Mallory Park, 3rd & 4th March 2001

Saturday

Had to check that the event was still on what with this foot and mouth epidemic and all the snow, so after getting confirmation from Mallory Park and Mr Kevin Tubby (the secretary of the meeting) we loaded up and were all geared up to go.......

Left the Island on the Saturday 0700hrs Seacat to Liverpool with a packed van and Graham Burden riding shotgun, as he was entered in the 400 class on his Honda VFR400. Had a load more kit to take than usual, with the awning and spare fairings etc.....and drove down to Leicester as Mallory is only a few miles away, but Leicester were playing Liverpool so we went to Filbert Street to see if we could get in. Unfortunately tickets were sold out, so I told Graham that we should hang about a bit because sooner or later we would be approached by a ticket tout.........sure enough, a scouser asked did we want tickets, I said that we did.....but he wanted sixty quid each....told him that he was having a laugh, so to speak, but he wouldn't drop his price.......so we didn't bother. Decided to go to Mallory Park and set the awning up.

Got to Mallory and had to wait an hour and a half before they would let us in, as they had straw down and were pouring gallons of disinfectant all over it. Eventually got in, found a flat area in the paddock to set the awning up, by this time it was starting to get really cold, and not having set this up before with all the metal poles it was like a krypton factor of eight.......but got it sussed in the end.....stuck all the bikes and kit in it, set the van up for sleeping in, had a shower then went to the pub for some grub........got back to the paddock a while later and Juan had arrived with Dawnio and Darren 'Archie' Murphy, who's going to help Juan out this season as he's talking a year out from British Supercup. Juan's Race transporter is HUGE......its Dave Molyneux's old one that he used for the World Sidecar Championship last year.....just the job that thing....

Got my head down in the back of the van, it had forecast -5C overnight....to say that it was cold was an understatement.......it must have been the coldest night's sleep I've ever had....and I was sleeping fully clothed, in a king size duvet all rolled up in the middle of it...woke up at half two and reached over to get my drink....and it was frozen on the top, the van was all icy on the inside.....and the flame on my lighter froze!

Sunday

Woke up to the sound of my teeth chattering......Jesus, was it cold......put my new leathers on and pushed the bike to scrutineering....bike passed no problem, the scrutineer commented on how tidy it was, I was hoping it was going to stay that way with all the frost that was lying on the ground. The digital temperature gauge on the bike was reading -3C....thought that wasn't good as race bikes aren't allowed to have antifreeze in them, cos it doesn't evaporate like water does if spilt on the track.

Noticed that the Usual Suspects from last year were here....Atkins, Cooper, Litchfield, Tranter, etc.... and Milky Quayle turned up on an Aprilia 250 he'd just acquired as this year he's going to compete in the Aprilia 250 Challenge that runs alongside the MRO Championship.

Got back to our spot in the paddock, Juan was having trouble starting his bike.... I had a go with mine.... no joy either, tried for ages, and still no luck. They started to call Solos practice over the tannoy.... Graham was helping me push it up and down the paddock and Archie was doing the same for Juan...... They called the second Solos practice.... and mentioned that if you didn't make practice you wouldn't race...... so told Graham it was not worth all of us missing out, so I helped him start his bike, no joy either on the first few attempts, but it fired eventually and off he went..... I was knackered, and I thought I was fit!

I had two mates coming to cheer me on today, Ian MacRae from European Pump Services Ltd in West Sussex (EPS Ltd) and Richard Hocking from Bikes and Stuff in Peterborough (Bikes and Stuff). They helped me try and start the bike.... still no joy, and by this time the battery had gone flat....... nightmare!!

Tried for ages, and it still wouldn't fire.... and missed the third and final practice session, as did Juan and a few others...... some unlucky punters sheared their water pumps off trying to bump start their bikes...they must have been frozen solid. Was getting a little pissed off to say the least, both Juan and I were wondering why the b*****ds who owned the bikes before us had taken the chokes off..... can't see what benefit there is in doing so. Anyway after having no spark, the bikes in pieces, changing plugs around and jump starting with the van, my bike eventually fired at around 1045hrs after nearly three hours of trying, I noticed that the temp gauge was reading over 6C when it did, I'd held the starter on for ages and as it was turning over the temperature was creeping up....... Juan still had no joy....

I ran to the race office to plead my case...."From the IOM, new bike, wouldn't start, just got it going.... would they please let me out in the first race and I'd use it as a practice"...... the Clerk of the Course said OK.... as long as I used it as a practice.... then told me I had 15 minutes to get the bike to the holding area...... Shite!... the bike was still in bits.... ran back to the paddock, and Ian, Richard, Graham and Luke (Ian's son) were frantically putting the bike back together (Thanks boys, if it wasn't for you, I'd never have raced).... I chucked my new leathers on, forgot to put on my ID discs, back protector and ear plugs and hurried to the holding area.....The marshal wouldn't let me out, said that they were all on the grid, after doing a sighting lap then one warm up lap and were on the grid waiting for the start.....I argued that I had got permission, so they reluctantly let me start from Pit Lane......

I was hoping the boys had tightened everything up, as we had no time to check anything, and I was freezing cold sitting there dreading it....... An icy track, a bike I had never ridden before, I hadn't been on one for 5 months, cold tyres and no practice............. I thought Christ Almighty.... what am I doing here?? All the bikes zoomed past the pits and I was waved out........ Took it pretty steady and had a slide around Gerrards.... saw two bikes cart wheeling off the track.......... Still slippy then...................... Had an almighty slide as I flicked over to the left hander at the Esses and it nearly had me off................... if anyone caught that on camera, it will be a beauty!

Just took it steady after that, at the end of the day I didn't come to fall off..... and on my fifth lap approaching the hairpin, the blue flags came out...... I thought to myself.... 'what the hell does a blue flag mean'... as I hadn't seen one come out before.... then it dawned on me that the leader must be behind and I had to move over, so this I duly did and a V&M R6 Yamaha whizzed past, he obviously wasn't worried about the conditions..... so I got lapped, still I was on a learning curve and I had 5 laps under my belt, and I finished 18th.

Got back to the pits to find that Juan had got his bike running, he had to use my van and the jump leads we had borrowed as well, he also said that his didn't want to fire till it reached 6C..... something that will stand us in good stead for the future. I might invest in a greenhouse paraffin heater or the like.... or more likely not bother this early again!

Both Juan and I were out in Race 7.... Graham was out in race 8, I was on the last row of the grid...... You're never going to win a race from there... got a shite start, which is unusual for me and doesn't help.... so again just more time on the bike.... had a few more slides in this one, but felt that I was getting quicker and was doing laps of 56 odd seconds which wasn't bad as my previous best had been 56.9... I noticed that my corner speed had improved and I could get the power down quicker, but I was still slow on the slow corners, and with the sheer number of bikes in front filtering through the chicane was getting held up a lot and I was bouncing off the rev limiter in every gear, another thing that I will have to get the hang of as the R1 Yamaha had loads more power also went backwards when some Novice overcooked the Esses and I lost places trying to avoid him and at the finish was 21st ..... I was still pretty upbeat though as I knew I could do better even though the conditions were far from ideal...... Archie told me to make a move and make it stick, but the confidence will come when I start to get used to the bike.

Graham and Milky were out in race 8, but I never had time to watch as I was back out in race 9.......This time I was on the 5th row and got another crap start.....can't seem to get this 600 off the line as well as I could the R1.....something I'm going to have to get right because I'm losing places over it.....started to get my head down and was passing people most notably around Gerrards, which hadn't been a favourite part of mine in the past, but this handled so much better and went where I pointed it, something that I was well pleased about.....but I was still riding it like the R1.....a little apprehensive of going into a corner too tight and worrying about drifting wide on the exit, and was fighting it too much, but relaxed, and then I was getting the hang of it and made up a few places and finished 11th , with a fastest lap of 55.3......the bike wasn't running at the right temperature so I tried some tape on the Radiator to make it run hotter....but as the day got warmer (not much) I had to rip the tape back off.......its supposed to run at 75C and apparently every degree either side of that you lose one brake horse power.(the first race it was running at 55C.....20BHP down).

The weather was sunny but still really cold, the awning was a god send....wasn't out again till race 20 so was thinking of changing my gearing as I was running a 46 tooth rear sprocket which was way too small........everybody else was running 48, 49 or 50. I couldn't run anything bigger because I had a standard sized chain on, so Richard had brought with him a longer one (cheers for that mate) but I didn't have a link remover or much time so I never fitted it, but will have it on for next time.

Much the same happened in Race 20, got another poor start, was getting a bit fed up with that but got my head down again and started to enjoy it but the races aren't long enough, if I had more laps I'd do better, because I'm fitter than I was last year.....(all this training should stand me in good stead)....and at the finish I was 13th....Juan managed 4th.

The last race was race 22....and I was on the last row of the grid again....bloody unlucky in that respect.....Juan was on the front and Graham was in this one on the 5th row...got blocked for the first three laps and was in a group of 3, and managed to take them all in a oner at Gerrards and had a clear lap in front of me.....Whey hay...the first time I'd had that!....so for the last two laps felt like I was Flying and was reeling the group about 200 yards in front of me in...and at the flag they were just in front of me.....I ended up 16th. I asked Archie what my lap times were for the last two laps, because I was sure they were well into the 54's, but he hadn't bothered to time them..........t**t.

Packed the van up and headed for Liverpool with Graham and Dawnio to catch the Seacat at 2100 hrs to the Island, ripped up the motorway and made it just in time.

So the three things I went for happened...... I stayed on, beat my previous best time by 2 seconds and got a signature (Number 19). Can't complain about that......Going back to Mallory on the 18th March for the New ERA round....feel a lot more confident as I now know what to expect...get the gearing right before I go........and hopefully the weather will be better....loads of Manx Boys going to this meeting..... should be a laugh.

Tune in next time for another very exciting, freezing cold episode of..............Tommy Clucas Racing