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W.E.R.A. race weekend at Nelson Ledges Raceway *PICS*


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Spent most of my weekend at Nelson Ledges Raceway near Garrettsville, Ohio. W.E.R.A. race league had a full weekend of sport bike racing and my buddy Dave took his '03 Yamaha R6. I drove up in the Maxima because I had to work Saturday night and he had more races on Sunday. We got to our hotel on Thursday afternoon and decided to drive my car over to the track to basically, find our way there since he hadn't raced there in about 10 years. Got to the track and paid the entry & race fees. While we were paying, Dave mentioned how long it had been since he'd raced here and the official said we could take my car around the track for a couple of laps. What really sucked is that we had all the camera and video equipment back at the hotel, so none of the two laps I clocked on the track with my Maxima were documented. The first lap was fairly slow, just learning the turns and whatnot, but the 2nd lap was a different story. Got the rear to come out a little bit on a couple of the turns. The suspension and tires held really well, especially with having 7/8ths of a tank of gas. That was a REALLY fun time and I was smiling all evening afterwards.

 

On to the bikes.

 

Friday was an entire day of practice and we were at the track from 9:30am-5pm. I got some pics of the practice as well as some clips on my digital camera (still have to edit and upload) and some 8mm videos on Dave's camera as well. Here's a few shots from Friday's practice.

 

Here's the layout of the track

 

http://www.na-motorsports.com/Tracks/OH/images/nelson2.gif

 

Dave's '03 Yamaha R6

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson004.jpg

 

Coming around turn 13 to the front straight

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson003.jpg

 

Going through the "kink" which is turns 11-12

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson002.jpg

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A couple of other bikes coming down the front straight

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson009.jpg

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson010.jpg

 

Dave chasing down this guy Kevin from Lexington who was parked across from us on his GSX-R750

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson011.jpg

 

Another one of Dave coming down the front straight

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson013.jpg

 

This is race day on Saturday. Dave coming around turns 4-5

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson016.jpg

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson015.jpg

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This is our buddy Paul's '05 Kaw ZX-6 that came up on Saturday

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson014.jpg

 

A few more bikes that I took some pics of in the pits

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson008.jpg

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson005.jpg

 

Larry Denning's tent with his ZX-6's and ZX-10

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson006.jpg

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v289/TimTaylor75/Nelson%20Ledges/Nelson007.jpg

 

On Saturday Dave raced in 2-20 lap races. The first was a novice race for all 600's which was about 50-55 bikes. He finished 1st in this race after battling back and forth with another guy for a few laps. I got a cool clip on my camera of Dave coming around turns 4-5 standing on his pegs throwing his arms all around and pointing over at me. The 2nd race was a "heavyweight" race which is 600's, 750s', & 1000 cc bikes. He finished 4th in that race. I spent most of my time installing and removing the tire warmers, changing out DOT's to slicks, and adjusting the clutch & a few other misc tasks. He had a few races today and he told me over the phone he got 1-13th, 1-8th, 1-4th & 1-2nd.

 

His best lap of the weekend was a 1.11

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hell yea! i was there all weekend as well. i was pitted 1st in the hot pit. #852 blue SV650. It was a great weekend. i did very well too. evidently he was kickin some ass as well. too bad you didnt get any shots of me. i've been searchin for pix.

 

BTW, what kinda times was paul running? we took the rider school last year together at nelson.

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i caught paul trying to say he rode formula extreme and what not when he was riding his 50 at circleville a few weeks ago. i had to laugh.....pretty hard. i ended up with 2 3rds and 2 2nds this weekend.
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wow, i just checked mylaps.com and really have to laugh hard now. paul was talkin himself all up at circleville to my Pro Supermoto buddy and i thought it was funny(i was passing him last year on a stock street SV650 @ ledges) but man, his BEST time at nelson saturday was a 1:21.57! I ran that in my second practice on saturday before actually trying to go fast.....my best on the weekend was a 1:16.22. and remember that i'm on a bike that is making under 80hp to his 110+hp. and we both started at the same time since we took the school together.
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wow, i just checked mylaps.com and really have to laugh hard now. paul was talkin himself all up at circleville to my Pro Supermoto buddy and i thought it was funny(i was passing him last year on a stock street SV650 @ ledges) but man, his BEST time at nelson saturday was a 1:21.57! I ran that in my second practice on saturday before actually trying to go fast.....my best on the weekend was a 1:16.22. and remember that i'm on a bike that is making under 80hp to his 110+hp. and we both started at the same time since we took the school together.

 

Very interesting...to say the least...

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and another way to look at it.....Winner of my lwt ss novice class actually ran a few hundreths slower than i did in 2nd.( he later ran a 14.8 in another class though) the winner in paul's class was the guy mentioned above(dave) who ran 1.11. The track record at nelson is in the 1.07 range.(on a 1000 superbike i believe) so i was right on target for my class(almost won) and was only 9 seconds off the track record. whereas paul was 10 seconds off the novice 600 riders and 14 seconds off the record. someone got a reality check this weekend i'm thinkin....

 

basically i could've ridden up into his class on my slower bike and still almost lapped him if not actually lapped him based on avg times in the 20 lap solo race..

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Here's a few short clips I took on my digital camera. Still working on getting the video camera clips uploaded (with sound).

 

Drew, all good points you're making. I actually showed this thread to Dave, and I think he peed in his pants a little bit...but just a little.

 

video 1 of Dave

Video 2 of Dave

Video 3 of Dave

you'll need quicktime

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Probably becuase he had enough sense not to go that fast at Ledges. :p

 

Wrecking in some spots there in a car=death in a hosptial bed.

Wrecking on about half of that track on a bike=instant death.

 

Tire to the head at 60+mph sliding=instant death... meaning there really are a million ways to die at that track on a bike. :eek:

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my avg speed was 94-95mph there. i believe there was one guy who got into the 1.07's. and a few in the 1.08's. avg speed of 107mph or so. that's rediculous. there was some guy in my one class that went off the track in turn one. i got the checkers and saw him climbing out of the tires with his bike buried.
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Tim, great pics man! Sorry I couldn't make the race, duty called at the Fire Dept or I would of been there to help ya out with changing tires and adj. shit on Dave's R6. I took a few of your pic's and posted them on our team website under the results section. Hope you don't mind.

Later

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after him and i got into it on the WERA board he decided to say that he was just there to finish his provisional status and that he was just tryin to finish his race and was just out having fun. he also said that he was just joking when he said the stuff about bein a AMA rider. even though he was bein stone cold about it. pretty funny stuff imho. i gave him the link to this thread too. havent heard anything in his defense about this.
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Tim, great pics man! Sorry I couldn't make the race, duty called at the Fire Dept or I would of been there to help ya out with changing tires and adj. shit on Dave's R6. I took a few of your pic's and posted them on our team website under the results section. Hope you don't mind.

Later

 

hey its wheelie monster. :)

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Dave and I dropped his R6 off at Yamaha of Columbus yesterday to find out why the bike wasn't pulling. Dave stopped by to pick up his transponder off the R6 for the YSR/NSR racing this weekend at Beaver and Justin @ Yamaha of Columbus informed him as to why the bike wasn't really pulling very hard. A week prior to the races at Nelson, Dave had Paul install a BRAND NEW Barnett clutch (which wasn't installed properly) which basically burned up 5 minutes into the practice round on Friday. So, Dave some how was able to pull off his finishes with a blown clutch. Now it's kind of obvious as to why the lap times were getting progressively worse during the weekend. So, now Justin is installing a new Yamaha clutch and hopefully now we'll be able to actually see what this bike can really do. The next race is Grattan in Michigan in June. Maybe we'll find out then.
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Yamaha of Columbus is the shit! My buddy Andrew Hyder and I ride supermoto for them. Great group of guys. see you at grattan!

 

BTW- I won all three of my classes at the WERA National in Joliet,IL this weekend! I love the rain now.

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some shots i just got from nelson.

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a314/owndjoo/2825MG_2897.jpg

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a314/owndjoo/2825MG_2882.jpg

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a314/owndjoo/2825MG_2469.jpg

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