All the hard work finally paid off: 3rd place finish and podium at Mosport in Canada! And what an eventful three weeks between the races it has been... to be followed by a great finish... read on...
We had been developing the Mavizen the minute since it got back from Wisconsin. At one point the bike was reduced to the frame and the batteries. Every other component was being worked on. The rear tail was nixed and replaced by a custom made tail by Shubrey design. The partners in Shubrey Design, Liam Shubert and Brad Reynolds made a custom carbon fiber tail to replace the aerodynamically inefficient stock RC8 tail. The suspension was being reworked by James Sidall at Superplush Suspension. And the wheels were sent out to Carrozzeria to fit a 160 wheel for the rear and a 120 for the front. That was a custom job, and they turned it around at an amazing speed, so we had the new and lighter wheels back a few days before we left.
Making the the fairing from scratch was a lot more work, Shubrey Design having to design the plug, make the mold and fabricate the fairing and I didn't pick up the bike with the mounted tail until 5am the morning of July 4th after Liam and Brad had worked all night to finish it. I left to drive to Toronto a few hours later after putting some finishing touches on the bike, namely some modifications on the rear wheel to ultimately fit it properly to the bike, getting all the bondo dust off from the tail fabrication and dialing in the suspension, and generally getting it ready for the next race.
The drive to Toronto was long and grueling, 2700 miles, which we did in just over 3 days. Driving, driving, driving, and sleeping, and not much else. We got to Toronto early Wednesday, in time to see Germany loose against Spain at a big screen in a sports bar in a Toronto mall. We then left to go to the track on Thursday morning in sweltering heat. We were the first motorcycles to ever have a garage at Mosport, due to the need to plug in. It was so humid that the floors were wet in the garage but it was great to have shade.
Unfortunately my brushes had not yet arrived from the UK, where they had been sent for testing to figure out brush issues we had at Wisconsin, so I had to sit out practice. A friendly Canadian however lent me his electric bicycle to take around the track that evening so I could at least get the lay of the land. The Canadians were as excited as the US spectators about the electric bikes, and a lot of racers and spectators came to check them out over the weekend.
The next day it rained, hard, and there was no practice in the morning. It was warm though, and not too miserable. Being in a garage was again awesome. Slowly all the other competitors trickled in and we caught up on the modifications and developments we had made since the last race. We did get to do the last practice of the day and I was glad to have seen the track at least by bicycle. Two of the downhill corners are blind, and you need to be turning in even before you see the end of the corner, which is a little nerve wrecking at first but once you get the track down, the flow of it is a blast! It's like going down a luge, then having to negotiate a very tricky double apex corner that you really need to make into one apex, followed by a looong uphill straight, all the time trying to avoid the concrete patches right on the racing line that make both your tires slide.
We had some controller issues that led to the throttle sticking on and subsequently the chain coming off from the bike flexing and swapping back and forth from trying to slow down my ride under involuntary full acceleration, scarcely avoiding a crash, but thanks to having a spare controller and the Honda CB125 Cup camp that supplied us with two new chains that we linked together to make it work, we were up and running again by that evening and ready for the race the next day. I had been offered to run against fuel bikes in the 600cc Women's Cup but unfortunately couldn't get the bike back into shape in time.
The next morning I had a superb practice, no glitches with the bike and running like a bat out of hell I really started to understand the track and went into the race with full confidence. In the 18 laps in 2 practice sessions that I had under my belt I had shaved off over 20 seconds to a 1.58, and having no problems with the bike I rode the Mavizen to my and its first podium. 3rd place!
I could barely believe it finishing the race and rode the Mavizen up to the podium where interviews and media blitz followed and I was handed a big old trophy and a bottle of champagne to spray! Now that I know how it's like to be on the podium I'm going to try for it more often. :)
Next round is in Virgina, and from there the bikes are getting shipped to Albacete, possbily with stint to the Intermot where I might have a speaking engagement. What better excuse to go on a vacation by racing in Spain and going to an international motorcycle show in Germany... stay tuned!