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May 19-22 - 3rd Round of WERA Mid-Atlantic Series

Virginia International Raceway

By Dennys Passeto

Pictures

Hey guys, cyclejam was great! I didn't participate in Thursday's open practice or Friday's endurance race. My dad, kelly, and I rolled in to Danville on Friday night to get set up for Saturdays races. The paddock was FULL! Had John not saved everyone spots we would have been in the nose bleed section of the paddock. The Saturday races were almost all full.

I went out for practice on Saturday morning and my bike felt very different. I had done a few modifications and adjustments so I was having to get used to all of them. Donnie unger and I had sorted out some injection problems I was having, I had put on a lighter chain and sprockets, and I had added some full floating EBC rotors that were much lighter than the stock ones I had. All this unsprung weight removed and actually being able to open up my throttle bodies 100%, resulted in reaching top speed by the time I reached the kink. I couldn't even draft anyone because It would make my bike rev even faster. The bike was free wheeling into turns much faster as well. My gearing was way off and I didn't have any other sprockets on hand to select from. I hardly broke into the 1:39's.

Donnie - Thanks for making my bike too fast for itself! :)

I was looking forward to the second practice to get a better feel for the machine. Unfortunately, there was a big accident in Lightweight practice which required massive oil clean up. I'll let other Madsters elaborate on this incident. Needless to say, no second practice. Now I really didn't know what to expect from the races. I didn't have the feeling I wanted from the bike. This being cycle jam, there were riders from other regions and we were gridded by points and so I started 3rd on the grid. I had never raced many of these guys. They were from the northeast and southeast regions.

Anyways, The green flag waved for HWT SS and we hauled into turn 1. I was in 3rd coming out with a 748(so he claimed) and a RC51 in front of me. I was happy to be able to keep up with their pace as I got more comfortable with the bike. Suddenly, I felt real comfortable and realized they were holding me up. I made a few attempts to pass the 748 in front of me but he was even crazier on the brakes than I was(I had my rear wheel off the ground). I waited patiently and made my move at the top of the roller coaster. I quickly made up ground on the leader coming out of turn 17 and I went for the pass at turn 1 on the brakes. I was certain the 748 guy was going to come up inside of me as he had but I put enough of a gap down the straight. I put my head down and checked out for the last 3 laps. I had figured out how to ride the bike. I won by almost 12 seconds. I couldn't believe it! Once passing for the lead I had done 2 straight laps in the low 1:36's. I was stoked! My fastest ever and the bike wasn't even properly geared.

For the HWT SB race, I started in 3rd position again and wanted to be first into turn 1. I B-lined it to the apex and parked it mid corner so that no one would take me on the inside. Too many wanna-be heroes that I wanted to avoid. I put my head down and tried to be smooth. I didn't have anyone challenging me in the race so I just stayed in the 37's the entire time. Occasionally a 1:38 through lap traffic. I took the checkered 8 seconds ahead of 2nd place. Cycle jam was worth double points so I've got a nice 15-20 point lead on second place.

Sunday was the national challenge series and there were many less in attendance. I didn't understand why more people didn't stay. I only raced in raced in the HWT SS race and I started second to last since I had no points in this series. I could see from the lap times in practice that I could win if I got through traffic quickly. I went into turn 1 in third place and waited patiently for some clear track. The leader had a 4 second lead and I didn't want to let him get away. I made the pass for second and worked my way up to the leader. To make it more challenging, I lost my knee puck on the gator teeth and I couldn't touch my left knee down anymore. I felt like a blind man without a cane. It really showed me how much I rely on the feel. It slowed me down a good bit. Thank god it was the left knee puck and not the right. There are only 4 left handers and 12 right hand turns. I passed the leader on the brakes going into turn 1 and tried to open a gap. I was sliding a good bit since my rear tire was kinda cooked so I wasn't lapping better than a low 38. I was afraid he was going to be able to hang with me. He tried but crashed behind me. I didn't find out until after the race. He was okay. For winning the race I got a really cool trophy which I'll try and post a picture of it later.

Next round is at Summit Point on June 12th! The goal is to drop into the 1:20's.