27th June 2003 - Brands Hatch GP

After the last round at Cadwell I dropped the bike off with Performance Techniques to see if they could do anything with the suspension which was rather too hard for my liking. Darren Maisey did a top job getting just the right level of compliance without it bottoming out on the brakes. I headed straight off to Brands Hatch to take part in the usual bundle to get a garage and settled down to a bit of last minute fettling on my bike. My one and only visit to the GP circuit previously had been in my Rookie 600 year when I managed a best lap of 1:51.16 as well as getting involved in a huge start line pile up which took out half the field. We were promised decent weather although the forecast kept suggesting the odd shower but they seemed unable to decide when it might be or how long it would last.

I went out for the first practice session only to find that the bike wouldn't pull cleanly below 7500 rpm (a significant problem given that the red line is at 10500 rpm). In the break since Cadwell my carbs had been looked at to try to increase power a bit and there was obviously something that wasn't right. I missed the second session whilst I stripped them, changed the needle position and the jetting to get it closer to the settings I was after. The next time out proved to be a dramatic improvement with the bike running well and I was immediately lapping at 1:55s which was where I was at in the first race the last time I was here - On a CBR600 with 115 bhp versus the 68 bhp on my little SV650. The last session before lunch saw that improve a little more as I tried to get an idea where the new Sheene's Curve went (where Dingle Dell used to be) and what line I should take through it.

After lunch I concentrated on getting round Surtees and on to the back straight as fast as possible and gradually building up my speed in to Hawthorn at the other end. After a couple of moments I found my times getting down to 1:49s with a best on 1:48s. The bike felt really good and my confidence was improving. I soon learnt where the large bump was in the middle of Sheene's Curve and the next session got my times down to a consistent 1:48s lap. My excitement was only tainted slightly by finding out that Red and Deb where also putting in similar lap times - Big respect to them but I knew they were going to cause me trouble the following day if I didn't do something about it. The next session was great fun as I managed to keep in front of Dan Hobson (Rookie 400 Superstar and first person to get over 500 points this season) for several laps despite him showing me his front wheel everywhere. He eventually got by but it took the rest of the session for him to pull out a twenty yard gap. Shame my lap timer had packed up but if the racing was going to be this much fun then I was well up for it.

I missed the last practice session and got the bike scrutineered and set about cleaning the bike for the next day - Yeah right!