Apex Track Days

Travis Writes

For the first time in a while I actually have some exciting news regarding my racing efforts. This year’s goal was to race the endurance series and have a top three finish in the championship points. The first weekend (March 31st) we did better then expected. It was my team mates (Skyler) first weekend riding a 1000. He has been a good 600 rider for a few years but a 1000 is a different beast. He did well considering it was his first time on the bike. Half way through the race we pitted, fueled the bike, and changed riders. I made up a couple places and we ended the race 2nd in our class and 4th overall. The class finish is the only one that counts for the point’s championship, so we were 2nd in the points. The team that took first in our class is a good team and would be hard to beat.

For the second weekend we worked on our pit speed. I built a gas can that would dump gas faster and we calculated how much gas we would need. We started the second race with apprehension. Skyler was gridded on the first row so we had a better chance at placing high. However, earlier in the day we were watching our lap times and comparing to our competition. I was running lap times of about 3:10 and Skyler was running about 3:14. Our competition was doing better then that. Some of the front runners were at about 3:09. If you know racing, 1 second is a big deal. The start went well and Skyler was hanging with the front runners. About 10 laps in and the story started to change. Sky was running an average lap time of 3:10 (much better then practice) but he had made a couple mistakes and was down to about 7th place. He came in for the pit stop a few laps later in 8th place. Our competition was running about 3:08 lap times, so we were losing 2 seconds a lap. Skyler had done a very good job, riding better then he had in practice and keeping it on two wheels. Now it was up to me. Thanks to my home made gas can, and some good team work, we had a great pit stop. Courtney timed us; we had a 27 second pit stop, very good. Average was about 5 to 10 seconds more then that. So I got on the bike in 8th place but a closer 8th place. My first lap out was 1 second faster then my best time in practice at a 3:09. I focused on being smooth and raced as fast as I could. My lap times went down every lap and I caught and passed someone about every lap as well. When my pit board read 2nd place I knew I could win. I started to get glimpse of the leader at the end of straight-aways, I really buckled down to try and catch him. With two laps to go I passed him coming into turn one and never looked back. I was praying for that checkered flag because my body was crying for relief. The last lap came, I tipped into the last turn accelerated out onto the front straight, and took the checked flag! The pit crew and my team mate were jumping up and down. First place in my class and first place over all. I was surprised to find out I had run a lap time of 3:05! 5 seconds fasted then my best lap in practice and 3 seconds faster then anyone on the race course. What a fun day!

However, the weekend wasn't good for everyone

Poor Spencer made one small mistake going into club house turn and paid the ultimate price!