EDITORIAL
Insuring your Survival
Author: David Vaughn
This may hurt a bit....
I felt really good that day at Gingerman. In fact, I hadn’t felt so much confidence since my championship-winning season of three years earlier. I’d been riding every other weekend all summer, and was at the top of my game. Two weeks previously at Autobahn, I’d earned a sixth place in Middleweight Superbike after starting at the back of the field. I’d run down damn near everybody, and was only a second off the lap record in that race. No doubt about it, I had my game working.
It was a cool crisp morning, but the sun was shining brightly and it was going to be a beautiful day. Gingerman Raceway in South Haven, Michigan, is my favorite track in the Midwest, and I was really happy to be there. I felt that I had something to prove at this Championship Cup Series race weekend. I was ready to put it down!
I sat out the morning’s first session since the track was still cool and damp from the overnight dew, and took it easy in the second practice. My goal was simply to shake off the cobwebs from a good night’s sleep, and scrub in my new set of Michelins. Returning to the pits, I immediately put my tires on the warmers to insure that they would be nice and hot for the upcoming Unlimited Grand Prix qualifying session.
I had an hour to kill before the qualifying session started, so I sat down to relax and clear my head. I wanted to be focused, because there are some very fast guys in Unlimited GP, and it’s key to have a good grid position in this race. I must have gotten a little too comfortable though, because I woke up to hear second call for my qualifying session! I leapt to my feet, hopped into my leathers, and yanked on my helmet and gloves. The third and final call came over the public address system as I ripped off my tire warmers, dropped the bike off the stands, fired the motor, and roared away toward the grid.
Once moving, I tore through the pits like a lightning bolt. I’m sure that I was WAY above the pit speed limit of 10 mph, but at that point I had other things on my mind! Go gotta GO! Once I turned onto hot pit lane I really hit it, never even slowing for the Grid Marshal who was there to wave me out onto the course. As I entered the racetrack, breath coming in ragged gasps, I tried to calm myself. The pack had left about a minute ahead of me; so being late was actually working to my benefit. At this point, there was nothing but clear, empty track ahead. Approaching the end of the yellow blend line that leads you out of the pits, I hit it hard. I needed to get down into the 1:25 range to get a good grid position, and I now had less than 15 minutes to make that happen. Not much time to pull a smoking lap out of my hat! Pinning the throttle on my way to Turn Three, I felt the front tire skim the pavement, twitching the bars momentarily each time I clicked in a fresh gear. Instantly, I was in my own personal heaven, known to most as Gingerman Raceway. At this point, confidence was NOT a problem. Two quick downshifts put me back into second gear for the tricky, double-apex Turn Three. It was definitely time to get down to business.
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