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WERA ’13, Grand National Finals – Barber

Thanks to Chris and Lora Broome for their hospitality during our Barber trip this past week. We hung out the weekend before, during the STT event and then Chris and I hung out all week while we waited for the GNF. I worked for a few days and in between, beat Chris repeatedly in NBA Jam on the PS3 – although he'll try to tell you differently.

Once down there, hanging out with people was the highlight. My dad, Doug, Eric Johnston (who we hadn't hung out with at the track in awhile), along with Brian Livengood, Lori, Nick, Mandy, Stymie, Jillian, Gary, Gene, Greg, the 419 Racing crew, James and Jeff from Pirelli, Mike Fitzgerald, Mark Junge, Mike Pascarella and crew who were with Tucker Lancaster. Dave Grey, Richard Harris, David Bavol, John Trauttman, Ma, Sean Dwyer, Mark and Dawn Merical, along with many new faces we met. Thanks also to Kyle (Wyman) and Elena Myers for having Chris and I over for dinner during the week. And George and Charlie from Pit Bull for letting me visit their place on the way down. That should cover all the name dropping.

One thing I felt bad about was an incident with another rider. In the first race, I made a pass on the outside of the left at the end of the back straight about four laps in, on a slower rider. The pass was made cleanly and I was clear of the bike, but as I tipped into the right, she ran right into my back tire and made contact. Luckily we both didn't crash, but she went down unfortunately. It was a close place to pass and I think it caught her off-guard. I went over afterwards – not even knowing she went down at that point. Fortunately she was okay. While I still felt bad about a close pass in the first place, we both agreed it was a racing incident. Tensions can run high in those situations and a guy who's friends with her later said she was "taken out". That's not how it happened and the GoPro video shows that (they were recording both front and rear). I would run off in the grass before taking anybody out and certainly don't have, or want that type of reputation. I showed the video to a handful of people later that day to make sure it wasn't just my own opinion of what happened and they definitely agreed. In any event, it still doesn't resonate a good feeling when someone crashes like that.

As for the racing, there really isn't much to write about. We struggled and went slower than last year. It wasn't a whole lot of fun, but that's racing sometimes. We'll formulate a plan and regroup. We now know what the issue was, at least.

As someone wiser than me once said, riders aren't permanently fixed in place, regarding their racing abilities. Given how this event went, I sure hope not.

Thursday, October 31st, 2013 | POSTED AT: 5:23 AM
FILED UNDER: Race Reports