to his VW Golf and I was pulling Jeff's trailer with my Sonata. I had used Jeff's trailer to haul my bike to MPH in Ohio a couple weeks before and the license plate fell off on the way home. I tried to get a replacement plate, but couldn't because it's registered in Jeff's name. Jeff didn't have time to get the plate before we left so I decided to roll sans plate and hope for the best. Of course there was a local cop at the first light we stopped at that followed us all the way to RT 79. In my rear view mirror I could see Pat laughing.

We made it about an hour and a half into the trip before Pat called me to tell me he was having car trouble. He downshifted going up a WV hill, lost power, and his check engine light came on. We got off the next exit to check it out. Pat had the tool to check the code and it was indicating there was a miss-fire on cylinder #1. Pat pulled the sparkplug and it looked terrible so I went over to the nearby Napa to pick up plugs. He got them in and it was better, but still not good. We made some calls and found an Advanced Auto that had a coil-pack for his car and made our way there. Pat replaced the coil-pack and it didn't resolve the issue.

Pat decided to bag the trip and try to limp his car home. He said that if he were me, he'd head to CMP and do the trip solo. I really thought about turning around and going home. I got on RT 79 heading South and 10 minutes later my brother called me. He lives north of Charlotte and I had emailed him in the morning letting him know that I was heading his way for the weekend. He said I should just crash at his place for the night. I believe it was around 2 PM when Pat turned around so I put the hammer down, only made a couple very quick gas/bathroom stops, and was at my bro's house by 8:15 PM. The weather was nice and sunny until I hit VA and it poured non-stop all the way to my bro's place.

It was still raining when I got up in the morning so I was not in a big hurry to get to the track. I went out to breakfast with my bro and his wife, hit the road, and was at the track by around 10;30 AM. It was still raining, but per the forecast it looked like it should clear up soon. I signed up and paid for Sunday and said I'd pay for Saturday if it stopped raining. I unloaded and got my stuff set up and ready to go. They have free Wi-Fi at the track so I hung out in my car and surfed the web waiting for it to clear up. The lunch break came and went at it was still raining. It was still raining at 1:30 and I decided to pull the plug on Sat. I checked into the Executive Inn, drove around a bit (because I hadn't had enough windshield time already), did some shopping, and was pretty much bored off my ass. The weather finally cleared up at 4 PM. I grabbed a bite at Subway and hit the sack early. This trip was really not going as planned!!! I was starting to think that I should have turned around with Pat...

I got to the track on Sunday and it was cold, but clear, and the Sun was out. There would be a total of 5 riders on the track - Josh, Tim, Gary, Carl, and me. Josh and Tim run the CMP days along with Stickboy and Gary and Carl are WERA racers from NC. There would be plenty of open track.

Session 1 - I was the only rider that went out for the first session. I had a brand new front tire (Power One V) and a completely shagged rear (Power Race Med-Soft) and just went out to take it easy and re-learn the track. I was enduring a ton of windshield time for 1 track day so I was not going to sit out any sessions. The temp was now in the upper 30's / low 40's and it felt pretty cold on the track. I took it really slow at first and picked up the pace lap by lap. Although it was cold, the track felt pretty good and had plenty of grip.

Session 2 - The temp was up to about 45 degrees when we went out and I felt pretty comfy and picked the pace up some more.

Session 3 - Warmer, picked up the pace some more, my shagged rear tire started sliding around, and I almost ran out of gas.

Session 4 - Put a fresh Power Race Med-Soft rear tire on, filled the bike up with gas and had another fun session. After it was over I noticed that Tim must have put the transceiver out and my lap-timer showed a best lap of 1:46.34 for the session. My previous best ever lap was a 1:46.10 so I planned to go out in the 5th session and try to get into the 1:45's.

Session 5 - I followed Tim out on the track and figured he could tow me into the 1:45's. He towed me around for 3 or 4 laps and I felt like I picked up some lines and some speed. He waved me by and I felt like I was able to go even a bit faster. When I pulled in and looked at my lap-timer it showed that while I was following Tim I got down into the 1:45's on the second lap, into the 1:44's on the third lap and ran a 1:43.85 after he waved me past. That was the most fun session of the day and I am psyched I was able to get into the 1:43's.

Session 6 - I went out behind Tim again and we had another fun session. I was getting tired and wasn't able to match my pace from session #5 and ran a best lap of 1:44.63. I started to make some mistakes toward the end of the session and didn't think I was going to get the bike slowed down enough going into a couple of the heavy braking zones. I backed the pace down and pulled into the pits.

I was feeling bad that Pat had missed out on a really fun day until I pulled into the pits after the last session. He was chilling at home and I now had a 500 mile drive ahead of me. I had packed up everything I could before the last 2 session of the day, so all that was left out was my bike, stands, and tire warmers. I loaded up in record time and hit the road. Of course my iPod died on me on the way home so all I had to entertain me was the radio and 1 CD - Uggg! I tried to hammer out the drive as quickly as possible. I kept the cruise-control set at 8 mph over the limit and only made 3 quick stops. I was able to listen to the 4th quarter of the super bowl on the radio. Per my GPS, I made it home door-to-door in 7 hours and 42 minutes with 21 total minutes of stops and an average speed of over 63 mph.

CMP 2/6

CMP 2/6

CMP 2/6

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