Round 1 Race report

Angelsey Coastal Circuit 18^th/19^th/20^th April 2008

Friday – Track day/testing

When the race bike was unloaded, the tools organised and the electricity located the task of set-up could begin.  The weather was dry and overcast with the usual strong wind flow across the paddock. Hazel Drury arrived at the track around 9am in time to get signed on and help with the pre-race checks to the race bike and equipment. Shaun Moss was replacing the team’s third rider, Richard Greenland, who had suffered an injury just 4 weeks before the event.  He sorted static sag settings for both front forks and the rear shock unit.  After a couple of sessions both suspension units were working brilliantly and rider feedback was positive. Towards the end of the day Gary Jones, the teams other rider for the event arrived and rode the final session to get some practice in on the race bike

Latter in the weekend a member of another team mentioned to the manager that “Best Choice looked more professional than the championship winning team of the 2007 Endurance season, who only had a brand new 2008 R6 and essential equipment”.

Many thanks go to all members of the team for their important role in ensuring a comment like this was received.

Saturday - Practice & Qualifying

The team headed to the track for 9am, arrived and set up camp in position 5 in the pits next door to last years champions “Moores racing” 42.  Hazel’s 3mx3m awning proving good but limited space to operate from, this did not prevent operations running smoothly though.  Pit crew ensured that it was secure and that all to necessary equipment was in position. Garry & Hazel both went out for the morning practice session of 15min, they confirmed that all the adjustments made to the bike were working well.

13:00 Qualifying :-

All riders were completing fast and consistent laps around the Costal Circuit. Both Gary and Hazel completed multiple laps of 1:18. Sean Moss achieved the quickest time of 1:16.184 for the team. Sean was actually going faster as his session went on and could have beaten AMA Racing to fifth overall only 0.9s ahead of us but on a 1000cc Yamaha R1. The team however made the decision to pull Sean in so Gary could get his time in on the bike in the dry conditions. In class Best Choice qualified 1.5s behind Moores Racing (the 2007 champions), 1.3s ahead of Team Viking, 2.5s ahead of Darkside Endurance and 2.5 s in front Phoenix Endurance. For “Best Choice” to enter and qualify, second in class and sixth overall on the grid, in their first race entry ever in the UK National Endurance series gave the manager great delight. This allowed the team feeling that a podium position was within their grasp. Qualifying had gone well in dry conditions, and all 3 riders had lapped consistently fast, a major factor in any Endurance race.

Mick and Mark then went to help out a team in the Junior Tag Endurance race so they had some practice with refueling, tyre changes and rider communications. Information fed back to Manager from this left him confident that “Dundee” had all the details needed for the bike, to complement his experience in Pit Mechanics.

SUNDAY - Race day

At 8:30am the weather was cold, cloudy and raining. It was different day compared to Saturday. The manager kept spirits high by informing the team that a forecast had predicted no further rain in the afternoon.

At the race start time 11:55, Gary Jones competing in his fist national race from the drop of flag with Haze holding the bike. Garry lost only 2 places in the first lap and lapped consistently before pitting after 45 minutes. After fuelling Sean went out to complete a 65mins session as Team Moores had crashed their brand new 2008 R6. This moved the team from 5th in class to 4th. The team remained in this position for anther 4 hours, catching team Phoenix all the time. The gap was down to only 0.3s before a quick splash and dash was required to complete the race. Haze went out for the final stint returning to the pits 1 lap latter as a bolt had come loose on the gear change selector rod. The pit team completed the work, however this lead to the chance to overtake Phoenix and a podium position had been lost. 

However Best Choice Endurance continued until 6pm, race finish, where the bike was parked up in “Parc Ferme”. All the team gathered to enjoy a small bottle of beer to celebrate a fantastic job completed by all members of the team. The team felt very pleased to get 13 points from their first ever National Endurance race. A haul of 13 points from the first of 7 rounds was a great achievement.

The manager would like to thank each and every member of the team for the efforts put in over the 3-day event.  The companies which have helped Best Choice Endurance complete it’s first of 7 rounds in the 2008 HMRC National endurance season: Tullets Plant, Seton Tuning, HEL, Motorbike-Crazy.com & all that have been missed this time.

Timing Sheet

Photos can be found Here