Race1

2004 Race Diary

2004 Race Season Prologue

During the off season another track opened up in Stockton California. For the last 3 years I'd been racing at Prairie City in Rancho Cordova California which is a few miles north of Sacramento. Prairie City is an awesome track, It is very technical with elevation changes and could be configured in many different ways.

The only bad thing about it was that it was over 2 hours to drive to get there and most of the time took 3 hours to get home because of the weekend traffic coming back from Tahoe and Reno. So when Stockton opened up, many of the racers based out of the San Francisco Bay area started racing at Stockton instead of Prairie City because it was a much shorter commute.

Minimotorcycle racers in Northern California were very lucky in 2004 because they had 2 venues in which to race. Most people around the US would be luky to find 1 place to race within 300 miles of where they lived. If I wasn't married with 3 kids I probably would've raced both venues. The only bad thing about having 2 race venues in close proximity is that there just aren't enough racers to support both sites. I believe that Prairie City will drop minimotorcycle racing at the end of this season. It's a shame since the track is awsome. It'll be a really big loss.

My trusted YSR R1 was still down after blowing up my motor at the last endurance race in 2003. I'd meant to get the engine rebuilt during the off season but never got around to it. As a result I missed race 1 in March. I came out to watch my brother race and first saw what Stockton Motorplex was like. My brother did pretty well but the new class structures at Stockton had him racing against TEAM CALAMARI.

2004 Race 2 April 4, 2004

My brother leant me one of YSRs for race 2. Since Stockton is a brand new track racers were designated as:

Novice = Experienced racers with a few races under their belts with other clubs. This meant that Expert class racers in other clubs were grouped in with true Novice racers like my brother and I. That's why even tough Eddie, my brother did well in the 1st race at Stockton he failed to trophy because he was up against guys like TEAM CALAMARI.

Beginner = Riders with little to no race experience.

The classes were set up differntly too. I decided to race in the Modified YSR class which is close to the class I raced in PC (Supersport) and a new class called Novice 50. This class puts stock, supersport and superbike YSRs with Honda XR100's and Yamaha TTR125's as well as Derbi GPR50's, Aprilia RS50's and Derbi Sendas. Although I felt that I my bike was outclassed, I decided to race in this class because the grid was so large and racing against so many bikes brought back memories of my 1st year of racing at PC when the grids had over 20 bikes in them.

Since the track is now only about an hour away from my house I drove up the night before and actually practiced before the race. In years past I never went to practice because I would've had to spend the night in Sacramento because the commute was so long. I decided I needed to practice since this is a brand new track that I'd never seen and I was racing my brother's bike which although is a supersport YSR like mine it was set up differntly and no 2 bikes are ever alike. I learned the track and got used to my brother's bike. Eddie's bike fealt like the front suspension was softer than mine. I didn't like the way the front end felt. It seemed too bouncy. Once I got used to it I started putting down some pretty fast lap times.

On race day I found out that Novice 50 and Modified 50 were back to back. Once I got off the track for my Novice 50 race I had to gt back on the grid to race in Modified 50.

Here I am leading the pack in the Mod50 main before I started getting passed. I through on my old Repsol Replica plastics.

The Races
Mod YSR

I felt pretty fast since I practiced the night before. I felt that I could do pretty well in this class. I lead several laps in both heat and main races but ended up loosing places either because of fatigue or Eddie's bike started overheating. In the main I was leading the pack. but I started loosing top end power when I was reving the motor high. As a result I started loosing spots. I knew I couldn't beat the TEAM CALAMARI racers but in the heat races I was actually keeping up with them. That was a total surprise to me. Maybe they were taking it easy during the heat races but I was all over their back tires. I never found an opportunity to pass but they were actually holding me up in some sections. I ended up finishing mid pack in the main.

Novice 50

My bike just wasn't fast enough to compete. The XR100's, TTR125's , amd Derbi's just walked all over me. I was the 3rd YSR to finish behind my brother and another YSR racer but the XR100 guys kicked our butts.

This planted a seed in my head. I figured times were changing and I had to change or get left behind. After that race I decided I needed to buy a new race bike. I didn't want an XR100 because motard style racing just didn't appeal to me. I started looking for a used Aprilia RS50 or Derbi GPR.