Amazingly enough for Loudon in May, the weather was perfect: Sunny and about 65-70 for each day. The track was also in excellent shape. All of the paving that had forced the revised track layout in April was complete, and the transitions onto and off of the NASCAR oval in 1, 2 and 12 were smoother than I've ever seen. The new pavement in turn 11 that had been so slick in the April rain, was also in nice shape - completely eliminating the seam that had been right in the line all through 2002.

Friday afternoon, I managed to get up to the track early, not for practice, but rather to get a chance to finish up some minor work on the bike. By Saturday morning the bike was sporting a new chain and sprocket, new brake pads and fluid, a new carbon fiber rear fender, and an ill-concieved device that would in theory ease the problems I'd been experiencing starting the big motor when cold.

Saturday morning, I put my home-brew jump start rig to the test. The device was basically a modified battery tender pigtail through which I could: a.) charge the battery (good idea) b.) link the small internal battery to a larger external battery to give a little more juice for turning over the starter (bad idea), all without removing the tail section, or dropping the small aluminum battery tray. The device did well for charging, but as soon as I hooked up the big 12V jump start battery, I realized that I'd made a somewhat grave miscalculation about the size of wire required to carry those 15amps I'd wanted. After a small amount of melted insulation, a large amount of foul smelling smoke, and a slightly burnt hand, I made my way over to Jack Aksel's garrage to use his starting rollers... Saturday practice was pretty slow, just bedding in the brakes, and getting a feel for the new pavement.

GP Singles was up first. I started from the inside of the first row of juniors, and got a truly awful start. After lofting the front wheel last weekend, I was too cautious with the clutch, and managed to be almost the last four stroke into turn 1. I made a couple of mistakes early on, missing a shift in traffic and lumbering up the hill out of 3 in 4th gear, then getting a little off line heading into 11, and having to run way wide. Between these things, I let a lot of people by. Toward the end of the race I got into a better rythm, and managed to turn my best lap time so far, a 1:27.7. About half way through the race I noticed another junior on a motard (James Bacon) a few seconds ahead of me. Over the next couple of laps, I put my head down and caught up to him, managing to pass him on the inside coming up the hill out of 4, slipping (barely) by between him and the right-side curbing in 5. I didn't want to get passed back, so I tried to carry really good speed through six, but also tried to take an inside line. The end result was the front end chattering, and the back end sliding. A little scarry but everything stayed on two wheels so no harm done. I carried on to the end of the race without any more excitement, getting lapped by expert race winner Eric Yoo, just before I crossed the line on my last lap.

LW Sportsman was a really fun race on Saturday afternoon. I got another poor start, but managed to pass a few people back in turn 1, 1a, and 2. I settled into a really consistent pace, and pulled in right behind James Duggan's EX. I knew we ran about the same pace, so I decided my race was probably right here. I followed him for a couple of laps, then closed enough that I could tell he could hear my bike. I could really out drive him up the hill, but was never quite close enough to make the pass (usually because I got a lousy drive out of two). Unlike last season on the stock MZ where everything would pull away from me, I could also make up some room on the front straight. It seemed like I could carry some better speed through 1 as well, so I finally sucked it up and stuck my bike underneath him going into 1. I made the pass and held it for a couple of laps, now right behind a blue FZR400, that was running just a tiny bit slower than Duggan and myself. The FZR slowed way down for a waving yellow in 2, and I got pretty worried that Duggan would be all over us now. Sure enough, he tried the pass on the outside in 6/7, but I managed a pretty good drive out of the bowl (despite a little slide) and held him off. Then on lap 7 he passed me on the brakes on the outside into 3, but he got the back end just a little squirley, and I got on the gas hard driving under both him and the FZR up the hill. I tried to take defensive lines for the rest of the last lap and a half, and managed to stay ahead. I finished 4th out of 11, taking home a trophy, while Duggan beat out the FZR to finish about a second behind me in 5th

SSIN: After a minor off-track excursion during morning practice, Sunday's Supersingles race was pretty uneventful. After turn 2 on the first lap, I neither passed nor was passed for position. I stayed with a group consisting of Kevin Kenedy's MZ Replika, Duggan's EX, and a couple of others until I did a bad job of getting through traffic from the expert PT race, and lost touch. After that I had a pretty lonely race, cruising around to finish 3rd of 8.