AFM 103 – Greg McCullough

Another rider’s misfortune became my good fortune early in the race weekend. I’ve been trying to get on Ken Hill’s schedule for a 1-on-1 day of coaching for some time. At this Friday’s Z2 trackday, Ken’s student irreparably crashed his bike early in the day. I picked up the 2nd half of the day of coaching and worked with Ken all afternoon.

My plans for the weekend revolved around fixing my approach to the carousel and continuing to work on braking into turn 7. I was losing time hand over fist in these areas, and needed solutions in a bad way. Having Ken for the afternoon was a godsend, because I didn’t really know how I was going to fix the carousel… just that it needed fixing. Shawn Reilly had given me some good pointers for these corners, but I was having a really hard time turning a verbal description into actual brake/throttle position, turn in points, etc.

In the first afternoon session, Ken picked out 3 areas to work on: carousel (obviously), 7 (the exit – which I didn’t realize was an issue), and a different approach to turn 2. After the 2nd session of riding and video, I was understanding and applying – to a limited degree – his new approaches to all of the corners. Turn 6 was still psyching me out a bit, and after listening to me beat myself up about it for the 10th time Ken turned to me and said “Go get suited up. We’re going for a 2-up ride”. Damn it. I hate being a passenger on anything, let alone a bike on a racetrack. Oh well, if this was the way to sort it out, then that’s how it’d have to be.

We meandered around the first few corners, then as we came around 5, Ken pinned it up the blind hill. That’s a hell of a rollercoaster when you’re not at the controls. By the time I got my stomach back in its place, we were coming around 5 again. This time, I took the opportunity to just watch the track and let him worry about where we were going. Turns out, there’s a whole lot more time and distance in a straight line to be on the gas AND on the brakes. I’d reduced it to nothing in my head, and the view from the passenger seat was exactly what I needed to reset my perspective.

After a full afternoon of working on these 3 corners, plus trying out some pointers on pretty much every other corner on the track, I finished the day with unimpressive 1:47 laptimes, but a wealth of new knowledge. It looked like I could drop full seconds off last round’s times if I could just get some repeatable improvement in these areas.

Saturday practice has typically been the time where I’ve tried to push, sort out suspension issues, and get as close to race pace as possible. Given everything I’d learned with Ken, the plans changed a lot. The 4 sessions were spent applying all the input from Friday. Bike setup would have to wait until another day. This weekend would have to be about the rider. With that in mind, I put in some quality practice sessions, with some pretty unquality laptimes – a 46.3 was all I hit, but reminded myself that literal laptimes weren’t the goal. I finished the day with a entrance to 6 that was losing me a lot less time, a drive out of 6 that kept me on par most of the time, a turn 7 that kicked ass when I got it right, plus lots of other little gains in 2, 3a, 5, 8, 9a.

Sunday morning. My schedule was race 2 – 600 Production, followed a while later with race 7 – 600 Superbike and Formula Pacific back-to-back. With that schedule, the back-to-back races would give me a feel for what an 18 lap AMA race might be like, testing focus and endurance more than our usual sprints.

600 Production

Due to the new 4-wide gridding structure, my 5th place grid spot was 2nd row. With the wall to my left, I knew I’d have to get a good jump if I wanted to be near the front out of turn 2. My launch was only ok, and I got pinched off, rolling off for a second to avoid running up on Sebastian. Heading up into turn 2, it was Hale, Liko, Sebastian and Barnett ahead of me. My drive out of 6 sucked and Berto pulled past me on the outside, pulling in front of me into 7 before getting on the brakes early. Hung out behind him, Wiwi dove inside of both of us to take over 5th. After Sebastiao crashed in 8a and Berto and I both passed Barnett, I settled down to click off some better laps and get back in front of Berto. Jacob Rower came by me with a really tight pass into 4 – standing me up, and Eccleston joined the party a lap or two later. With yellow flags out on half the track, I couldn’t find a good spot to pass Berto until the very last corner, squaring him up and beating him to the line by a .02 seconds. I finished in 6th and set my personal best laptime of 1:43.2, with an average lap of 1:44.5

600 Superbike

From the second row again, I got a better start, in 3rd into turn 2. Billy Scott passed into the lead as Lenny missed a shift. Eccleston came around me through 3, showing off a weakness which Liko would take advantage of the next lap, passing me in the same spot. Hoffman passed me into 7 when I didn’t keep with the plan and let the guys in front of me dictate my brake marker. I got him back out of 11, and set off after Billy Scott. My line into 6 was too tight, killing my drive. Hoffman drove past me between 6 and 7, but got on the brakes early, and I passed him right back into 7. Billy was getting closer, but I spent too long committing to a place to pass him. After almost outdriving him out of 7 twice (one the areas Ken guided me), Berto took advantage of my lack of a plan around Billy in the carousel and drove around me on the way out. I re-passed him into 7 a bit tight (sorry man!) but he got he better of me into 8, and we both passed Billy through 10 and 11 as his rear end spun up out of 9. I spent the rest of the race chasing Berto as we both tracked down Eccleston, but couldn’t get it done before the checkers. I finished 5th, setting a new personal best 1:42.9, with an average lap of 1:44.3

Formula Pacific

With a quick splash of gas and drink of water I headed out for FP. Gridded at the back, I got past a few guys into turn 2. Kunzelman came by me on the second lap, and Santa Coloma came by on the gas out of 6. He braked way early into 7 – it seems like everyone was braking early after working on this corner with Ken – and I almost passed him back, but thought better of it. He was on his 1000, and I knew he usually had about 2 seconds more pace on that bike, which should be able to pull away from my 600. Sure enough, he kept up a good clip working up through the field, and left me to deal with Harley Barnes. I tracked him down a couple laps later, and took another couple to set up a pass into 9. After that, I settled down to gap out Harley and see if I could close down on Kunzelman again. No dice. He kept up his pace, and I finished in 9th, with a best lap of 1:43.0, an average of 1:44.0 with 5 of 8 laps in the 43’s.

I can’t thank Ken enough for his help getting my head wrapped around some of my problem corners and showing me how to improve a bunch of other areas I didn’t know about. Chris, that new Pirelli SC2 front is outstanding. Sam, Tom and all the other folks at Z2 – your helping hands and encouragement make all the difference.