Post Cadwell, BIG BOOOM...

Like a total dipstick I left the UK after our last round at Brands hatch having already typed out my Blog on my desktop but forgot to post the bloody thing and couldn’t get it again until we returned to the UK, well, as you’ll probably all know to well by now things haven’t exactly gone to plan since our return but before we get too involved with that I’ve got to say that what was supposed to be a bit of time out and a nice family holiday turned into an absolute full on training mission, in those 3 and a bit weeks I trained probably harder than I’ve ever trained in my life, 13 bicycle rides equaled 755 miles, that’ll give you an indication as to how much I trained, and that’s just cycling, that doesn’t include 3 or 4 10 km runs, a BSB test day at Donington and some swimming so I definitely both physically and mentally was right up for it by the time we got back, going for a BSB weekend would probably seem like a bit of time off lol!!!!

Onwards now to last weekend and looking back it actually started off pretty crap with a crap bank holiday traffic infested drive up to Cadwell Park, there is nothing worse than being sat going nowhere and I’m far from the most patient of people where that is concerned, it took something like 5 and a half hours to get there yet two days previous we got there to drop off the motorhome in just under 4, then to make matters worse where a mate of mine hadn’t plugged the motorhome in to the electric whilst storing it for me and the batteries were dead so nothing would work when I got there, that made me smile, not!!!

Right enough doom and gloom already, knowing that our rivals had all tested up at Cadwell very recently it was important that we tried to get up to speed as quick as possible and sure enough we came out strong, we had nearly a second a lap over the rest of the field for a good chunk of the session however Tommy fired in a new set of tyres towards the end and pipped us by a 10^th but we were right in the ball park from the word go so I was more than happy enough.. I had been hoping that it would stay dry, especially after the bad forecast and it did stay good, well for that first session anyway, I was certainly relieved to have woken up to that and to get some dry laps in, as you never know when it might suddenly change, that then makes it difficult if it is wet all the way through till race day and then it dries out especially as we knew the other guys had already been out for some dry track time.
 
Then it all went a bit wrong in the afternoon...

On my first proper flying lap in free practice two I went up through the Woodlands section, I had new tyres in that were perfectly scrubbed in and I was pushing on a bit, unfortunately just over the top of the crest I hit the brakes in my usual spot but locked the front tyre, luckily, well unluckily for me as the case would be you are already on left side of the track, I managed to catch it but in hindsight it was a terrible thing because if I had just lost it and crashed I would have gone straight on and been ok, but the bike gripped darted sharply to the left and went into the tyre wall and then after a head on flipped me big time over the handlebars.

The end result is I have managed to have a grade five dislocation of my left shoulder and torn the ligaments off my collarbone and sent it off out the back somewhere, amazingly with a grade 5 being really rare I never actually broke anything so I was incredibly lucky, after being assessed initially by the wonderful circuit medics I was then taken by air ambulance to Hull for further tests but to be honest we weren’t making much progress there so a call once again to the circuit medics and some hectic texts and calls by them on my behalf got us the chance to see Professor Lennard Funk in Manchester the following day, however, the circuit medics came to my motorhome after all their hard work that night, informed me I needed to be in Manchester around 11am the following day, left me some painkillers and headed off, well, that was great but I took the painkillers, slept like a baby and woke at 10-55am the next day!!!!! Talk about panic, I got up, brushed my teeth then me and my mate rushed over to Manchester, I was sat in the passenger seat thinking bloody hell this is like being in a real life Gran Turismo computer game but we made good time so I was happy, being sat in a car with your collarbone popping in and out really isn’t that much fun!!! We arrived to see the professor who after about 2 minutes said yeah we should definitely operate, I’ll do it this afternoon, with that before I knew it I was under the knife and job done, new ligaments attached to the ones I’d ripped out, pinned back together, some self taping screws and superglue (only joking!!)!!! That evening we headed back to the track at a rather more sedate pace than what we’d got to Manchester at and chilled out ready for hopefully another good nights sleep…  

The sleep situation was nowhere near as good that night but regardless I got to see and thank the circuit medics personally, done a bit of TV stuff then got packed up and headed home early to beat the bank holiday traffic, Now, I’m resting and I’m really hoping the Showdown might work for me this time, basically I’ve got just over three weeks to heal, you can rest assured I’ll do everything in my power to get as strong as possible as fast as possible and who knows, if I feel good enough I might even try to ride at Donington which would be cool. If I feel like I can win at Donington then I will come back and ride but if I don’t feel strong enough to ride then I will wait until Assen and the first round of the Showdown when we need to ride.  It is one of those need to basis things. I am doing everything I can between now and Donington to be strong and if I am strong enough then great but if not we will do Assen.

The funny thing is about the whole race weekend thing I really don’t think I got the chance to hurt too much, that may sound a bit daft but everything seemed that busy and blurry that things seemed to be happening before I’d even realized, yesterday however was a whole different ball game, I finally got to sleep in my own bed, chilled out but the following morning, BOOOOOM, it hit me like a train, I woke up pretty damn sore, quickly had some breakfast so I could take some painkillers then pretty much went back to bed where I ended up staying for most of the day, I guess all the time your still and sleeping your healing though so maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing, Thursday is when physio starts, step by step though…

I’ve got everything crossed that we’ll be back at near 100% by Assen as I haven’t come this far and worked this hard to give up on my 3^rd title now, I’ll let you all know how that’s going in my next Blog, but until then, keep the faith…. I HAVE!!!!!! 

Post Brands hatch!!

Well, what can I say, this is the blog I have been looking forward to writing all season, the one about our first double win for the Rapid Solicitors Kawasaki team and cementing my place in the title shootout showdown and where better for that to happen than my home track Brands Hatch, even if I now get labeled as the Brands specialist lol ;-) typically me though it’s a week late coming but hey, what do I always say, better late than never right!!!???

I know I mentioned in my previous blog after the Oulton weekend that I was gutted not to have won there and both myself and the rest of the team left there really revved up and determined to turn things around, especially knowing the next round would be at Brands where there’s always a good turnout to support us and also with Tommy Hill doing such a good job at Oulton we didn’t need to be losing touch in the podium credits stakes!!

The Brands hatch GP weekends always start with the first day of practice on the Indy circuit, we all know why it has to be done that way but the official test was just a chance really for us to have a bit of a run around before the real work started on the full Grand Prix track, the two in some ways just don’t compare though, I’m actually not a massive fan of the indy circuit but the GP one, well, that’s a whole different kettle of fish, the first laps around there really make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up!!!

Practice and initial stages of qualifying went real well, we’d been in the mix all weekend but when my crew chief told me before the final qualifying session we would need a 1.25 second lap time to get pole and I wasn't sure it would be possible as we were riding really hard already doing mid to low 1.26’s, you can’t rest on anything though in this job so with one final attack I pushed as hard as I could and did a 1.25.8 to take Pole position, It put us in a good position for the first race but we knew Pole was one thing and racing for 18 laps (around 30 minutes) was another so we needed to keep pushing.

Race one felt great, after a great start I made a mistake on the first or second lap at Stirlings and Michael Laverty got by me, alI I wanted was to try and get some laps in and then settle into a decent rhythm, I spent a little bit of time getting past Michael but once I did first my pit board said Michael was there, then it changed to Haga then it changed to Brookes and I thought flipping hell give me a break!! After what seemed like almost an eternity It felt fantastic to win the first race at Brands Hatch even though I was more than a little bit aware Josh Brookes was all over us there at the end, I know you only need to win by the smallest margin possible but that was a little bit too close for comfort!!!

After wininng the first race I knew the second one was going to be difficult, for the 2^nd race I’d qualified 4^th which means the inside of row one and the camber down there is real steep so it’s usually real difficult to get a good start, especially in the wet however wet wasn’t a problem for once this weekend!! The 2^nd race was almost like a mirror image in some ways, in both races I got the lead pretty much straight away and I both races there were yellow flags out on the GP section on the 2^nd lap, I almost thought I was dreaming at one point!! 18 laps is a real long way with +.0 on your pit board, again the names changed about a little but at the end it was Josh and I going at it, we had a fantastic battle, colliding up at Druids with Josh trying some brave moves to force me into a mistake, I just tried to be as precise as possible and then I saw Josh alongside me down the straight finish line and I thought 'oh no, he then tried to pass around the outside at Paddock and I wanted to let off a little to not let him passed but I didn't want to run wide and ruin the drive up to Druids, but fortunately i held on and was able to push really hard for the last three laps which got the job of breaking him slightly done only then on the last lap I made a small mistake on the exit of Surttees which could’ve cost me as that’s the corner that leads out onto the all important back straight and then to make matters worse i missed a gear between Westfield and Sheene Curve and I thought that's it he’s going to do me now as I had seen plus zero on my pit board but fortunately I held it and crossed the line for a double win!!!

There are a few of us who were really fast last weekend, and indeed have been all year, three of us, Tommy, Josh and myself have all cemented our places in the showdown now and have everything to fight for but there’s a couple of others that are strong too, Haga and Laverty spring to mind immediately who will almost certainly end up in the Showdown so it’s going to be tough, none of us can give an inch right now and those all important podium credits are still up for grabs!!!

Brands put us in a good place, I got a decent start from pole position and then won both races even though Josh kept me honest, it’s critical now not to rest on our laureIs and continue pushing real hard in preparation for the Showdown.

We now have a bit of time off for the summer break, a month or so in fact so we’re off to our place in Spain to chill out for a bit, that and to absolutely hammer myself cycling around the local area, it’s great training, loads of the big cycling teams come down and spend time there so I’ll be doing my best to chase them down, hopefully they’ll all be knackered after the Tour so I might get half a chance ha ha!!!

Right one more thank you to all involved in my racing and hopefully it is onwards and upwards from here, talk to you all soon, take it easy, Shakey #67
  

Oulton park 2 2012...

To say that I was looking forward to getting back to Oulton park for round 6 of the championship is a bit of an understatement, let’s face it, things have been going pretty well lately, my bike’s been improving week in week out and having won at Oulton last time we were there, won at Knockhill and generally taken some good steps I was hopeful of some very strong results from last weekends triple header!!

The weather forecast didn’t look particularly special so I never bothered taking my bicycle with me so I was gutted when I woke Thursday to be greeted by bright sunshine, it seems every time I take my bike it rains and when I don’t it doesn’t!! The weather had other ideas for Friday though with a particularly gloomy wet start to the weekend, we had a new spec of engine to try that we were very hopeful of but for some reason in the first session the bike ran like a bag of nails, my data guy Ben made some improvements but the actual performance wasn’t exactly staggering which was a bit gutting, I withheld judgment though hoping a dry session might let me use the engine better and give better feedback on it..

Saturday we finally got a dry session and with some improvements mapping wise the bike started to feel a little bit better, from a chassis point of view the changes we’d been making over the course of the last few rounds were feeling pretty good though and I was enjoying my riding which is always highly important, we knew we needed to improve but ending up P2 and only a 10^th or two off of Tommy was a decent start in the dry.

Due to the three race format from here on in it was straight into qualifying, we knew we comfortably had the pace to get through at least the first session and probably the second but there’s a good few one lap wonders out there and to be perfectly honest using a tyre to the best of it’s ability doesn’t appear to be one of my strong points at the minute, it’s something we’re working on but for me it’s far more important to be strong for race distance than it is for one lap and generally we seem to find ourselves on or pretty damn near front row pace anyway!!

For some reason we got through Q1 no drama at all but in Q2 we started having a few little dramas, nothing major it was just that the engine was feeling real tight on the overrun and I had a bit too much backing in going on whilst trying to run into turns quickly which wasn’t ideal, we got through ok though so it wasn’t a drama, Q3 here we come…

Q3 just didn’t go my way, that’s the long and short of it, we made a couple of little changes to the bike to try to improve the bikes rear corner entry stability but just didn’t find what we were looking for, my cause wasn’t aided either when one of the other guys lapped about 3 or 4 seconds off the pace in the final session yet didn’t move over when waved a blue flag but anyway, no excuses, we weren’t good enough in the final session and we ended up P5 and off the front row, needless to say I wasn’t happy!!

The first race of the weekend just didn’t go to plan full stop, that from my point of view is almost enough said, the problems we’d suffered in the qualifying sessions were compounded massively by a duff rear tyre, I ended up with so much corner entry chatter that I just couldn’t ride the thing, I maintained 2^nd for pretty much most of the race then got passed by Josh at the last corner and dropped to 3^rd, if you thought I was unhappy after qualifying……

Sundays warm up gave us a chance to get out and realize the rear tyre had been a big issue in the previous days race but something was still a miss, if I told you that the race I won earlier in the year I was lapping almost a whole 1.5 seconds per lap average faster that’ll tell you we were up against it, with that pace i could have rode off into the distance this time around!!!

Race 2 and to be honest things didn’t get a great deal better, we pushed hard, stayed closer to Tommy by miles than we had done the previous day, had a good battle with Haga but ultimately finished 3^rd again, it’s strange in a way how two podiums from two races would normally be considered good form but let me assure you it’s not what I’m turning up for, the difference of that 1 posistion between 1^st and 2^nd means everything, and I mean everything, I used to think Foggy was overdoing the winning statements back in the day but I so get it, if you get a 2^nd or a 3^rd who gives a shit, I certainly don’t, both of them mean you lost yet the elation from finishing 1 position higher and winning is the only thing that matters, weird!!!!

After that 2^nd race the boys discovered a problem, the problem, but an even bigger problem was the fact that the problem had been happening for an undisclosed amount of time and we didn’t know where to go to rectify it, it turns out that an electrical issued (yeah I know, an electrical fault ;-) ) had basically not been letting our engine braking strategy work properly but it had been kind of intermittent and engine braking was something we’d been working really hard on for the last few rounds.. the guys or should I say Ben our data guy took a bit of a punt on the setting and Johnny my crew chief went a step further with our chassis setting than we’d ever been so the final race was going to be a bit of a revelation or a disaster, fortunately though it was pretty much the former, it took me a while to get going and to understand the bike and the settings so I was a bit steady initially but once I got my head around things we were away, unfortunately it took me too long to pass Nori in the final race despite catching him quite quickly as the Yamahas just seem to be that bit stronger than everything right now, sure the guys are riding well and I take nothing away from Tommy but shit that thing’s got some grunt and not only that it has good top speed now too, just what we need, not!!!

The race came to a conclusion with Tommy once again putting the hammer down whilst I was stuck behind Nori and gapping me a little but at least in that race I actually felt like we might have an answer, sure we never had the best bike out there but we had a decent package and this isn’t a “I could’ve won that” number it’s simply me being far happier with the bike in the final race meaning I could push harder.


What a cool pic!!!

The team are away now to work flat out to fix our issues, Birdy was really complimentary about my riding at the weekend and has vowed to do whatever it takes to get us back to the front and believe me the mans not shy, hopefully Brands hatch in a couple of weeks will be a whole different ball game, I’m certainly going to do everything I possibly can to make it happen from my end, I want this championship again this year, 2 title’s is nowhere near enough and on that note I’m out of here, take it easy guys ad girls, Shakey #67

Knockhill!!

Well that was Knockhill for another year guys and girls and I’d just like to thank whoever ordered the weather for the weekend because despite the forecast looking particularly grim we didn’t end up like drowned rats on race day!!

We had a pretty good first day on track and somewhat unbelievably we got two pretty much dry sessions, there was one small rain shower but it didn’t really affect us too much at all, we were fastest in free practice one and then just pipped in the second one so we had an idea on what we needed to improve for qualifying and we felt good going forward, the only problem was that we needed at least one more full dry session as pretty much everything you do with your bike chassis or settings wise is devised form your current “dry” settings, my team had done a great job and I was looking forward to the weekend already despite the small air of uncertainty settings wise, we knew we’d get it nailed but like I said it needed to be fully dry and I needed to push 110% to confirm a few things.

Qualifying went ok, by ok I mean we just missed out on the front row, which was a bit annoying really as we were fourth, generally at pretty much every other circuit you have 4 bikes to a row but 4^th at Knockhill meant the 2^nd row, something I never actually realised until I did a bit of surfing that evening in the motorhome and read on a couple of websites, to think I was pretty happy thinking 4^th meant front row, I even did a big wheelie over the start finish line, what a dipstick!! 

Fortunately for me the Sunday morning warm up session was dry, that was luck in itself though as whilst I was sat eating my breakfast it started spitting a little with rain, I sat there staring out of the motorhome window saying words to the effect of “please sod off rain” :-) Being dry we got the chance to try some settings that we’d wanted to try all weekend and despite the fact we used old tyres from qualifying we ended the session fastest and matched my all out lap time form the qualifying session on new tyres so things were looking a bit more promising for the race, well, if they were dry that was!!!

The first race was tough, I mean proper tough, being such an almost ridiculously short lap circa 49 seconds we have to do 30 laps per race and the thing with Knockhill is there isn’t one split second where you get to actually rest on the bike, you’re constantly heaving the thing from one side to the other or fighting to either A) stop yourself going over the handlebars under hard braking or B) stop the bike from throwing you off the back under hard acceleration, bear in mind a little food for thought our Superbikes will accelerate from 0-60mph in 2.5 seconds and the only reason it takes that long is the risk of flipping one!!!!

I got a good start from the 2^nd row and by about lap 3 or 4 I’d taken the lead, It isn’t easy when you have 30 laps with +0 on you pit board but the Rapid Solicitors Kawasaki worked really well, throughout the race the most I could get the gap up to was +0.5 but then it would come down the lap later so there was no rest. At the end of the day though you only need to win by the minimum amount possible and to take the win by just over a second was testament to the job the team did for me, a win is what we were after so we are all well happy with that.

To be honest after such a good first race we’d have been stupid to change too much on the bike, we went with exactly the same settings and I figured I’d try to get a start again then just see how things panned out. One of the reasons we’d kept the same settings from the first race was because in some ways I was surprised by the outright lap times from the first race, I actually felt if needed I’d be able to maintain a slightly faster pace for race two so we just rolled with it, both Michael and Tommy had a strong pace initially and I sat in third thinking right you boys can do the leading for a bit in this one, I’ll just follow happily for a bit, however about 10 laps in I noticed Michael Laverty looking particularly keen to lead and at this point I was behind Tommy, Michael got his head down and to be honest it took me a lap too long to pass Tommy who’s incredibly strong there anyway and by the time I did Michael had pulled about a second or so on me and with the circuit being such a short tight lap it’s almost impossible to catch back up, I desperately wanted another win and pushed as hard as I could but in the end second is better than crashing out and I was happy to come away with some more podium credits for our championship and the top points scorer for the weekend so I have to say a massive thanks to the Rapid Solicitors Kawasaki team for all their hard work, fingers crossed it’ll be more of the same next time out at Oulton park, maybe see you there, take it easy, Shakey #67
  

Moto GP rider for the day!!!

It seems like forever ago even though it’s only 6 days but I thought I’d do a quick Blog about being a Moto GP rider again for the day. If I’m perfectly honest with you it wasn’t really something that I was that bothered about doing but at the same time it was a far better option than racing the bike at Le Mans and I wanted to try to help James and the team as best I could without causing any problems, basically Birdy (my team owner) had asked for my input on the bike but whilst it’s quite an exciting prospect I’m under no illusions whatsoever as to how hard it would have been to turn up cold at a Moto GP race and try to finish anywhere other than last so the test the day after the Spanish grand prix seemed a far more sensible option!!!

Turning up at Barcelona was pretty cool, you truly forget just how bloody loud the bikes are and how fast the top bikes are too, the team had a couple of bits and pieces that they had to test with James but I was to go out and ride for a bit first, then James, then me for another quick go in the afternoon, my cause wasn’t helped by the fact that shortly after the track opened both Abraham and Cal Crutchlow crashed not exactly inspiring me with confidence to get out and try Bridgestone tyres for the 1^st time ;-)

Eventually I got out for my 1^st run on the bike after just moving the levers and gear lever a little bit, the aim of the test was simply to try to give some feed back so the bike was left exactly how James had it in the GP, having spoken with James and his crew chief I was a little bit concerned about the whole tyre thing, Mick James’s crew chief basically said right you’ve got experience with carbon brakes, they need to be kept warm and make sure whatever you do you load the front tyre all the way into the corner on the brakes or it’ll go cold and the bike won’t steer at all, b****y great I thought, two experienced riders on those tyres have just crashed and I’ve got to head out on a bike I’ve never been on and load the front tyre or it won’t steer….perfect…  My initial quite surprising thought was that the bike wasn’t very fast, I mean that in a nice way though, the electronics on the bike are quite impressive but need a bit of work and generally the bike felt quite user friendly, I was expecting a far more angry package but the way the bike feels is pretty good, I struggled getting my head around the completely different way you have to ride the front tyre but the rear was absolutely perfect other than loads of chatter on corner entry, through the middle of the apex and on initial exit, this though in my opinion wasn’t all down to the tyres..

I pulled in after about 15 laps and the guys changed some electronic stuff after my feedback which had followed pretty much identically what James had said then got 1 more lap in and the bike felt much better, I was actually gutted when the chequered flag came out as I was starting to have fun even though the bike was set completely for James and we hadn’t done a thing to change it for me.

James rode the bike after lunch and they changed a few things for him and gave him the newer better front and a new rear tyre, he did his work then the bike was given back to me, the only change for me was the tyre as the front James had run was the newer one which apparently everyone other than Honda likes and for the CRT bikes is a much better option, my final exit was good fun, I enjoyed riding the bike and seeing the likes of Lorenzo etc on track was pretty cool, by the end of my second exit on used tyres I got to within a second and a half of what James had done when the tyres were new without changing a single thing so I was pretty happy with that considering James had just spent an entire weekend roaring around, sure in the race he’d gone a chunk faster again but like I said we were near enough first time out to give some feedback, for sure you need time to understand those tyres and with a bit more time we could’ve dropped the lap time easily but the last thing I needed was to either a) throw the thing at the scenery or b) go real fast and get James a load of grief!!!

I hope and I’m fairly sure that my input on the bike will help the guys going forward and who knows if I get another shot on it at some point maybe we can get going quite a bit better, thanks to the team and James for letting my have a play on their baby, for now though it’s back to BSB, I’ve got a championship to try to win, take it easy, Shakey #67

  

Snetterton round 4...

If I’m honest with you guys I went to Snetterton with 1 aim, that, was to come away leading the British Superbike championship, in hindsight that isn’t exactly important when you consider I lead the championship all last year but actually ended up 3^rd but after our 1^st win of the season at Oulton park lets just say I was right up for more victories!!

Snetterton actually got off to a far better start than Oulton with no dramas whatsoever, in fact, after arriving Wednesday evening I spent a good chunk of Thursday cleaning out all the inside then out in the sun washing the motorhome off, it’s truly amazing what a bit of sunshine does for the motivation levels ;-)

Look at the sun shot!!!

Thursday afternoon my mate Wag and I went and did some cycling around the circuit, it started off at a fairly decent pace, then we had a couple of steady laps with my data guy before Wag and I got going again, we saw Dan Linfoot, James Westmoreland and their friend pedalling around too so we cut the circuit to join them and all of us had a good ride around, to be fair I only did just over 30 miles but the conditions were so nice I felt like I could’ve rode all day, our average ended up fairly decent but the following days we all had different types of bikes to ride so didn’t want to knacker ourselves!!!

The setting that we’d been working on for the last few rounds was working pretty good, I pretty much immediately went P1 and stayed there all the way through the session, I ended up literally a 10^th off my best time from the test which was a positive start as we weren’t exactly driving ourselves mad for a lap time!!!

The afternoon session went good too, more of the same to be fair, we worked a little bit on the setting and tried changing spring rates etc, by the end of the session we’d found some positives with both the harder and the softer settings and knew we’d have to sit down that evening go through some data and choose a direction to pursue the following day.

The Saturday morning session went real good again, we were there or thereabouts the whole way through and did a more than race duration run on the used tyres we’d started on but at the end of the session after we’d done our work we fitted a new pair of tyres and I put a couple of laps together that pushed me 0.6 seconds faster than anyone and the first 1.48 second lap time of the weekend.

Qualifying was all a bit of a balls up to be honest, track temperature had shot up big time since the morning session and for the 1^st qualifying session in which you only have to make the top 20 I put a lap together that felt good yet I crossed the line and it was poor, that surprised me a bit so I pushed harder for the 2^nd lap and even that wasn’t fantastic so my 3^rd lap I properly dug in and went a bit quicker but nowhere near my 1.48 from the morning, I spoke with my crew chief and said I felt like a I pushed way too hard for such a crap time and initially we put it down to the hot track temperature, either way we were through to Q2 so it wasn’t a drama.

Can't say i didn't use all the track ;-)

In Q2 I pushed on a bit not really expecting too much but my 2^nd flying lap put me P1 a 10^th faster than my morning time which was a bit weird, no problem I thought, I’ll nail a perfect lap on my 1^st flyer in Q3 and that should do it. To be fair I only ever aim for the front row, I’m not fussed about pole position, it’s nice when it comes but the front row is all you need… 

Q3 then, the important one, perfect lap, s**t time, 2^nd lap, pushed hard, well hard, average time, lap 3 everything I had and an average time, I was fuming, the bike was exactly the same as Q1 and nothing like Q2, it was only after checking all three rear tyres that we saw that Q1 and Q3 were both from the same batch and Q2’s tyre was from a different batch, ironically my team mates were identical batch numbers to mine in all three sessions and he complained of exactly the same problem, all the hard work from the weekend down the pan and Rapid Solicitors Kawasaki’s 7^th and 8^th, not we we’d hoped for at all, still 2^nd row so not the end of the world but bloody annoying nonetheless..

Morning warm saw quite a few riders firing new tyres in and pushing on, the Yamaha’s in particular were pretty fast but we used old tyres from the Q2 session the day before and ended up P3 or 4 and not a million miles away times wise so all cool.

I’ll just quick apologise again about pit lane walkabout, I had an interview scheduled for the start of the walkabout but on the official time sheet had it listed as finishing at 12-15 or something yet when I rocked up with about 25 minutes or so remaining the officials claimed I was too late and that it was over so if you were one of the people that queued to see me I’m sorry!!

Lining up on the grid waiting for the lights to go out I felt pretty confident, we knew we had real good race pace from the day before so a good start and a steady few laps and we should be away. Due to the high track temperature it was always going to be necessary if possible to manage the rear tyre as best as possible so my plan was to get on and sit at the back of the leading group for the first half or so of the race then start pushing through in the later stages. My start was ok, turn 1 ok, I passed my team mate into turn two and slotted in around 5^th, absolutely perfect I thought, at one point I nearly forced a move on Haga but it would’ve been tight and in such early stages I saw little point, after a few laps however Nori started dropping off the back of the leading 4 so I thought right, time to get my finger out, I passed Nori and got my head down to get back on the back of the leaders but then a lap or so later I had an engine problem which meant I had to retire from the race, I was gutted but there’s little point in jumping up and down when your team’s involved, I know them boys are 110% behind me and they’ll be probably more gutted than I am, I got back to the pits, explained the symptoms, watched the end of the race then went back to my motorhome for lunch and my power nap that I always have between races!!

Race 2 was always going to be a little bit of a battle with all the top guys having a race under their belts and the information that gave them giving them the chance to make any necessary changes to improve their bikes, we’d made a couple of changes to my bike because of the feelings I had in the first race and that coupled with the fact that we had to change to a lesser spec motor for the 2^nd race had me a little bit on the edge!!

Open your eyes Charley ha ha!!!

I got a good start as the lights went out and ran through turn 1 maybe 3^rd but as soon as I hit the brakes for turn two the front dived real fast and got me all a bit crossed up, I had to take avoiding action to not ram the first two guys and ran out wide because of that, I rejoined in about 6^th or 7^th behind Luca Scassa, followed him for a few corners then he had a massive rear end low side on the exit onto the back straight, being right behind him I had to roll the throttle then get going again, I knew I was gonna get humped down the straight because of it and sure enough Alex Lowes came 1 side and Nori the other, we got towards the braking point and they both started squashing me a little and by now we’re doing maybe 180 odd mph, I knew getting stuck behind them both would cost me dearly so I waited till the pair of them braked then hit my brakes as hard as I could and managed to get stopped and turned through the chicane, Michael Laverty, Tommy and Josh were up front and after a few laps I was closing in on Josh, then Tommy had a bike problem and retired, I managed to pass Josh and got my head down to try to catch Michael, I went so much faster in race two but despite some fast laps I wasn’t making any headway into Michael’s lead, all I was doing was gapping Josh, eventually I settled down a bit and tried to just chip away but then towards the end of the race Josh started to catch me back up, I sped up a bit to keep him at bay but the last couple of laps were close to say the least, in fact, as I started what turned out to be the penultimate lap I rode real defensive and weaved about a bit on the back straight so that Josh couldn’t get such  a good tow but then as I got back to the star/finish I saw the 1 lap to go flag, I couldn’t believe it, I’d just rode real defensive, showed all my cards thinking it was the last lap and now there was another lap to go, I thought for gods sake, how am I going to keep him behind me now!!! Fortunately though I did so I ended up second just under 2 seconds off of Michael which I guess under the circumstances wasn’t a bad result, it’s funny though, the difference between 1^st and 2^nd to a rider is HUGE, when you win you’re buzzing, shouting to everyone under your helmet, smiling from ear to ear yet 2^nd or 3^rd you’re just like, b*****ks, I should’ve won that, no happiness whatsoever!!!!

My son Zack getting some tv time!!

One real good thing about the Snetterton round was that it clearly highlighted our Achilles heel which is off of slow turns punch, our bike’s fast once it’s up and running and good on flowing circuits but anything with slower more stop start corners we struggle a little, now though the team have a little bit more time to go away and think about a plan going forwards and talking of plans going forwards we’re off to Spain now for a couple of weeks holiday, that sounds like a perfect plan to me ;-) Take it easy everyone, Shakey #67

Oulton park round 3!!!

For some reason or another getting started with this Blog has for one reason or another been pretty hard, especially strange when you consider the fact I had my best weekend so far with the Rapid Solicitors Kawasaki team, I’ve sat at the computer for god knows how long thinking right I’ll do my Blog but then thought, actually I’ll just check this site quickly, oh, I fancy a quick coffee, like I said it’s just been a bit of a nightmare getting going so whilst I’m on it I better fire through it asap before I come up with some excuse to skive off halfway through!!!!

I think its fairly safe to say that the weekend didn’t exactly get off to a very good start whatsoever, in fact it got off to a terrible one, I’d arranged to arrive at the circuit by 6-30pm Thursday evening in order to get a good parking space but never even left Kent until about 5pm and I guess you’ll not need telling what the m25’s like on 5pm before a bank holiday weekend, needless to say we missed the 6-30 deadline, unbeknown to us though eventually we arrived at Lymme services to fill the motorhome with diesel only to discover a load of coolant flooding out the back of the engine compartment…this wasn’t at all good!!!

To not bore you to death and go into too much detail the long and short of it was about a 5 or 6 hour delay and we finally arrived at Oulton park about 5am Friday morning on the back of a dirty great big low loader truck, not exactly rockstar!!!!!!

Things went form bad to worse the following day when we realized the motorhome could only run for about a minute and a half before the engine stop light came on so we ended up in a little car park all on our own and once set up and sorted a further investigation found a dirty great big hole in the radiator.. just what you need to get your triple header race weekend off to a good start!!

On a positive note though first practice went pretty well, to be fair the weekend went pretty well from there on in, there were a few things we needed to do to the bike pretty much straight away but the way our bike makes its power right now seemed really quite suited to the undulations and flowing nature of the Oulton park circuit,  we just needed to do a bit of work on the chassis setting and sort out a better gearing pattern to enable us to go forward.

It seemed real weird having two one hour sessions on the first day, you always spend a bit of time getting up to speed then gradually work through a few things before arriving at a point where you’ll maybe throw a tyre at the job towards the end of a session and have a dig to suss out where your at but we seemed to just keep working and working which was no bad thing because we continued to improve and ended up spending a few more laps on race tyres which I learnt last year is no bad thing..

With the first two sessions being on the Saturday it felt pretty weird knowing that nothing would happen until 12pm on Sunday morning due to the church nearby and then it was only a 15 minute session!!, we’d made some changes and just pretty much went out from start to finish to try the changes, I got into a pretty good rhythm and felt pretty cool heading into qualifying which was literally 40 odd minutes later.

I got through the first qualifying session with my first flying lap and didn’t bother heading back out as we’d start the second session on the same set of tyres, the 2^nd session came and went with no dramas as did the final one which we got through to eventually qualifying 2^nd for the first race on Monday, I was pretty happy with that..

For the first race of the weekend I had to start from the third row as this was taken from the fastest laps at the cancelled wet Brands hatch race and we all know how pants I was there but regardless I was feeling ok for the race, I got a decent start and settled in ok, making progress up through the field and closing in on Josh Brookes who was leading, I noticed a few times though at high rpm my bike was starting to play up a bit, like fuel starvation or something so I was pretty relieved when the race got red flagged whilst I was still P2, I wasn’t sure if we’d done enough laps for it to be declared a result so I got back to the pits as quick as I could in order to give the boys the best chance to try to rectify the problem.. unfortunately we hadn’t done enough laps for it to be declared a result so we were going to have to get back at it!!

Starting P2 I got a good start again and went 2^nd into turn 1 behind Josh, I stayed there for a bit but for some reason the problem was just getting worse and worse, it was only an 8 lap sprint race so I thought I’ve got to just try to hang in there, the problem was it was getting close to a bit dangerous because my bike just kept losing power and it started getting more and more frequent, by the time the chequered flag came out I’d dropped to a totally pissed off 11^th place, not what we came for at all!!!!

The boys got to the bottom of the problem straight after the race and the data showed I was actually really lucky to finish the race at all as the engine had been running so lean that I was lucky it never let go, you never know those few points might make all the difference at the end of the year so whilst it was only 5 points it was better than none at all!!

Morning warm up the following day I had a new engine in and the fuel starvation thing was fixed so my bike felt like a rocket, I ended the session 2^nd on used tyres and was preying for two dry races even though the forecast wasn’t great at all.

Typically about half an hour before our race it poured hard but then eased off again so just before our race we got an 8 minute wet practice. In a funny kind of way this was exactly what we needed as we knew from Brands we had a poor wet setting then at Thruxton we got it much better but maybe here we could go another step, it certainly seemed to work as I lead the whole session before Rutter followed my around for a lap to pip me to fastest, I guess now after getting a bit of confidence in the wet I couldn’t care less if it was a wet or a dry race… not a bad position to be in ;-)

With race one coming so soon after the 8 minute practice the conditions were almost identical, basically wet with a few damp patches, I decided to go for wet tyres for a couple of reasons, one because I was fast a few minutes ago on them and two because Tommy and Josh both had them so we’d all be in the same boat, I got a great start as the lights went out and immediately went into the lead, I was pretty steady for the 1^st lap but still built up over half a seconds advantage, I knew if I could keep that kind of advantage for a few laps I’d be able to hold and manage it and fortunately for me that’s exactly what happened, I tried to push but not push at the same time as just a few laps in I could see the track was drying pretty rapidly and in those conditions its really easy to destroy wet weather tyres, I knew from the grid that Rutter had gone with intermediates and I kept thinking that sly old dog he’s got this in the bag, after about 10 of the 18 laps my gap decreased for the 1^st time and I thought here comes Rutter, I figured there’s no point trying to up my pace as I’ll eat my tyres and his choice will be so much quicker anyway that I’m better off staying safe and consistent, eventually with about 3 or 4 laps to go the pass came…..Chris Walker….on wets!!!! Initially I couldn’t believe it and had to take a second look, as soon as I was sure he was on wets I thought right that’s it then, I’ll just up my pace again and go with him but as soon as I did my bike started sliding around a fair bit and with about a 3 second gap behind me I thought do you know what, 2^nd’s a whole load of points and 2 podium credits, a bin trying to stay with Walker will get me nothing, I opted for plan A and kicked back a bit until the end of the race to take my best result of the year, albeit a little disappointed not to take the win after leading for 15 laps!!!!

Somewhat unbelievably bearing in mind what the forecast had been for the day the final race was in full dry conditions, in some ways this was good because at least we knew roughly where we’d be plus we’d made a few little changes for the dry that should make the bike even better but in some ways I was kind of hoping for a full on wet race, when you bear I mind how crap I was in the wet race at Brands that’ll give you some kind of indication as to how much better we got my wet setting now!!

Anyway, it was dry as I said, I lined up 8^th on the grid for the final race right on the inside of the track, on the start of the warm up lap I had a big look to make sure there were no wet patches still on the inside on the way into turn 1 because the track tends to hold a bit of water there and it looked dry enough so all I needed was a good start right…

As the lights went out I did get a pretty good launch, I think I exited turn 1 maybe 5^th or 6^th, I could see my team mate had nicked the lead and after the first few laps I was feeling pretty relaxed and getting to grips with the changes we’d made to the bike, after a couple more laps Tommy passed me and it kind of spurred me on a bit, Rat boy was still leading and had built up a bit of a gap but once I’d got passed Graeme Gowland and Josh I had clear track to try to reel Tommy and Rat boy in and it worked perfectly, as soon as I got the clear track I needed my lap times tumbled and I got going faster than I’d been all weekend lap after lap, Tommy managed to nip past Rat boy and a lap or so I did the same, before long I found myself rather quickly closing in on Tommy and by the time I’d caught him I saw his lap times had dropped off a bit, at that point there were two things on my mind, A how difficult Tommy can be to pass and B the worry of getting caught by whoever was in 3^rd, it took me 3 or 4 laps to suss out where I could pass Tommy but eventually I got a run on him out of turn 1 then got alongside on the run down the avenue and managed to slip past him on the inside into Cascades, I deliberately never used all the track in order to give him somewhere to go because if I’d used my usual line it would have put us both in a bit of an iffy situation, Tommy let his brakes off a little but ran a bit deep into the left of Cascades by which time I’d got stopped and turned and fired back up the inside, I got my head down again and dropped about a second a lap that lap which gave me a bit of a gap, then a lap or so later I thought right I must check my pitboard to see how many laps are left this time round and as I came onto the start finish straight the chequered flag was waving, I thought bloody hell I’ve just won it!!!!!!!!  

A victory burnout, that felt good i tell ya!!


In a way the great thing about the win was the way the bike was working for me, like everyone we obviously know roughly where the bike needs to be from a chassis setting point of view and the changes we made to the bike were going in exactly the direction we’ve been thinking about going since Thruxton where the bike also worked well, my crew chief Johnny sat studying the data and noticed some things that fell in line with my comments about the bike and both of us together agreed that we needed to change a few bits and the proof in the pudding was that final race where not only did I do my fastest outright lap of the weekend my rhythm was far stronger too. We now have a bit more of a plan going forward towards the next round at Snetterton, we started this whole chassis direction thing at the official test there ages ago, in the final session of the day after struggling I felt like we’d touched the surface of something real good so I can’t wait now to get back there an go racing.

Johnny and i discussing the local newspaper ;-)


Massive thanks have to go to my team for all their hard work over the weekend, I guess to the RAC for their help in getting us there in the first place and whilst it will seem a bit soft, to my mate Wagg who came along for the weekend to help out, his temporary repair to the motorhome got us to the garage for it to be fixed on the Tuesday after the race so thanks mate!!!!

Who you looking at!!!!!!


Right I’ve got massive finger pump now and still have to type my column for The Sun newspaper yet so I’m out of here, see you all at Snetterton, take it easy, Shakey 67!!!