As promised, yesterday was a very busy day. First order of business was to give Rhonnda a quick spruce up before heading up town to meet with the rest of the gang for our nursing home jaunt. Unfortunately, where previous events have involved over a dozen riders, the turn-out was small for a number of reasons. One rider is presently without bike as his BMW caught fire in his garage a couple of weeks ago and has been written off as a result. Another had to travel out to the country to visit a sick relative, so there were only five of us to do the show. I should add that this is a very eclectic group with Harleys, metric cruisers, adventure bikes and sports/sports touring bikes. All welcome.
Not that it really mattered as the staff and the residents at Hammondcare are appreciative of anything that we do to make life a little more pleasant for them. The courtyard inside is a delightful oasis of green and calm and could easily be miles away from the city. It is probably a coincidence but it also provides a wonderful place to display bikes as the attached gallery will demonstrate. Some pleasant time chatting with the residents and enjoying the customary sausage sizzle put on by the staff and it was time to head home, get the bike into the garage and the bike gear off and get ready to head to Goulburn Speedway for a huge meeting in the evening. Meetings are normally run at night, under lights but, once Autumn comes around, the starting time is brought forward from 1800 to 1600 and gates open two hours earlier as well at 1400.
There were three titles to be decided last night so the entry list was massive. As well as the ACT Title for F500 cars, there was the NSW Title for Gp Midgets and the NSW Title for Compact Speedcars so getting there as early as possible and doing the necessary homework in the pits was very important. I rolled into the track around 1415 which was not too bad and I set straight to work. As well as the above divisions racing there was also Modlites (mini versions of the traditional dirt track modifieds), Modified Production Sedans and Super Sedans, big, loud V8 cars so it was elbows in the face in the pits.
The meeting went off brilliantly, the track surface held up remarkably well given that its was subjected to over 300 laps of racing for the evening. And, despite a few hairy-looking incidents, the only injury was a broken collarbone when one of the Compact driver’s car rode a wheel and rolled over several times. Despite the shocking appearance of Justin Paull’s accident, where he bit the wall and rolled the car end for end a number of times, he climbed out of the car unassisted and the car was far less damaged than what would have been expected given its severity.
A 90 minute drive home, (assisted by a large coffee from the local Maccas before I set out) and I rolled into home around midnight. Don’t mind telling you, I was pretty beat today. Still haven’t made up my mind about MotoGp tomorrow morning, but, given that my main man is back on pole, I probably should provide the moral support, eh? Oh, and some of my Texas mates are racing at Cresson Motorsport Park out of Fort Worth today so I should send a shout out to them too. Word is that the temperature is around 70 degrees Fahrenheit, a huge change from when I was at the corresponding CMRA meet at Cresson in August 2015 when the temperature was 105 degrees UNDER the sunshade at David Hirsch’s Michelin pit. Have fun, guys.
In other good news, one of my Facebook buddies who has been out of circulation since January after losing an argument with a kangarro and suffering a badly broken collarbone as a result, is back on the bike today doing an overnighter camping/riding tour of the Hunter Valley. I hope he stays dry because we just had a massive rainstorm here and it’s moving north.
This shot was taken in Newcastle so hopefully he’s ahead of the dirty stuff. That’s all for today, catch you next time. Here’s some more pics from the Hammondcare show yesterday.