10 Dec 2005 - I had the 613 motor stripped down after the last race of the year. I wanted to get Craig at Calsport (Dyno Torque) to fit my new KTM slipper clutch anyway. I got it off ebay at a bargain price. Normally I couldnt afford such bling, but I was supprised to find I had won the auction with £250. At that price who can argue? After Craig cracked open the motor we decided to replace the bearings and a few other parts. The piston looked a bit worn, so we replaced that too, now I have the old one at home, on the lounge table....

After he had carefully rebuilt the engine, he fired it up, and it started spitting out water straight away, dodgy head gasket. grrrr. So the poor guy had to strip it down again, and fit a new gasket. Thankfully everything is back together nicely now, and it running sweet as. also, while I was there, he found a spare magento cover, and he gave that to me, in case I drop the bike....hmmmm. I think I may still need to get the bike a bit quieter, for the new regulations, but I'll deal with that later, just want to ride it at the mo.

16th June 2005 - The KTM is dead. The poor old 660 motor had completly destroyed itself, maybe with a bit of my help, or not. The conrod had snapped around the crank bearing, and gone thru the front of the case. No sign of wear, just a complete fracture or the part. The crank had then spun round and hit the conrod, and the 2 are permanently wedged together. The piston is very scored, with chips taken out of it, and the barrel has cracked at the top. The broken bits then flew around the motor, jamming the gearbox. That has freed up now, but the gears dont sound smooth at all. That pretty much leaves the head....

I really didnt know what to do. The 660 is dead, and I cant get a new, or even second-hand motor any time soon. I thought I was pretty much stuffed. Holding my head in hands and all that....It's going to cost a lot of money to get back on the track, but I just couldn't see a way forward. THEN, While the bike was at Calsport (Dyno Torque), one of Craigs mates, saw the frame and offered £1800 for it. At first I wasn't sure, but then I realized, this is a 2 year old, raced chassis, its not exactly pretty in its current state iether. So I took the deal. Then it's a matter of what to replace the 660 with. I'd really like to stay in the open class, on a "big" bike, but there aren't that many competative and/or reliabe bikes out there. I could buy a Husaberg, but I race nearly every weekend, and I see a lot of them on their side being worked on, cos this or that has broken. There arent any other light, powerfull "racers" out there for the open class, unless you go custom, and I cant afford that. For example, a well sorted 525 (maybe taken to 540/570), but then you need new brakes, wheels, and tweeked suspension. Or if I go 450, a CRF450 was my other thought, which I really dont want to do, but they are competative with just new brakes and wheels. Hmmmmmm.....

So there I was looking thru my Motard Mag, and there is a big Brackens advert at the back, selling a bunch of old race bikes. There is a huge selection of them too, just depends on how much money you have, or in my case, how big the credit cards are....There are a few 660 Factory reps, well outside my range, and a few 450s, ex Winstanley, etc, but not what I'm after, and then there is the 613cc ex Terry Rymer Hm tuned beast, and I could probably stretch to the price too. After a chat with the Iain, at Brackens about it, particularly the running costs and servicing of this bike, I went and chatted to Craig about it. To my suprise, he didnt think I was being stupid, and pretty much dittoed what the Brackens guy said about the motor. Whether its just cos he wants to see it, or what, I jumped in and paid a deposit. So this is my new full on racebike, long live the KTM. Further details and pics will be placed in the racebike section after I've picked it up, in a week or so.

Rough Specs : KTM 450sx, stroker crank, 100mm piston, takes it to 613cc. 6 speed gearbox, full Titanium Akro exhaust, 6 pot front berringer calliper and disk, radial master cylinder.

25th April 2005 - I bought a helmet camera off ebay last week, it took a while to get here as it got sent to the wrong place, but I got it now. I'll be getting loads of footage wherever I go playing on the KTM. If you want some reference to what I've bought, these links to e-bay will be around for a few months. The is the camcorder I've bought for the hemlet cam Cannon MVX100I and this helmet cam, Sony 480 Line Helmet Cam , click on the links for the ebay pages. You can also get the helmet camera from RF Concepts, package 3 is the one to get. Check out the Onboard Page for some reduced footage. If you want to get an idea of the true quality of these cameras, I'd download a smaller file from the library, as they are the original un-reduced files. Enjoy

18th April 2005 - My KTM 660 started leaking from the head gasket on saturday evening. The oil had gone that milky white. I decided to change the oil and try it in the morning, just to try my luck, although I had pretty much resigned myself to not taking part in the races. After the practise, the oil was bad again, so I called it a day. On monday I called Craig at Calsport (Dyno Torque), and he told me to drop it round. By the time I had got there, he had cleared the bench, and I wheeled my bike straight into the worshop. 3 hours later he called me to tell me the gasket had started to split. There was no other damage and everything else in the motor looked sweet. He even said that the head looked so smooth it probably wasnt even worth gas flowing it, so he just stuck a new gasket in and rebuilt the motor. I picked the bike up later in the week, did a few oil changes, and it all seems sweet again.

28th June 2004 - Jim and I went off to another potential practise track on Monday. Sent out a bunch of e-mails to as many Midlands Karting tracks as I could find. A few replied, which was really cool. Most of them were too small really, but one of them looked pretty good, and they said that we could call them up, and if nothing else was booked in, we could use the track. Stretton Karting Track near the Leicester Airport looked just about big and twisty enough, to make for supermoto track where you had to work hard, but could still get some speed up too. The guy that was running it, Jon, seemed like a pretty easy going type of chap, he showed us the track, and a few things, and pretty much just told us to go and have fun. So we did. We both had to change the wet front tyres to a slick, as it was a nice dry day, then it was out on the track. First impressions, were really good, the track was very grippy, yet slightly undulating with a few crests, where the different track layouts join up. All the corners were varying RPM 2nd gear, except for one, long cresty, bumpy, grippy, right hander. There is a pic of the track on their website. We ran anti-clockwise. After a few sessions, I just had to have some little glitch, my clutch reservoir started to leak, which really killed the stability of the bike into truns, as I drop it down a gear, with only slight clutch. It slowly got worse, till the clutch was like a pretty crap switch. When I pull the lever all the way in, I get a tiny amount of clutch, enough to drop it down a gear, but when I release it, it just pops in. Not very smooth. The clutch fluid is different to brake fluid, but it says mineral oil only. Mineral oil huh. The van runs on mineral oil, oh sod it, I'm not wasting more track time, so I filled the reservoir up with the vans mineral oil throught the day, and it worked fine, just leaked a bit. Bodger? me? yeah. We continued ripping around till about 5pm. My footpegs were decking out, especially on the right hander, I think I need a new slider, its pretty much gone. I got a bit more feel back on the bike again, getting back up to speed, slowly. My shoulder got a bit tired towards the end, just a bit achey from pushing the bike into the long right hander all afternoon. I really enjoyed it, we will definately go back there many many times. But first I have a race with Pro Supermoto at Blyton on Sunday, and then I go on holiday on Monday, to Corfu for weeks.

20th June 2004 - Jim And I hooked up early Sunday morning to try out Ady Smiths Supermoto practise track. We had the little track track to ourselves all day. The tarmac track was very tight, just hit 3rd, just, but the important part for us was the dirt. The dirt section was longer than the tar, and thats what we wanted to come here for. The shale, jumps, ruts and berms are what we came here to practise. At first I wobbled round the ruts, but I learned a lot by the end of the day. The big rear tyre feels wierd in the rut, it sort of moves in an arc, as its much fatter than the front, at first it felt strange. Afew a few goes I started to get it, and the berms too, another thing you dont find on the road much.... I'm really glad we came here. I managed to run the new bearings in, change the oil and filters, and get a good days pratcise, on just the right surface, we will be comming back here again for sure.

19th June 2004 - I took the KTM in to Calsport (Dyno Torque) on Monday, Craig had obvously heard from Lippy, another racer, team organizer, general SM freak, who was at Lydden Hill. I told him I had a big paper weight for him, we started it up for a moment, and there was definately a metallic tick from the motor. To be honest, it never sounded as bad as it did at the time, maybe the thick, cold oil dampened the noise or something. He asked me when I was racing again, hahaha, um, sunday? I had already assumed that was out the window, but he laughed too. Stripping the motor, ordering parts, etc. The next day, he called me, and told me he had stripped the motor. The mains bearing was starting to break up, you could see the hardened surface had worn away on some parts, but it hadn't collapsed yet, a BIG plus. All he needs to do then is clean it out, check everything, and replace the bearings, again. The rest of the motor looked fine. If I had ignored it, and carried on racing, the bearing would have collapsed, and could have taken any number of internal parts apart as it did. So it would appear I thrashed it within a millimetre of it's life, poor thing.

Craig called me up today and told me he had managed to put my KTM back together. Excellent news, I've already cancelled my race entry for the weekend, but now I can go and run the engine in at Adys track tomorrow. Wicked stuff.

14th April 2004 - Well, after stuffing up my shoulder again, at 3 sisters this time (check the 2004 Race report page), I've decided that I've missed the start of the NORA seasion, so I have joined the ACU, and Bemsee, in order to race the Super 7 Championship that they are running this year. The first race is on the 3rd May at Snetterton. I'll still be doing the remainder of the NORA rounds, but using them mainly as practise sessions. I'm missing the track again, I found myself drifting into a traffic round-a-bout this morning. I think I'll try to fix the SM, service it, and go for a spin on the weekend, maybe even try some dirt to see how the shoulder is holding up.

25th January 2004 - I'm off back down to the track for some more practise, A couple of friends, and myself drove up to Rowrah karting track, all the way up north, at the top end of the lake district. Jimbo, another NORA
racer, and Mark, a mate from work, who hasnt ridden for a while, and is going to ride my 660, all hooked up VERY early in the morning, and made our way up to the M6. I got up at 4am, picked Jim, and up by 5am, and we all got to the track at about 9am, 1 hours before, the track opened, and before anyone else got there.

The turned out excellent. I really enjoyed it, so did Mark and Jimbo. Mark wobbled (relatively, he still wasn't the slowest) around all day, except in the first few laps of the day, where he fell of at a hairpin. The track was damp, he had wets on, but dropped the bike into 1st gear, the back locked up, swung round, and low sided. He was riding road bike style, and dinged his knee, wasn’t even really bruised tho, althoug, he still moans about it..... He managed to break the gear lever, but I had the spare, so no biggie. He was pretty carefull after that till the track dried out a bit.

It was cold overnight, but didn’t rain, and when we got there at about 9am, the track was damp, but not really wet, not round the whole track anyway. I put the wet in the rear, mostly for marks sake, I was just gonna cut up an old slick really badly, but he crashed even with the wet (and I'd have probably joined him if I left the slick in.... the day was chilly, but dry and bright all day, and track slowly dried out through out the day, and the pace just got hotter and hotter all day. There were still a fair amount of crashes tho, most them at fairly slow speed into and out of the hairpins. I could manage about 20 minute sessions before my fingers started getting too cold to quickly go from max throttle to max brake quickly.

I wasn’t as hot on the front brakes as I could/should have been, but on the positive I was sliding the bike into the turns probably nearly as good as, if not better than I have ever done. 2 turns in particular. 1 at the end of the straight, slight kink left, then 2nd gear late apex hairpin right. I was doing to pendulum thing all day there, drifting the tail to the right, then to the left as I tip the bike in, so the rear re grips at about half lean angle. Mark said it looks really cool, and a few of the other guys there were calling me bastard and things after I'd drifted round the outside of them, hahaha. The other corner was a right hander late apex, but when you come out of the previous turn you are on the wrong side of the track, ie on the right. Most guys were swerving over to the left for the entry to the turn. But I found if I stayed on the right/middle, and got enough speed, when I drop into 2nd, and tip the bike in, the rear would break away, drift wide, and I'd end up pointing at the apex when it regripped. I never really managed to get it perfect, it was regripping to early, or too late, so I had to either tip it in again, or run a bit wide. but it felt really really really reallllllly cool.

I was faster than most there, but I never attacked the brakes at all. There is an acu test day at 3 sisters on the 5-6th feb, so I'll go do that, and work on the braking all day. I should be able to get it back to how it was before crash fairly soon, its not fear or anything, just feel, plus the winter road riding style brake-release-turn, not the racing style of brake-hold-hold-s**t-hold-turn-s**t-hold-f**k-release-s**t-phew....

I had a nice little battle with one of the other racers there, we both know that we are similar pace, and we tagged onto each other a few times. We pretty much stayed together till one of us ran wide, or hit a neutral (which I had a real problem with today), then we'd loose the tow, at the end of the day tho, it was just him and me on the track. He was buzzy round, and I went out. He was the other side of the track, so I waited till we were at the part of the track were the 2 sides are closest, then I zoomed across the grass and dirt, rejoined on the other side, and set after him. He saw me coming, and his head went straight down. By the time I got on the track, and cleaned the tyres, he was just far enough in front, not to give me any tow.

For 15-20 minutes, we were 10m apart flat out. I gained on all the twisty stuff, he pulled away on the longer bits, but it was just flat out. We chatted afterwards, and he said he just put his head down went as fast as he dared. I never caught him tho, but he never pulled either, I think it looked quite cool from the track side...Then he told me he'd spent £2.5k on his motor. VOR 570. he should have bloody pulled away then...... you wait till I remember how to use the brake..... :)

6th December 2003 - I'm back on track Woooooohoooooo, Although I rode like a panzy all day, but it was still bloody fun though. It took a bit of a mission to get there, as everything seemed to be against us, but we got there in the end.

A mate of mine came over to the UK for a couple of weeks, and while he was here he wanted to do a track day on the KTM. I've been out of action for the last month and a half, after I broke my collar bone a couple of times over at a practise session, see below. Wildtracks has recently opened a new Supermotard track, and since they are open every weekend we thought we'd pop along to clear the cobwebs from my brain.

My SV has the carbs off at the moment, so I've been using the KTM for work for the last 2 weeks. The shoulder is pretty week, but is healing nicely. Riding to work is one thing, playing on the track is another, but I'm really looking forward to it. With the lack of track time, my frustrations are starting to come out on the road. I'm just a bit worried about a silly little lowside rebraking my shoulder, but I guess, just dont crash huh.... I got home from work on Friday evening, and we stripped the lights off the KTM. That's easy enough, next, change the rear tyre. It had a Dunlop sportmax on there, and they're not very good on track. I bought a new hard compound rear wet for the track day. Now, if you've changed tyres yourself, you'll know its not hard, just about getting the knack. Bloody hell though, 30 minutes later, both my buddie and I are jumping up and down on the spade, and the damn bead wont break, time for the WD40. Eventually it popped off, and got the tyre off. The new one went on fine, but my pump is broke. It wouldnt pump the tyre up, never mind pop the bead on the rim. Crap. Ok off to the petrol station to use the pump. I set the pump to its Max (60psi), and let it start. The one side pops on, but not the other, let all the air out again, pour water over the bead, and start again. It took about 5 attempts for the damn thing to pop, but it did go on in the end. So what should have been a 20 minute job, took over an hour and a half.... Anyway, now the bike is ready, soft wet front, hard wet rear, that'll be fine for this time of year wet or dry. We pack the van, jump in and get going. we have to stop at the gas startion again to fill up the van, and check the van's tires, it hasnt been used for months. We sort out the tyres, and go to get gas. The place has closed while we were doing the tyres. Crap. We go in seach of gas, and get some a few stations down the road. Finally we're off proper. We hit the motorway , and we were supposed to go down the A14, as we get closer, we see signs saying the A14 is closed.... Crap. We have to down the M1, and then down some little B road. We eventually got there at about 1:30am.

I told the guys at the track we were arriving late, and they said I'd be able to drive in and unload in a relatively secure area. We arrived and the gates were locked, there's no way I was taking the bike out just on the road side, so we slept around the bike , in the van, on the side of the road. I was comfy enough, dunno about Shayne and Leigh-Ann (his bird).

The day broke, chilly, breezy, but dry. The track looked great, and I was ready to get on there in a rush. I got my kit on, started up the bike, and went straight out. I took a few laps to get the bike warmed up, get the tyres warm, and the new rear scrubbed in. The tarmac is very nice and smooth. There isn't much dirt, a little straight, with a jump, then a corner straight after the jump, so you wont get much air, anless you ignore the next turn, which is a 180 degree with a jump after it, then a small straight, and a tight hairpin back on to the tart. The 180 corner has a very nice rut on the inside, but it was too hard/violent on my shoulder, so I skipped that, and used the gentler less pronounced rut in the middle of the turn. I basically stayed in 1st gear on the dirt all day, I just wasn't willing to loose the front, and fall on my right side, even falling on the left might rebreak the bone. The right hander after the dirt is and excellent turn for spinning up the rear. The track gets dirt dragged onto it, as its just after the dirt section, but its just dusty. I went in a touch hot a few times, and the front tucked. Nothing major, just had to pick the bike up a bit. I found that gentle in and hard out was the most fun. Make sure you get the apex, and then nail the gas. The back end steps out, but the gearing was a bit short. I was hitting the limiter before I needed to brake for the next turn. At the end of the day the right side of my rear tyre was plastered all over the track. Really cool black curves. After the first few sessions I was starting to feel a bit frustrated. there were 2 or 3 bikes that were faster than me, mainly on the dirt, but I just wasnt willing to play, so I just let them go. But I soooo wanted to chase after them, maybe teach them a thing or 2 on the tar, but I couldnt risk it. All day I didn't brake anywhere near as hard as I could. I did a bit of backing the bike into the hairpin, but it was all back brake, just for the camera, normally I wouldnt use the back at all.

I'll do another track day in January, and go a bit faster, then maybe in Feb I'll push it a bit. The shoulder should be tough enough by then to take a crash. Then its the start of the new season......cant bloody wait.

Come on stop reading about it!!!!! As Nike say ....." JUST DO IT!!"

C YA in 2004.

4th October 2003 - Well, I had a trackday/practise day booked on friday down at Lydd International Raceway, where the world championship round is being held in a few weeks. I got a lift down with a mate, in his van, to split the fuel costs. We drove down on Thursday night, got there about 11:30pm, and slept in the van. The day started dry, and a bit dull, but it started to brighten up.

I was one of the first out, and there were still a few puddles, and damp patches, but it was mostly dry. Every time I hit a damp bit, it would wet a section of the slick. It felt like a wheel bearing had collapsed everytime that wet bit contacted the ground and the bike slid slightly, the regripped. wierd feeling. I started to learn the track. We only used the tarmac for the first hour. I was out for most of the hour, and was backing the bike in quite nicely into some of the corners, but not really pushing the front yet. I came in twice for a drink and a little rest.

Then the layout was changed, and the dirt section added. I watched the first session, then went out for a look. First lap, I got highsided coming off the dirt. I hooked 3rd gear before I joined the tar, and then opened the gas really gentely,but obviously not gentely enough. The bike stepped sideways, and I managed to stop it momentarily, then the rear gripped. I hung on to the ejector seat, but the bike then filpped the othher way and threw me down into the floor. I impacted my head and right shoulder.

I got up ok, the bike was still running, but I must have been a bit dased. I went to pick up the bike, and got the brake and clutch lever mixed up. I was holding the brake, and couldnt figure out why the bike was stalling. I got back on the bike and realized my eblow was lower than normal, so I checked my collar bone, and yup, it has become a trampoline (you can bounce it up and down with your finger....)

The track staff were brilliant. As soon as I had sat on my bike the marshal was asking if I was ok, he and I realized my shoulder was damaged, and straight away the red flag was out, he had my bike off me, sat me on the tyre wall, and the ambulance was right there. The marshall even took the bike back to the van for me.

Anyway off to hospital. X-ray, which I'll scan I'm if I can get to work, no scanner at home. The collar bone is broken in 2 places, hurts a bit, a lot sometimes, but its ok. 2 years racing, probably my 6-8th crash this season, 1 broken bone. the law of averages is working out ok for me so far.

Season over? well cadwell is defo out, but I'll see how I feel for blyton, and what the weather is like. maybe.......

Ps the bike is ok, bent 1 of the handle bar bolts that bolt the bars to the top yoke, and some scratches. me yellow shoulder, elbow , thigh, knee, little hole on my hip,knee, and elbow, and the collar bone..

It was good to meet some of the guys from The Visordown Supermoto Forum, sorry I didnt get to play properly, i only did the first session, so everyone was still taking things pretty easy, oh well, there's allways next year. Thanks for the lift jim, good thing we hooked up, or i'd still be driving back now. thanks to LMMR for the lift from the hospital, you scoundrel you. and thanks to everyone else for the concern........... it is but a flesh wound.......

This message was brought to you by the one handed typist.....

4th August 2003 - Well I got a call from Calsport (Dyno Torque) today, about the bike. It seems the main bearing on the crank has failed, and spat itself all over the engine. Luckily the only the thing that seems to be damaged, other than the bearing ovbiously, is the barrel. There are a few score marks on the barrel, and just slightly down the side of the piston, but the head, piston top, rings, and bottom of the motor are all ok. Its still going to cost about £600 to fix, but it could have been so much worse.

5th May 2003 - I went down to Reading on the bank holiday Monday for a track day at a go kart track. It was a very tight and twisty track with mostly first gear corners, and a short back straight, which made it very hard work, but also very good practise for getting on the power in the tight turns. I really enjoyed it, even though I binned the bike in the second last session of the day. It wasn't a huge spill, but it was enough to leave a me feeling sore, and bruises down one side of my body. It was a very strange crash, and I still don't know why I went down. As I was setting up the entry to a very tight right hairpin, I hit neutral, and grabbed a bit of the front brake. As I grabbed the brake, its like the front wheel seized, and in an instant I was on my arse, well, more like my face actually, sliding towards the outside of the turn, chasing the back wheel of my bike. I didn't even have my foot out to try and save it, I just wasn't expecting anything like that to happen. The other riders on the track came to help me up, and pick up the bike. I just looked at the bike in confusion expecting the front to be seized, but it wasn't. I got back on, and went back to the pits to reset the levers, then I went straight back out again. Even though I was a bit sore, I was straight back up to speed within a few laps, and the bike felt fine, weird. There wasn't much damage, the left hand guard is scuffed, and the left rear number plate has a few little scratches, and the skate board wheels I installed on the axles are pretty ground down, but thats what they are for, and I have replacements for them.

I had 2 other close calls during the day, one as I went into a 2nd gear corner after the start straight. As I turned in, I heard shouting from just behind me on the inside. I picked up the bike and went wide to avoid the kamikazi pilot, and as I picked up the bike, I felt someone tag the rear wheel fairly hard, leaving a big rubber mark from his front tyre on my side number plate. Good thing I went wide when I heard him. I had it under control, and looked over my shoulder to see some poor bloke, and his motard, do a bit of a flip, and end up in the dirt, I guess he missed his braking point and just went for inside in the vain hope I would run wide. He was ok, and go back on the bike to continue.

The other one, was as I was trying to pass one the other riders, we came to the tight hairpin, where I later crashed. Someone else had already crashed there, and left a little bit of oil/petrol in the turn. The other rider went round the outside of the oil, and I allways went on the inside of the oil. As he moved out, I went for the pass, thinking he was moving over to let me through, and as I got next to him, he tightened his line and nearly clipped bars with me. Luckily I was at a bit more lean than him, and I just elbowed him up a bit. He never crashed, and I later apologized to him.

All in all, it was a very good day, the track started off very slippery, but as we put some rubber down, and as the track warmed up, it really came good. I was starting to slide the bike out of the tight turns, not something I'm used to doing, but I was doing it all the time in the afternoon, and it felt great. I feel like my riding skills are really moving forward. I could have done without the crash, but I suppose its bound to happen every now and then. Better it happens in a practise than in the race anyway, and I'm not injured, so its ok. I haven't really checked out the bike yet, as I was too tired to unpack it last night, but I'll check it out tonight, and post some pics.

Blyton is in a few weeks, and I'm really looking forward to it. Some nice tight turns, which I allways found tough, but with this last bit of practise, I really improved on getting hard on the gas in the low gears (highside city), letting the rear of the bike slide as I pick it up, and even with the crash, my confidence is growing.

11 April 2003 - I had a practise day at 3 Sisters race track today, what a brilliant day it turned out to be, after a somewhat dodgy start.

I got up and packed the van with the bike, tools, etc, and got ready to go up to Wigan. I got in the van and tried to start it up but nothing happened, it seems I left the bloody lights on the last time I used it and the battery was as flat as a pancake. I was hoping to get up to the track by 1pm, so I could do the 1-3pm session, and the 3-5pm session. Putting the battery on charge was going to take a few hours. So I push the van back a bit squeezed my sisters car between it and a fence, and tried to jump start it, but the car didn't have enough power, so I added the charger to the power of the car, but I put in a 30a fuse in the charger. This worked, and I finally got the van started, but I was about an hour late now. Oh well.

I got to the track at about 2pm, signed on straight away, and coughed up the money for the 2 sessions, said hi to a few people, and went straight out onto the track. The sun was shining, the bike was humming, it was great. I took 2 laps to warm up the tyres, and the motor a bit more and then started to get my head down. Straight away I came up behind a sportsbike going into the tight hairpin. He braked so early that I wasn't expecting it, and nearly went straight into the back of him. That wouldn't have been a good start..... After some mad avoidance, and JUST missing him, I gathered myself and disposed of him a few turns later.

I started the session by taking my time overtaking people, kind of like I would on a trackday, but by the end of the session I was just throwing the bike up the inside, around the outside, between 2 bikes, kind of like "get out my bloody way". Well, we were all racers after all, so we should be used to a bit of close overtaking. After I had been out a few times, I was really getting into it, and the pegs were soon being ground away, and some crazy lean angles were had. I really enjoyed the day. I believe we are going to be using a small dirt section in the race next weekend, which is a shame as I really like this track as a tarmac only track, but i think it should be bee pretty damn good.

Ode, one of the Visordown lads took these couple of pics of me, thanks dude.

03 April 2003 - After the hiccup that occured during the first round at Cadwell, I took the bike back to Calsport (Dyno Torque) to have the head off and a new gasket put in. Craig said he couldn't see any other damage, so we just have to cross our fingers and hope it was a bad gasket. I've done a couple of oil changes to get all the water out of the system, as the poor engine was a bit flooded.

My seat cover finally arrived, I had to take it to a shop to fitted, as it looked too difficult for me, I got enough blisters just doing the stickers. I got the seat back today so here are the latest photos of the bike with the new decal set and seat cover.

24th March 2003 - Yup. My nice spangley new 660 had a minor (I think, I hope) heart attack On Sunday. It has about 17 hours use……

I was at Rednal go-kart track on Friday. Had an excellent day thraping around the track, trying to chase Warren Steele and Ady Smith….. Yeah right….It's a great little track, almost a bit small for the supermoto, but not quite.
You can read the first, very short race report, and damage report in the 2003 section.

20th March 2003 - My new sticker set, and race numbers finally arrived from Danger-UK. I spent a few hours on Thursday night putting them all on the plastics. I have a blister in the middle of my thumb now from the hairdryer and all the rubbing. oh well. The bike looks really good with the new decals on. The seat cover hasn't arrived yet, but it looks great with out it. I'll get the camera from work, and put some photos up here as soon as I can.

28th February 2003 - I had the day off on Friday to have a track day on a go-kart track with a few other motard riders. I stripped the bike down on Thursday night, put the motoX front board on, and removed all the lights. I'll put some picks on the website later, next week. It was fricken brilliant. The weather was crap, but that didn’t matter. I arrived at about 10:30. When I got there, the track was damp, but it wasn’t raining, so I thought I'd try the cut slicks first, as they were already on the bike. After a few laps, I came back in as I had no confidence on the front going into the turns, and the rear was trying to spin all the time coming out of them... tried to put the wet wheels in, but the disk has a space between it and the hub on the new bike, and the spacer wouldn’t fit the wet wheels. The rest of the guys came over and swopped the tyre for me from the wet wheel to the dry wheel, thanks guys. The rear fitted ok. Went out again, and felt much better, but after 5 minutes it started raining. I came back in and put my gortex jacket on, and then zoomed out again. I had the front tuck a few times as I was pushing it quite had into the turns, but the foot out saved me all the time. I came back in, and added a few (2) psi to the front under the advise of one of the other guys there. Went back out, and it felt great. After half an hour I was starting to back the bike into a few turns (the ones where I had to change down a gear), and after a little bit more time, I had the rear lighting up coming out of a few turns (2nd gear). Not all the time, but quite a few times I had it spin up, and after a few times it felt great, not scarey at all. Towards the end of the day, I was having the rear spin up, holding the gas open, and letting it rev out in 2nd, with the bike sideways, a few times it would grip again, and pull a wheelie. Awesome. This KTM is wicked. I might do a sicki on Monday, and go back there as a few other motards are going down there. I'm actually glad it was raining most of the day, it was excellent. I bloody loved it, specially spinning up the rear, and actually getting sideways out of the turns. It feels so cool, even better than sliding into a turn. One of the other guys though, crashed right behind me, in the pit lane. I heard a noise behind me, as I was about to pull onto the track, turned around to see his bike go sliding into the tyres, and then him go sliding into the bike. He broke his wrist..... tit. One of the others crashed, lost the front, but he was ok, got up and carried on, but we all took the piss out of him.

27th February 2003 - I took the KTM to Calsport (Dyno Torque) today to have it set up correctly, have the air box opened up a bit, have a Remus race can fitted (Craig just happened to have one lying around), and to have some of my old cut slicks fitted for the track day tomorrow (even though the forecast says its going to rain all day, but I thought I'd be hopeful). Below, you can see the dyno graphs from todays work. I'm pretty damn happy with what I see, its much better than the 47hp I had to race with last year on the LC4. Bearing in mind that the motor has only just been run in (11hrs / 375miles), I'm sure it'll gain a few hp over the next few weeks as the motor loosens up some more. I expect to have over 60hp by the time the season starts, and by the gains I've seen from some other people having full race systems, I recon between 65 and 70hp isn't out of the question. Just got to save....save, what am I thinking, pay off some of the credit card bills first.

17th February 2003 - Well, I picked up my new bike this weekend, and I love it. I have managed to do 220 miles on Saturday afternoon and all of Sunday. I was hoping to get the full 10 hours running done, but it was too cold for me out there. After 3 hours on the road, my toes and fingers were a bit numb. Here are a few pictures of the new 660. I have ordered a graphics kit for it so it is a little bit different from all the other KTMs out there. I'll post some more pictures when the new kit arrives.

10th February 2003 - The bike shop called me today, my new KTM 660 SMC should be here this week. oooooh, I've gone all gurly. I've ordered the new 310mm racing front disk, and some replacement bodywork for it. I cant wait for it to arrive and to run it in. I'll just have to be patient, not one of my greatest virtues......

9th February 2003 - A guy came round the house, and looked over the LC4. As soon as he looked at it he had decided he wanted it. We did a bit of haggling, and I sold him the bike. The LC4 was a wonderful bike, it never gave me any trouble, and was a great bike for my first years racing. I hope the new owner looks after it, because it deserves it. I'm a bit sad its gone, but needs must, and I'm sure it'll have an easier life now.

1st February 2003 - I've decided I need to get a more powerfull bike, if I'm to compete in the A, or B group this year. At the end of last year I was getting very frustrated being overtaken every time I went down the straight. The old LC4 was fast fast enough around the twisty bits, but was at least 10HP down on the bikes I was racing against. So........ I've ordered myself a 660 SMC for this year.