Race Report - Cadwell Park 21st/22nd August 2004 (Bemsee/MRO)

I was really looking forward to this  weekend, not least of all because Cadwell is one of my favourite circuits.  I did reasonably well there back in May with Derby Phoenix and I was hoping I could improve on my laptimes and possibly challenge at the front.  Also, this was an MRO weekend and having enjoyed the format and learnt so much at Oulton Park, I had high hopes for this meeting.

We didn't get there until just before 9pm on the Friday, so we found some paddock area near where we usually go and set up the awning, complete with van at one end and caravan the other.  It's the first time we've used it for a while with just my bike in it and there was tons of room!  We've also got the putting up of this thing down to a fine art......took us around 25-30 minutes and job done.  Another half an hour later and we had running water, warm from the gas heater, cool(ish) beers in the fridge and watching TV.  There's a lot to be said for a caravan!

Saturday Races (Bemsee Nationwide)

First up was the Rookie 400 race one and I was given a grid place of 27th!  This meant quite a bit of overtaking to get to the front, but if I could do just that, I'd have a better grid position for race 2.  The lights went out and I managed to pass probably 8 bikes before the first bend and then got bulked up a little bit before we all managed to exit Charlies Two and head down the straight.  I took a couple more on the brakes into Park and passed yet more through Gooseneck and into Mansfield, so that by the end of lap one I was up to around 12-15th. I then picked a few more off until I found myself chasing what was by then a pretty big gap to the front pack and nothing behind me for probably 300yds!  Seeing that I wasn't going to have time to catch the guys ahead of me, I sat back and the rest of the race was a bit lonely!  I honestly didn't know where I'd finished, but was happy when Lesley told me I finished 8th, so a 2nd row start for race 2.  On the downside, my best lap was 1:48.70.....a full 2.5 seconds off my best in May at the Derby Phoenix meeting there, so I wasn't too happy about that and needed to get quicker.

The Rookie races were scheduled race 9 and 19, so there was a fair gap both before the first one and then onto the second.  We chilled out in the awning and waited for the calls, which were a bit difficult to hear as we were just outside the main paddock area.  We waited and waited and eventually heard a call asking Rookie 400's to get themselves ready.  Knowing that the race before had only just gone out, I sat back and waited for the next call.  There was nothing for ages until we heard a call for race 20, meaning that I had probably missed my call.  I went down to the holding area quickly, but was told that race 19 was out on circuit and I was too late.  Nightmare.......I'd missed out on my 2nd row start and possibly a top 5 result or better.....Bollocks!!  I went to the race office to check out what happened with the calls, but was told abruptly that there were 3 calls and I had just missed the other two.  I asked around the paddock and everybody I spoke to said there were definitely two, but not three and eitherway, I'd missed it now and that was that.

My last race of the day was race 21, the Clubman 400-650 Shootout with a mixed grid of 400's and 650cc Minitwins.  I was gridded 19th and got away well to hold my place or thereabouts.  I carried on battling through a couple or more places and had no idea where I had finished until I got back to the awning and Lesley told me I was 15th or thereabouts.  I was 15th as it turned out, so I managed to get a point out of it.  More importantly, my laptimes were back down to 1:46's so better albeit not fantastic and I needed to pull my finger out if I was going to do better in the Sunday MRO race.

Sunday Race (MRO)

I got up Sunday morning feeling good about the MRO round, if not a little nervous!  I'd changed the rear tyre the night before, so the 5 minute practice (3 laps) was just to get that scrubbed up nicely ready for qualifying and to get myself loosened up a bit. 

Qualifying is 15 minutes and the rule is that you have to achieve a laptime within 107% of the pole time to get on the grid, though I guess this is flexible as there were a number of riders that didn't make the time, but got gridded anyway meaning a full 38 riders went out for the start.  My time was a disappointing 1:46.99 (against a pole time of 1:39.24) putting me 30th on the grid.  Looking at the rest of the qualifying times, I could see that the top 17 riders were all clocking 1:42's so the competition was very fierce.  So much for a points scoring finish!

The actual race was scheduled race 8 in the programme and it seemed an age before we got out on circuit.  In fact, from practice and qualifying finishing at around 10.30am it was after 4.30pm before we got called and were down in the holding area......that's six hours sitting around waiting to race!  Still, at least we got to watch the Brno MotoGP in the caravan.  I'd also mucked around with the gearing for the morning qualifying (tried a 14/42 set up, but it revved out too early), so went back to 14/41 only to discover the already shagged chain would no longer tension correctly without me taking a link out, which is not ideal given it was pulling off the sprockets.  So I went down to the A&R truck and picked up a new chain and fitted that to kill 20 minutes!

The race start was pretty hectic at the back of the grid, but I made a couple of places up and just tried to settle into my stride.  There's 12 laps to sort out your passing in a MRO race (or 12 laps to get passed if you want to look at it like that!), so there's no point in trying to be a hero on the first lap.  There were a couple of fallers after the first few laps and I found myself in a battle with Matt Brown (ZXR400) and another ZXR400 in front and Nick King (FZR400) behind me.  Matt and the other guy were just out of reach for me to challenge meaningfully,  but I was getting some very close attention from Nick behind me and every time I looked round all I could see this yellow FZR stuck right there on my tail piece!  Matt was involved in his own scrap with the other ZXR and within spitting distance when the guy ran off track at the bottom of the mountain on about lap 6 and binned it, but it was not enough to upset Matt for me to be able to get near him.  It pretty much carried on like that for the rest of the race, with me dropping Nick from time to time only for him to catch up again and with neither of us making much ground on the 200 yards or so gap to Matt.  I hadn't got a clue where we were in the race, other than a fair way back and on the last lap I could see the winners celebrating on Park Straight as we went down Gooseneck, so they were quite a bit in front.  As it turned out I finished a lowly 25th, but this was an improvement on my qualifying and I'd had some good scraps with Nick during the race.

Once again, the race experience over 12 laps was very useful.  However, I can't help but feel disappointed that I couldn't manage better than 25th in the race, albeit the competition was very tough.  I went away from Cadwell Park feeling very dejected and wondering what the hell I'd been doing wrong to not get better results.  This is the first time I've finished outside the points for a long time and I didn't even manage to improve on my fastest lap from the Derby Phoenix meeting in May.  I guess I just have to put it behind me and look to Pembrey in two weeks to try and get some good results and lift my confidence again.

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