AFM Round 4 Thunderhill, WERA West Fontana Double Header

This was a pretty unusual weekend. I’m trying to win three women’s roadracing championships, because it would be rad. There are a lot of women racing on the west coast in regional series, so to do so would be quite an accomplishment.

Anyway, points are accumulated each time a race is completed, and you win more points for a higher finish. To complicate matters, there were some scheduling changes with the AFM, and some scheduling changes with WERA, that resulted in some obnoxious overlap.

What isn’t obnoxious, however, is that the AFM runs their women’s race Saturday. WERA runs Women’s Superstock Sunday. Five races at two tracks on different sides of one of the larger states in the union? If I could win Formula AFemme on Saturday, I could skip the last AFM round, allowing me to make the last WERA round in Vegas (one of my favorites, as the season ender in Sin City allows for some epic Sunday night partying with my crew). And if I could place well in Women’s Superstock on Sunday, I’d be in better contention for that championship going into said last round.

Let’s do this.

Friday afternoon I rolled into the Thunderhill paddock and began setting up. Nikki, the pretty blonde mechanic, and Ross, came in a half hour later. We were eagerly awaiting Nikki’s freshly repaired and painted bodywork, which AFM racer Tim Scarrott was working on. Once we could get our literally hot (it was a scorcher that day) little hands on her plastics and mount ’em up, we could go back to our room at the Holiday Inn Express, relax, and prepare.

After we got set up, we socialized a little bit. We admired Jennifer Lauritzen’s absolutely rad new Specialized Ruby bicycle:

Jenn & Ruby 4EVA

We had amazing Thai food in Lenny Hale’s motorhome, with Lenny, Gabe and their OMRRA crew. Apparently, on their way up, Lenny called Nikki to ask if she’d buy and bring organic coconut milk. “Preferably from Whole Foods, but Safeway has something that’ll work too. Oh, P.S., I don’t have a mustache.” As proclaimed, he was clean shaven and barely recognizable when we saw him.

The bodywork got there a little late. But it was beautiful. I helped my team mount it on, and wore the sexy headlamp:

Headlamps are HOT.

Finally we got to our room. I showered, and we spent two minutes choreographing our early morning route, who would shower when, alarm clock setting and whatnot. I went to bed much later than I preferred.

Saturday morning was brutally hot, and windy. We tried all day long to avoid bringing out the big ass canopy, but it just got too hot. I was unremarkable in practice, hovering somewhere around 2:00. I just have such a hard time getting my motivation up for practice. I like to race.

I’d had plenty of practice time at T-hill, so we didn’t have to do anything to the bike. We were all in energy conservation mode, moving around slowly, sitting quietly between sessions.

Finally AFemme was up. It would suck really bad if I crashed, so I was going to take it kind of easy and work on lines and such. Also, Jenn was still not giving me any reason to be concerned, so I was not concerned. Well maybe I was slightly. I’m always slightly concerned. Okay, who’s kidding who, I’m always flat out paranoid. I know she did a 2:01 here last year when pushed by Zoe Rem, so I know she can do it. I just didn’t know when she’d bring it.

I didn’t get a warmup lap because I let too much time pass after “third and final call.” I was pretty surprised that I was late, and flustered by the whole thing, especially since I had a brand new rear tire that I wanted to scrub in. But I shot out to the lead, and kept the lead, the whole race.

What I didn’t know was that I only got Jenn by a few bike lengths at the line. It didn’t seem, from Ross’s signals, that I had much to be concerned about, but I definitely did. Jenn brought it and was right on my ass at the finish. Ross and I will be discussing hand signals and what they mean. But I was really happy for Jenn, she finally rediscovered her mojo. I was also really happy that I’d still managed to finish ahead of her.

I was back in my pit by 4, and by 5, thanks to the help of Joel at Pirelli, Greg McCullough, Kyle Schirrmacher, Ross and Nikki, Ross and I were in the loaded van at 5. We even changed gearing and oil on the race bike. I drove the first leg, down to Panoche Road, then made some calls and texts as Ross drove the rest of the way. I slept fitfully in the cubby behind the seats for a couple hours, all through Bakersfield, the Grapevine and partway through Pasadena. Occasionally I would open my eyes and see lightning outside the window.

Got to our hotel in Fontana at 12:45. Washed my hair, shaved my legs (I hate the way even two day growth feels under Under Armour), fell asleep around a quarter to two.

Sunday morning was a blur of adrenaline. Four practice sessions, then four races. The weather was deliciously cool in Fontana, compared to the stifling mugginess of Willows. I hit the track with 37s my first session and felt like an animal. I was sure I could get down to 34s by the end of the day. I was kind of high from the drive, the weekend, all the mayhem.

I won Women’s Superstock Expert, and had a best new laptime of 1:35. Forward progress, despite a near highside in the horse shoe that bucked me out of my seat. If you’ll note my excessive lean angle and poor body positioning there, you’ll understand why:

Christie Cooley and Dani Taylor

C Superstock immediately followed and was filled with nutty riders riding off the track and all sorts of nonsense. Melissa Paris had a problem on the start, and was wobbling around as the rest of the angry grid went buzzing by her, and I was praying I wouldn’t see a red flag at the first corner. Fortunately, she passed me a couple laps later, working her way back up through the grid. But all sorts of riders were going off track and making stupid moves that I kind of chickened out and ended up not going as fast as I would have liked.

Race 7 was red flagged before I got to the crossed flags signaling the halfway point of the race but the leaders had passed start/finish, so the race was called. I had a good starting grid position, but there were all kinds of fast boys behind me and I just spent the race having it handed to me. That pretty much sucked. I tried so hard to hang on to each guy that passed me, only to find them just out of my reach.

I got pretty sleepy after that and thought about not racing race 12. But I figured, hey, I came all this way, might as well get another race in. I did, and it was also filled with hooligans, but otherwise unremarkable.

Cal Speedway is a tough track for me. There’s lots of odd things you can hit. Joe Lopez, a novice racer, died after getting a tank slapper that sent him out of control and into the bridge over the back straight. There’s also the wall that you ride by at 150 mph going into turn 1. The rubber mats outlining the course going into the infield. The bumps going into the back straight. Haybales. Cones. A slippery horse shoe. But, I keep improving each time I go there. Not by much, but enough.

Mercifully, our Sunday night drive from Los Angeles to the bay area was extremely smooth, on the gas the whole way. We got to Nikki’s around 11 p.m. Three days later, I’m still exhausted. But maybe trying to climb Bohlman Road on my bicycle on Monday, and then mountain biking yesterday, also has something to do with it…

Thank you to the special people who helped make this nonsense possible:

Ross Embertson
Hilton Garden Inn, Fontana, CA
Alex Torres of Fastline Cycles
Chris Maguire, Joel, Frankie, Wes, and Corey Neuer of CT Racing/Pirelli Tires
Louie of L&L Motorsports
ACT Racing
G&B Cycle Pro
Mission City Signs
John Della Penna
Leo Vince USA
Nikki Nienow
WERA West
The ‘rents
My neighbors Carol and Chandran, who watch my cats while I’m away