I was in good spirits after my stellar luck at Sonoma the previous round, but luck wouldn’t help me much this time. AFM Round 6 took us back to good ol’ Thunderhill East, the bread and butter of North Californian superbike racers, and a circuit that many of my competitors had anywhere from tens to thousands of hours of experience on. I stuck with my old tires for practice and decided to focus on my lines and reference points. That didn’t help my times much – I didn’t even crack 2:00 – but it did help me get comfortably reacquainted with the track. By the time Clubman Middleweight rolled around I almost felt like I knew what I was doing.
clubman middleweight
I was gridded mid-pack, but got a decent start off the line. A minute into the race I’d climbed up to second overall, but bungled my turn 9 entrance and gave Hugo the chance he needed to gain on me, allowing him a cheeky overtake attempt into turn 10. He ran a bit wide and I was able to stay in front of him by holding my line. I managed to hold him off until turn 9 of the last lap, where he overtook me and managed to claim second behind Eli. I came in across the finish just behind him, nabbing third and a 1:56.046 fastest lap.
600 superbike
Botching the launch on this one left me in fifth off the bat. I had my work cut out for me. I took fourth in turn 1 at the start of the second lap. Third in T1 a few laps after that (I’m usually a bit hesitant about passing here, but it worked out!). I managed to hold third until the finish, posting a fastest lap of 1:57.415.
formula 1
I started second position, but scored the holeshot into T1! First didn’t last long though, as Hugo placed himself right beside me entering T8 and I decided to slow down rather than go head to head into a sketchy high-speed corner. He walked off fairly fast, but somehow I took second in the standings. I think he might have gone off or something? I’m not sure. Anyways, I snagged second behind Eli, with a lukewarm fastest of 1:58.126.
600 superstock
I took second out of the gate and ran uncontested the entire race. However, I also never caught up to Hugo. I decided that I needed to work on getting faster when I didn’t have someone right in front of me that I could chase. I wasn’t going to win any races by only going fast when someone was ahead of me. The rest of the race went well though; I even got a wave by from the ever-gracious Stu when I ran up on him during the second to last lap! I crossed the checkered in second place, with another room-temperature 1:58.907.
750 superstock
Nabbing a spot behind Hugo after the launch, I managed to stay with him until he passed an expert that I couldn’t snake around fast enough. I spent the rest of the race with one person between us, but managed to drop my fastest lap down to a 1:57.491 again by following one of the experts. The end of the race saw me in second position for 750SS Novice.