Portland Track day

Sunday night about 5pm I started packing up all the stuff for my drive down to Portland, for a Monday track day at Portland International Raceway. I got down there about 8:30pm and slept in the truck, mostly so I didn't have to do that drive in the morning, as I had to have my bike unloaded and ready for tech inspection at about 7am.

So when you first arrive at the track, you unload all your stuff, and then with the company I usually ride with, NESBA, you have to take your bike through tech inspection. Basically, they make sure things are in proper order with the bike and your gear. If you've been through one before, you can pretty much do all these checks yourself before you get there. After passing tech, you wait around until there is riders meeting. At this meeting they go over many of safety precautions. It's usually the same speech, but always good to have in your head.

So this was my first time ever on the Portland track, and I was happy that another rider I knew from up at Pacific Raceways in Kent, WA would be joining me. Will rides a Triumph 675, and he brought along another 675 rider, Eric. They came down in Will's van.

We all passed the tech and got everything set up and were ready to ride. The weather was suppose to get better as the day progressed, but we just hoped for no rain. It was cloudy and humid and the sun tried to peak out, but we never really did see the sun. Our first session went ok, seeing as none of us have ever been on the track. We were mostly trying to figure out the corners, find the right gear and learn the track. With NESBA, they have control riders, local racers who know the track very well, and after each session you can talk to them about anything you need help with. Here, Will and Eric are asking questions to a control rider.

At first, I was having trouble figuring out which gears to be in through certain corners, but by the second session, I'd found the right gears. We were very lucky also, in the fact that there weren't that many people there for the track day. Our group had maybe 15 people in it, which means lots of track time. Each session is 20 minutes, which doesn't seem long, but when your out there sometimes it seems too long. After the sessions, we "retire" to our pit area.

At first our times weren't that great, but we were pretty much sticking together. Portland is a pretty fast track, and all right hand corners, compared to the all left hand corners at Pacific. The track also has way better paving with only a few bumps and lots more run off area if you crash. The only thing I didn't like about it was the raised corners in some of the turns. They are kind of like flat curbs, but it's really just something to get use to. After our morning sessions we were really starting to pick up the pace. With only 15 riders out on the track, we would hang back and let everyone take off and wait for open track space, then go out. Until, we started to get even faster and were catching those other riders. A lot of that had to do with the "Red Bull" energy drink that Will and Eric were drinking, giving them wings. It made them faster, for sure, and pulled me right along. And Will was even looking for a faster pace by loading his bike with a different map for more power. Ahh, technology!

I think after the lunch break, we decided to just get out there first and try to run in the open track at the beginning. It proved to be a smart choice, as we ran 1, 2, 3 for almost the rest of the sessions, not getting passed. The control riders basically just let us go, and we felt fast as ever, until one of the control riders would pass us in a corner to show us how slow we really were, back to reality. But it was great, because we were all three pretty equal and putting down some good lap times by the end. We were no where near a race pace, but our times were very respectable. We started out running 1:58, then 1:50, for pretty much the whole morning sessions. Somewhere along the way, we found speed and upped the pace to into the 1:28's. By the end we were running almost consistently in the low to mid 1:20's with my best time 1:22:47. No where near what the racers can do at the track, which they said was somehwere near the 1:11 mark. But we are not racers, we are just out there having some fun.

And Will and I had some great fun at Eric's expense. I had come back to the pit area and so did Will, but no Eric. The I heard someone crashed, and with Eric not being back, I thought it was him and was worried. Will didn't think it was him, because he said he saw him pull off the track. Will thought his engine had blown or something. Nope, Eric ran out of gas. Unlucky for me, but lucky for him, I wasn't able to get to my camera quick enough to catch him pushing his bike back to the pit area.

The last session of the day had some very menacing clouds come in. I saw a few little drops on my faceshield, but not enough to slow us down, well, Will and Eric at least. I slowed down a bit after both tires slid a bit on me in turn three, one of the only left handers. It wasn't anything bad, but knowing it's the last session I took it a bit easier. Never a good idea to wad your bike on the last session. We got back to the pit area, and sure enough, down came the rain minutes after our last session. No big deal though, as nothing could dampen our spirits, we had an awesome day. Packed up the rigs, saw traffic was bad and decided a beer and food was a better option than sitting in traffic, plus, now we could talk about the day even more.

Another track day for me next Monday at Pacific Raceways, yep, I'm an addict. And for sure, I'll be making the treck down to Portland again. Better check the NESBA schedule and see if I can make another one this summer in Portland.