2007 MOTO-ST 8-hour Race Report
Team Motorrad has been competing in the SunTrust MOTO-ST Endurance race series for the entire 2007 season. The saga continues.... We arrived in Daytona on Thursday morning after a long drive down from Greenville, SC. After securing our credentials we headed in and set up our garage in the Nextel area, with Aprilia USA on one side of us and San Jose BMW on the other. James Chance III had driven down on his own from Savannah on Wednesday night, and he came over to our garage as soon we got there. The remainder of the day Thursday was spent putting the finishing touches on a few odds and ends. I'd rather not work on the bike at the track if possible, as there are so many other things to do with meetings and pit setup and such that the time can get away from you rather quickly. Working on the bike at the track was forced upon me by some issues we found the Saturday prior to leaving for Daytona. I finally received some new fuel injection parts and took the bike down to The DucShop to have some fine tuning done on their dyno. Mark Sutton, the owner, is a great tuner. Since he helps the other Touring Sport team and has some BMW tuning experience, we decided to have him help with the R1200S too. We got the fuel mapped great, but discovered a problem. The bike was only making 102hp! I left the DucShop in Atlanta and drove straight to Touring Sport that afternoon. Barry Crowe and I put the bike on the lift at Touring Sport as soon as I got there. We discovered that the compression on the left side was much lower than the right. I pulled off the left side cylinder and head and took it over to Ed Johnson, who does all of my head work. He found a burnt exhaust valve, and fixed it along with cleaning up everything else in the head. We threw some new rings at the left side cylinder for good measure. I didn't have all of the gaskets and seals to put it back together, so we had to express order them, and they wouldn't be available until Tuesday. Since we were leaving midday Wednesday this was cutting it pretty close, but I got it back together in time to leave. Of course this left a bunch of other little things unfinished that still needed doing, and so Thursday afternoon was spent doing those. On Friday it was go time. We arrived at the track as soon as they would let us in, 7am, and proceeded to finish a few things. We met up with Brad Hendry, as he was already at the track preparing to sprint race his Foothills BMW R1200S. Our first event of the weekend was coming up at Noon, the CCS Team Challenge Race. We use this as extra practice, since MOTO-ST practice is a little limited. The race started well, with Brad Hendry on the bike. He liked the setup and proclaimed it ready to race. James Chance III rode the bike next, and he also did some decent lap times. I left my crew chief Gary Walker in charge as I had a MOTO-ST team owner meeting to attend, so I didn't get to see the last 30 minutes of the race. It turns out we finished second in the GTU class, and that was with extra pit stops to make some minor adjustments. Unfortunately, a team pitted down from us had a fire while they were refueling their bike about 40 minutes into the race. The rider and the bike were both on fire and everyone in their pit area was in a panic. I saw it happening and grabbed our 10lb. fire bottle and sprinted the 50 or so yards down to where they were. I was the first one to the rider with a fire bottle, and he was not in good shape. After I finished putting him out I put out his bike too. Exciting, but not fun. The ambulance took him away and he was airlifted to a burn center in Orlando. The next event on Friday was MOTO-ST practice at 5pm. We were running out of time, since there was another meeting after the Team Owner meeting, and it ran long. We got the bike through MOTO-ST tech and just had time to make the starting grid for the practice session. We didn't have time to get to the dyno, so it would have to wait until the morning. Practice went okay, but we were clearly being left behind the other SST class bikes on the banking. Something was still not right. After practice we had a quick debriefing to see what the riders had to say. Brad seemed to think it was sluggish and James had a complaint about the bike losing power momentarily a few times. We took the bike back to the garage and started to service it, but we wouldn't get everything done until the next morning, since at Daytona the officials only give you and hour to clean up after the final practice session is over, and then they kick you out. We drained the oil and secured a few things, and left the valve adjustment for the next morning. We arrived early again on Saturday so that we could finish the service work before the one and only 10 minute practice we would get. As luck would have it rain was falling, and the practice turned out to be wet. I decided to take the bike out myself, since we had such a short time and I figured eliminating the middle man might help me diagnose the problem faster. We threw on some rain tires and I headed out. Sure enough the bike was cutting out; basically acting like the quickshifter was engaging even when you weren't pushing on it. I came in and unplugged the quickshifter to see if that would fix it, but when I went back out to do another lap, the session had just been given the checkered flag and they wouldn't let me back on track! I only got three laps and we didn't find out much, since I wasn't able to go back out and verify if I had fixed the problem. The next stop was the dyno. I was really curious to see how the air-fuel ratio looked, and when he did the run it looked good. The problem was the bike was still only making about 100hp. I was shocked and dejected, as I though we had fixed this with the head work. I decided to remove all of the fuel injection controls and just put it back to stock to see what would happen. We did all this and now it was only making 98hp. This class horsepower limit is 118. San Jose ran on the dyno right after us, and they were trying to find was to bring their horsepower down to the limit because they were over it. Clearly we still had a problem and we were running out of time fast. Gary called BMW Daytona to see if they would be willing to hook it up to their diagnostic computer and they agreed. We loaded the bike and I headed straight over to their shop. They hooked it up right away, and the problem became clear. The control systems on the bike were not responding and they were not communicating with each other. They tried to reset everything, but it wouldn't take the reset. By now it was 11:30am, I still had to drive back to the track, and we had to be on the pre-grid for the race at 12:30! I decided I better get back, and that racing with 100hp was better than not making the race. I got back to the track, the team threw the bodywork and new tires on, and we were off to the pre-grid for the sighting laps and the start of the race. Our grid position was on the outside of the third row based on our points so far from the season, as we were currently sixth in points. Brad started the race and we fell back about 5 positions initially due to our power deficit, but we managed to stay in 11th overall through our first pit stop. James was circulating well, and I was optimistic that we could move up the order through our fast pit stops and good strategy. James' radio plug did not see things my way, as it broke while he was out on track, and when it was time for us to call him in for his pit stop he couldn't hear us. The bike will run 20 laps on a tank of fuel at Daytona, about 40 minutes. 21 laps is cutting it close, and 22 is not advised. James ran out on lap 23 of his stint, as our futile attempts to call him were met with deaf ears. The crash truck brought him back to the paddock, way in the back corner of the garage area, not to the pit lane. They do this to everyone, so it's not unfair, but it's a long way away. The officials told us where they were taking him, so we loaded up the team golf cart with the quick fuel can, the extinguisher, and me in my leathers and helmet ready to jump on the bike and get back on track as soon as we could. It took what seemed like forever for them to bring James back to the garage area, and when he finally arrived we refueled and I jumped on and headed back to the hot pit. The MOTO-ST marshals signaled that I could go out and I was on my way. During all of this we lost 6 or 7 laps and fell from 11th back to 33rd position on track. Over the next 6 hours everything went smoothly. I came in from my stint on the bike and Brad went back out. We slowly made our way back up the standings until we were on the leader board again. Fast and accurate pit stops from the crew and consistent lap times from the riders made this happen. Strategy played a role too, as I was able make a pit stop under caution right behind Brian Parriott and the San Jose team. The caution had just come out while I was in the final laps of my stint on the bike at around the 6th hour. As luck would have it Brian had just passed me and I was doing my best to keep him in sight on our underpowered bike when I saw the yellow. I radioed Gary that the caution lights were on, and he told me it looked like San Jose was going to pit. I came in behind Parriott, we did our stop, and left pit lane with Brad on the bike right on Parriott's tail. This put us third behind the pace car and helped us gain back almost a full lap! Brad handed the bike over to James, and near the end of James' stint we got word that the track was about to go full course caution. Looking at the stop watch we knew James was back near the chicane. We radioed him to come in, (we had fixed his plug while Brad was on the bike earlier in the race) Brad got ready quickly, and we were the first bike onto pit lane. When Brad went back out we had gained almost another lap, putting us about 6th behind the pace car for the restart. This was the final stint, and in three short stops we went from 13th to 9th overall, finishing the race in the top ten and 8th in the SST class. Team Motorrad raced in every MOTO-ST race this year. We had some ups and downs, but in was an exciting and educational season. We finished 7th overall in the championship against some great competitors, and we couldn't have done it without the support or our sponsors and our volunteer crew, as well as some great riding from Frank Shockley, Brad Hendry, and James Chance III. Thanks to Gary and Kim Walker, Melissa Drennan, Brad Phillips, Mark Boucher, Dwayne Palmer, Terry Bailey, Jim Blakeney, Rick Tannenbaum, Earl Tottman, Randy Walker, Ed Johnson, Mike Hendry, Barry Crowe, Gina's BMW, all the Touring Sport employees, and all my friends and family and anyone who helped that I'm forgetting! Support was given by BMW North America, Touring Sport BMW, BMW Santa Cruz, Wunderlich, Cee Bailey's Aircraft Plastics, Rock Oil, Shock Doctor, RaceHost.com, Pinlock USA, Carbone Lorraine Brakes, Cogent Dynamics, and MachineArt Moto.
Posted 3:46 PM, Oct 26, 2007 by bmwivan
AHRMA Kershaw 8/18-8/19
I got home late last night from a great weekend of racing with AHRMA at Carolina Motorsports Park in Kershaw, SC. AHRMA is a nice low key environment with lots of comraderie and some fantastic twins classes as well as all of the vintage classes they are know for having. I entered the Team Motorrad R1200S in BOT F1 and BOT F2 both Saturday and Sunday. BOT is Battle of the Twins, and the F1 class is unresricted run what you brung. The F2 class is limited displacement depending on configuration. Both races had good attendance for the weekend, with over 10 on the grid in each race Saturday and just under 10 on Sunday (attrition happens!). During Friday practice, my suspension tuner Rick Tannebaum from "Cogent Dynamics":http://www.motocd.com (he came with me to race his 748 Ducati and help me with my setup) and I tried out some new settings and were able to get the R1200S flying better than ever. We still have the stock motor in the bike right now since we are working on the race motor getting things ready for the MOTO-ST 8-hour race coming up at Daytona the end of October. Even with the stock engine we got the bike down to lap times that would have put me mid-pack in WERA 600, and on top of the podium in WERA Heavyweight Twins. I couldn't have been happier, considering the stock engine and that we had temperatures on Friday appoaching 106 degrees in the shade. On Saturday we ran away with both races. Ted Cobb, and instructor for the Kevin Schwantz school, gave me a run at the beginning of the F2 race, but wasn't able to stay with me for long. In F1 I went completely unchallenged. On Sunday it was a repeat, with the F2 race a little closer as Cobb and I encountered a lapped rider in the last turn on the last lap. I had to slow down and let the lapper into the turn first and Cobb was able to catch up. I went to the inside of the lapper at the exit of the corner and Cobb went to the outside, and I was able to get a better drive off the turn and beat Cobb to the line. Thanks to everyone who makes it possible, especially BMW XPLOR, Touring Sport BMW, Cogent Dynamics, Wunderlich, Rock Oil, Cee Bailey's Aircraft Plastics, Carbone Lorraine, Shock Doctor, and RaceHost.com "Team Motorrad":http://www.teammotorrad.com
Posted 12:41 PM, Aug 20, 2007 by bmwivan
Daytona AHRMA Race Report
In addition to MOTO-ST, I competed in the AHRMA races at Daytona Monday and Tuesday March 5-6. I raced both my R1200S and my R75/5. The R1200S is legal in the BOT (Battle of Twins) F2 (Formula 2) class in AHRMA. This class includes SV650's built to Superbike spec. and 2-valve 1000cc Superbike spec. Ducati's among others. The R75/5 is legal in many of the 750cc vintage classes, depending on how it is configured (fairing, brakes, etc.) I typically race it in BEARS or Formula 750. Still riding San Jose's R1200S, I finished on top of the podium both days in BOT F2. I led the race flag to flag each time. Monday's race was not too exciting, as I ran away from everyone and was never challenged. I had fun trying to correct my lines and be more precise. Tuesday I had a DS1000 Ducati chasing me the entire time, and he almost managed to draft pass me at the line. I managed to hold him off though. Richard Chambers interviewed me after the race and I told him I was on basically a stock bike that anyone could experience by going out to the BMW Demo Truck outside the speedway and taking one for a ride. I'm not sure he believed me! I entered the BEARS races on the R75/5, and these were exciting. On Monday I had a rider highside in front of me in turn 4 on the first lap. We were running nose to tail, with him in second and me in third position. I nearly ran him over and ended up in the grass outside the turn going around him. I lost some positions but made them back quickly, settling into second place behind Tim Joyce on a very well built Triumph. There was a sizable gap back up to Tim, and I was not able to make it up, but second is pretty good, considering the last time I was at Daytona on the R75/5 I crashed out of the race! In Tuesday's BEARS race I came in second again. This time I lead the race until the last lap, when a rider on a Triumph passed me for the lead. I followed him through the infield thinking that I would draft pass him at the line. His bike was a little stronger than mine, and as we pulled onto the banking for the last time he was able to just stay in front of me. Bridesmaid again. All in all the AHRMA races were alot of fun. We really showed everyone what the R1200S is capable of doing, took home some trophies, and had a good time. Ivan
Posted 2:06 PM, Mar 12, 2007 by bmwivan
Daytona MOTO-ST Race Report
My endurance racing team, Team Motorrad, just returned from a great week at Daytona. We had some ups and downs, but everything worked out in the end. On Tues. Feb. 27th Brad Phillips, Jim Blakeney, Gary Walker and I left the race shop and headed down to Roebling Road in Savannah, GA., to participate in AHRMA practice scheduled for Wednesday. The sky was clear and it was promising to be a nice day as we unloaded the R1200S and the vintage BMW's from the trailer on Wednesday morning. We were able to get in a full day of practice, and made some minor necessary adjustments to the machines in preparation for Daytona. We loaded everything back up for the Thursday drive down to Daytona. Frank Shockley met up with us later in the evening at Ivey and Elaine's house, friends who where gracious enough to give us a place to stay for the night. A rainy but warm Thursday morning greeted us as we left Savannah and headed to Daytona. By the time we arrived the rain was done and the sun was coming out. We suffered through registration, found our garage, and set everything up for the week. Dawn arrives early on race days. We drove to the track in the dark on Friday morning, talked about strategy and prepared ourselves for the day. Our first order of race business at Daytona was on the schedule for Friday, the CCS Team Challenge Race. Frank and I entered the R1200S for a little more practice in preparation for Sunday's MOTO-ST event. The start of the race went well, with Frank riding strong and towards the front. I took over the bike after about 45 minutes, and we continued to forge ahead. Toward the end of my session, the bike began to show signs of impending doom, popping out of fifth gear as I would climb out of the chicane and onto the banking. On a street bike this might be a nuisance, but when you are shifting at redline on a racebike, you can only get away with a problem like this for so long before catastrophe occurs. A loss of power and trail of smoke signaled the end a few laps later. As I radioed our crew chief Gary with the news, it occurred to me that we were done. Without a backup bike our weekend was finished. In an effort to eek out a little more from our bike over the winter we had inadvertently sabotaged ourselves. The lesson here: don't mess with it if it ain't broke. The crash truck took me back to the paddock and a solemn reception from the crew. Looking for a little sympathy, I headed over to the garage San Jose BMW was using just down from ours. I fully expected my tale of woe to fall on deaf ears, as they were busy preparing their own machines and participating in some practice races. Instead they were very receptive to my story. So much so that they offered to let us use their backup bike, and not just any backup bike, but the bike that actually won the Inaugural MOTO-ST event the previous Fall. I couldn't believe it. Of course there were details to be worked out, but after a long night of anticipation we were handed their spare bike midday Saturday. After having no hope of racing on Sunday, our weekend was starting to look up, and thanks to one of our competitors no less! The winning San Jose bike had been on the show circuit all winter, and was still in roughly the same condition it had been in at the conclusion of the 8-Hour race the previous October. As soon as we received the bike we went to work. The valves were adjusted, all the fluids changed, bodywork, shocks, rearsets and final drive swapped out for ours, new spark plugs and a new alternator belt. We also installed our radio system and on-board camera. By the time the garages closed on Saturday night, the bike was as ready to race as it could be. On Sunday morning we were given one short 15 minute practice session before the race. We sent Frank out to suss up the situation. The question on everyone's mind: would the borrowed bike work? The crew waited with anticipation as Frank circulated the track. When he came in he was all smiles. The bike worked well and was ready to race. We took our grid position at 1:30pm, and at 2:00pm Frank and the rest of the field peeled off into turn one. 50 minutes later Frank came in to pit, the crew gassed the bike up, and I climbed on for my first of two sessions. She was working well, and I handed the bike over to Frank after another 50 minutes with no issues. The crew changed a tire at this stop, and it went great. Total time including coming down pit road and going back out, under 50 seconds! When Frank handed the bike off to me for the last session, the only thing I could think was, "don't crash!" I didn't, and crossed the line as the checkered flag flew. We were placed in 7th overall. To finish the race at all was a tremendous achievement considering our obstacles. To be a top-ten finisher on a borrowed bike was more than we could hope for. It turns out San Jose BMW had a mechanical problem near the end of the race, and I was sorry to hear it. They led most of the race prior to their problem, and they were looking good to make it two wins in a row. Without them we would have packed up and headed home, and I really have to thank them and all of the Team Motorrad crew for making the opening round of the 2007 season one to remember. Ivan
Posted 3:42 PM, Mar 08, 2007 by bmwivan
