News

Summit Point Weekend

Summit Point, WV

July 7, 2008

What an interesting weekend this was. The track is SO fast! I've never ridden like that before, just ringing the crap out of the bike for each 2 mile lap. The front straight is SO long! With my loudon gearing I was just topped out in 6th gear for 3 seconds or so.

Turn 4 is this down hill right hander that has you in forth gear topped out at the enterance. It was tough for me to really keep the momentum through there as the airfence lined wall is so close there and it is such a fast corner. I got better through out the weekend, but was still loosing time there.

There are 2 hard braking zones on the track, turn 1 and turn 5. Turn 5 is a tight left hand which leads into the carousel (turns 6/7). From here you start to build you momentum for the back straight. It is my most favorite part of the track (minus the condition of turn5 and 6). The carousel has you knee down for 200+ degree decreasing radius corner, which leads to a fast left (turn 8) right (turn 9) on to the back straight which has you topped out in 5th gear. Turn 9 is a 12k RPM, 4th gear corner which you can just rail through which sends you up the hill toward 10. You take an upshift entering turn 8 accellerate through to full throttle on the exit, back off a bit to turn in for 9 and hard acceleration up the hill ... the best part of the track in my book.

The track is also in very rough shape in several areas, and just down right dangerous in the wet because of the repair technique.

Quick background:
Summit Point recently got a repave, with that, they didn't leave ample time for the new surface to set before the cars ran on it. This caused the track to break apart in turns 1,3,5.6,7,10. They use various sealers to prevent the pavement from coming apart anymore, but still left rumble strips in 1,5, and 6. The stuff in the wet is worse than road paint or wet grass.

Its better in the dry, but the rear still spins on it under power. It is what it is, and we drove 8 hours for the race weekend, so time to suck it up and learn the track.

Friday:
We don't get in until 6am, practice starts at 8am. We quickly setup, I finish my bike prep and go out for session 1, damp track. Start turning laps, getting used to the flow of the course and just trying to figure out how to navigate turns 5 and 6 successfully.

5 laps in I come into the last turn (10) under the bridge quicker (topped out 5th gear) than I expected, hit the brakes hard going into the corner, and all of a sudden the front end is gone while I was still up and down. Crap ... 80+ MPH getoff .... ya for run off. I slid a good distance picking up some good old West Virginia clay, and the bike slid even further, even doing a tumble for good measure. I just became that guy ... you know, the one who crashes in the first warm up session of the day.

Get the bike in, review the damage ... both rearset brackets, right clip-on bar, master cylinder, rear rim bent. Daviid had a spare bar for me (thanks Daviid!) and I had a spare master cylinder. I brought the rearset brackets to the local suspension guy who pressed them straight for me, and got the bike back together in a couple hours. Brought my send rim with a rain tire on it over to Dunlop to get the tire switched. It rained while I was working on the bike, so I didn't loose too much dry track time.

After lunch I was able to get out for two dry sessions, but I was so exhausted and mentally spent with turn 10, that they were not all that productive.

At 3PM the rains came and they were unrelenting ... the place flooded faster than loudon. So they called it a day and we just settled in for the night.

Saturday morning we wake to rain, bring my rear tire down to Dunlop once a again to get the rain put on so I can go out for practice. Practice went well, learned very quickly that the sealer is unpassable in the wet ... avoid at all costs ... kept it on two wheels for both sessions.

Rain ended by 10:30 and track started to dry. I was race 9, so I brought my rear wheel once again to get the DOT put back on ... this is getting old. (=

It stayed dry and I went out for my 1 race on Saturday, MWGP. I was in row 5 for the start just on the edge of the first wave. We go and I forgot what its like to start from the back of a wave ... it was madness into turn 1. I just settle in and run my race. Still not having my shift points figured out and I make some mis-shifts in spots, esp. turn 5 giving the spectators their moneys worth in that corner. I finished 12th or 13th, but in the offical scoring the system missed a lap of mine, so it I was placed 30th ... not worth contesting. Got my first race at Summit out of the way. I rans 1:25s which was 5 seconds of the lead pace.

Sunday we woke to dry conditions and I had two dry sessions. Was able to get good work in both practices and build my confidence back up through turn 10. I was able to drop into the 1:23s in practice, so I was pleased.

I had 3 races on Sunday, which all kind of blend together. There were no real good battles to speak of, I just ended going out riding as best I could and was not concerned about where I finished ... just wanted to finish.

MWSB was my first race. I got an ok start and just ran as best I could. Was in the top 10 for most of the race, but a couple of the fast guys from the 2nd wave ended up working past me after the half way mark which put me down into 13th. I ran low 1:23s.

My next two races were back to back since they combined AM/EX HWSS. I was debating doing the double, but thought, why not ... I'm here to race.

I get a great start for HWSS and end up 6th into 1 and hold ground for 2 laps ... lap 3 the big bikes start coming and pass me on the front straight like i'm standing still. It was almost 3 bikes per lap that tagged me on the front straight. I ended up finishing 20th, running low 1:23s.

I came in and headed straight to hot pit for my final race, MWSS. There were people on grid with water for those that have back to back races, so that was awesome. We were quickly off to race again. I got an awful start and was 10th going into turn 1. The front group quickly took off! It was a fast front pack, and I couldn't hang. I got passed one more time on lap 4, then I made a mistake into turn 1 on lap 6 and 3 guys were able to get by me as I was very wide. I finished 14th with laptimes in the low 1:23s again.

Overall I would have liked to have done better and tried to get down to the 21-22s, but I was happy with my first time at Summit. There were 35-40 racers in each race ... so huge fields!

The last lap of the last race I finally figured out why I was getting killed on my drive out of turn 1, I wasn't taking enough down shifts to keep me in the meat of the power ... I was playing it safe I guess, but I'll make a note of this for next time. During that same lap I finally figured out the hot line into turn 10 to allow for late braking and fast corner speed for a great drive out, another note in the book for next time.

I'll be back to Summit for sure, but I will wait until they fix the track. I'll post pictures that Arcy took during the track walk we took Saturday night. It was a fun weekend and glad that we went down. It was great to race somewhere else and just get seat time during the 5 week LRRS break.

Thanks to Arcy for doing all the driving this weekend and congrats on 2nd place in Formula 40!