I myself am an engineer, and if I can consolidate how everything went for a test or design in just a few words, everyone is better for it. So, if you are like me and want the weekend in a nutshell, here it is;
- 4 bikes (3 to Willow, 1 to Bonneville)
- 3 riders (Jeremy Toye, Gary Orr, and Andy Sills)
- 2 crashes
- 1 twisted knee
- 1 busted ego
- 1 run in with a bird at 120 mph
- 2 locked motors
- Lots of tires
- 4 wins
- 2 lap records
- 1 world record
- 2 Championships
Now, if you are also like me and become interested when the results of a test or weekend are so dynamic, keep reading!
This was going to be Gary’s first ride back on the S1000RR since he had finished his 10 n’ 10 rally, and it was going to be the first time both of the riders had a chance to try out the new Turner Curve (T.C.) suspension linkage at Big Willow. The first ride on the new parts felt good for both riders. Orr noted that the bike felt more comfortable, while Toye loved the feeling through turn 8 and the turn in characteristics. That was pretty much it for the day! With the Trackdaz event being so popular the amount of traffic in each session was too much for putting in consistent fast laps. Aside from that in the third session of the day another rider’s bike had a seal fail and oiled the entire track from turn 6 all the way to eight.
Luckily neither rider was involved, but Jeremy’s B bike was. Chris Ulrich was working on a press intro from Pirelli, and borrowed Toye’s spare bike since all of his equipment was in Alabama for this weekend’s final AMA round at Barber. Ulrich spotted the mayhem ahead of him when coming down the hill in turn 6, but due to the lack of attention of the flagger, ended up rolling right through the oil, losing the front end and damaging the bodywork on the bike. It wouldn’t be so bad if this were all that happened, but Chris tweaked his ankle pretty bad and because the bike was on its side while running the motor hydrolocked and destroyed itself.
At this point team Toye decided with the traffic, track conditions, and an already positive feeling from the bike we would take the rest of the afternoon off. I’m sure it had nothing to do with the fact that close by there was a pretty fun motorcross track, and Toye just happened to have his dirtbike in the back of his truck. Gary hung out and did end up making some progress in the last session of the day when the track started to come back in. So now we could look forward to some positive track time on Saturday, or so we thought.
Turns out that wouldn’t be the case. As Toye took to the track with the slightly used race compound tires he noticed a major issue with edge grip in turn 2. The same problem wasn’t evident anywhere else on the rest of the track leading us to believe it was a geometry issue. This situation was made even worse when we found that the practice sessions were also going to be cut short for the endurance race that was going to be held in the afternoon. Many different settings were tried in order to get the grip back that we had last month, but to no avail.
It wasn’t until well after practice was over and the team had a few hours in the think tank that a theory had formed. With the introduction of new parts comes new things to keep track of, and what basically happened is a shock measurement was set incorrectly based on how we modified the bike for the new T.C. linkage at Fontana (the previous round). Before we left for Jonny Corino’s (one of the team’s favorite places up in Palmdale) we made the necessary adjustments and kept our fingers crossed for Sunday morning practice.
Was it going to work, was it the right theory? All of the team’s questions were answered when Toye blasted a 1:19.861 in first practice on the hard compound race tires! That is unheard of in recent years and gave the team great confidence for the second practice to put in a few good laps on a new tire, but it wasn’t to be.
In any manufacturing industry, like the auto industry for example, not every single run is perfect (i.e. lemons). Well in the world of motorcycle tires it is the same, and not everyone is going to be a ringer. You’ve probably even heard about it before when Spies or Hayden would say in their interviews that their first “Q” wasn’t quite there, but the second tire was much better. Unfortunately the same thing happened to the number 57 when we sent him out for his second practice, and instead of him having the chance to run laps faster than he ever had before he ended up in the dirt.
When the bike came back in Toye said the tire just wasn’t there, “It spun like crazy in places I’ve never had a tire spin before!” The worst part of the crash was that there was only 30 minutes to get ready for his first race, and when the bike fell over on Jeremy it tweaked his knee. After further discussion with the team, we were going to try making the race and he was going to give it his best riding.
I kid you not when I say that the final bolt was going in right at the very last second before he would be able to make the warm up lap, but SD BMW had made the grid. The worst part for the team was that right after the green flag flew and the riders disappeared from sight the race was stopped. A rider had fallen down in turn 2. The seconds it took for all the riders to return to view seemed to pass like days, but both Gary and Jeremy made it out unscathed and returned to the hot pit. Gary was doing fine and Jeremy said the bike was ok.
Now it took Jeremy a few laps on the restart to really get back up to speed. One would have to understand that he needs time to make sure he’s going to be ok, the bike is going to be ok, and start to trust the grip from the tires. On lap five Toye was back, and let everybody else know by setting a new Open Modified Production lap record of 1:20.580! He won the race, but Orr didn’t fare so well.
While breaking for turn one at over 160 MPH the engine locked up on him, and was forced to retire from the race with a DNF. When he returned to the pits in the crash truck everyone was please to see that he was ok and the chassis was clean. The technicians tired to find what caused this lock up, but didn’t have any luck. For at least this day the number 517 was down and out. It would be the 57 machine that served as the teams work horse for rest of the day!
Toye’s a bike was used by Gary in Formula 40 to win by a country mile and wrap up the California State Championship. Jeremy hoped back on for races number 7 and 13 later to take a win/lap record in Open Superbike of a 1:20.142 and then lead every lap of the F1 race, and put his stamp on the premier title for the California State Championship!
For the full teams last stateside event it was nothing less than exhilarating. Over the next month and a half one part of the team will be getting ready to return back to the Streets of Willow with the number 517 to continue demonstrating the BMW S1000RRs race prowess while the other side of the garage will be hopping on a plane aimed for Hong Kong! Jeremy has received another invitation to the Macau Grand Prix that takes place on the 18th – 21st of November. Eager for some international competition we’ll be making 100% sure that all our ducks are in order with some extensive testing, new parts and preparation of a 220+ hp power plant!
