Sears Point
			22-23 September, 2001

			      Background

At the August races, two riders who are faster than me on big bikes
had ridden my GSX-R 750 and both had mentioned that the front end
shook its head too much exiting corners. I had definitely felt that
behavior was limiting my confidence all year, but I had lacked the
experience to realize the behavior was abnormal and I had no idea what
sort of changes to try to address it. I discussed the issue with Phil
Douglas (#695) of Aftershocks after the August races, and he
recommended some changes he thought would help. The changes aligned
reasonably well with the changes Gary Jaehne (#12) had recommended
when he rode the bike in August. I gave Phil the go-ahead to make the
changes and I was looking forward to riding the bike after his work.
Phil unfortunately wasn't going to be at the track for the race
weekend, so I was a little worried about having to do fine tuning
without his help, but I felt reasonably confident the bike would be
better than it had been.

On the little bike, I was looking forward to the weekend, albeit with
some trepidation. My championship points situation in 250 production
was good, and I was poised either to lock up the championship or to
throw it away and destroy my comfortable lead, or anything in between.

			  Saturday Practice

Saturday started out foggy, damp, and slick. I was in practice group 3
on the little bike, and by the time we went out for our first session
the conditions still seemed questionable. The guy who went out right
in front of me got very sideways when he applied throttle just trying
to go straight, so it took me several laps to begin believing there
was any traction. Traction was down somewhat, but by the end of the
session I did a lap or two in the 1:33.xx range, which I felt was OK
for the conditions.

By the time group 5 went out for its first session, track conditions
were much better. Riding the GSX-R750 in that group, I got within a
couple of seconds of my best time from our Sears Point races in
August. The main thing I was looking for in that first session was to
learn whether the recent suspension revisions made a positive handling
difference. I'm happy to report they made a HUGE difference. It
suddenly seemed like nothing I could do would make the bike tankslap.
I was astounded at the effectiveness of the changes, and I figured
my improved confidence should be worth a couple of seconds a lap at
least.

Back in the paddock, I told Phil's teammates Joe Pardo (#728) and Paul
Somerville (#311) that I now knew why Phil hadn't shown up at the
track: He must have known that if he was there I would kiss him
because of the vast improvement in the bike's handling.

In the day's second practice session on the little bike, I pulled off
early because it seemed to me my motor sounded strange. It sounded
like an exhaust leak, but back in the paddock I couldn't find any
leak, and indeed I couldn't get it to make the noise again. I figured
the problem must have been in my head. My times from this session had
been decent, with mid-1:31 laps being the best.

In the day's second session on the big bike I did a 1:25.586 lap,
getting within a couple of hundredths of my best time from August. So
I felt optimistic that I would be able to improve my times
significantly as the weekend continued.

The third little bike session was cut short due to a scary-looking
crash on the straight before turn 7. I spent that session towing
Tamara Rushing (#683) on her FZR 400, but we didn't get a lot of good
tow time because traffic was dense.

In the third big bike session my times continued to drop, with a new
best of 1:25.269. Pete Gallant had a crash headed into turn 7 that
really mashed his bike up horribly. He said someone hit his front
brake lever. From the looks of the crash he was lucky to get out with
just a broken collarbone.

The day's fourth session on the little bike brought the return of the
strange noise. This time it was very clear, persistent, and definitely
not a figment of my imagination. I pulled off as soon as I noticed it
again, and as I exited the track the bike began losing power. By the
time I was stopped in the paddock I was convinced I had spun a
connecting rod bearing. Bad news. It's a common enough failure on
EX250s that I've learned to recognize it pretty quickly. It was about
4:45 PM on Saturday and I really didn't want to miss my race on Sunday
because doing that would put me in a position where I would have to do
well at Buttonwillow in October in order to win the 250 production
class championship. Luckily I had a spare motor for the bike.
Unluckily, the spare motor was at home. Luckily the failure had
happened on Saturday, not during Sunday's practice or race. Unluckily
I would have to cancel my plans to have a leisurely Saturday dinner in
Novato with Lois.

I got on the phone to Mike Norman (#586) of G-Force Performance Center
and tried my best not to ask him to help me swap the motors. At the
time I was unsure I could really use his help, and I think I wanted
commiseration more than help. But of course anyone who knows Mike
knows that he offered to help, and luckily for me I was smart enough
to take him up on his offer. As I drove toward his shop, I realized
his help would make the process much easier than it would be if I had
to do the work alone in my garage. He could work on stripping the bike
and preparing to remove the failed motor while I drove to get the
spare motor, for example. Another benefit was that I wouldn't have to
rearrange my garage to rig for motor swapping.

Mike and I arrived at G-Force in perfect synchrony at about 7:20
PM. After unloading my bike, helping him shuffle bikes around to clear
a lift, and unhitching my trailer, I took off in my car at about 7:35
to retrieve the spare motor while he got the bike ready for the
swap. At 9:23 PM, after driving home and back and filling my car's
fuel tank, I arrived back at Mike's shop with the spare motor. Again,
the timing was perfect. As soon as I got there, he was ready to remove
two bolts and the failed motor was out of the frame and in my hands.

By 11:07 PM we had the spare motor in the frame and had started it. By
midnight we had run it through the gears on the dyno and even taken a
sneak peak at its power output. By 12:15 AM the bike was loaded up,
his shop was back in order (mostly), and I was hitting the road for my
hotel room with Lois in Novato. I got to the hotel at 1:30 and
immediately got in bed. It took me a couple of hours to unwind and get
to sleep, unfortunately, so by the time the alarm went off between
5:30 and 6:00 AM Sunday, I figure I had gotten between two and three
hours' sleep.

Without Mike's help the motor swap would have taken me hours longer
than it did, no question -- so I probably would have had no sleep at
all. And maybe even more important, those would probably have been
hours spent frustrated and grumpy. As it was, Mike's positive attitude
kept me looking on the bright side and made the entire job much less
stressful.

			   Sunday Practice

Sunday practice was uneventful. I was pleased that the spare EX250
motor checked out fine on the track, and disappointed that my times on
the GSX-R 750 were no better than they had been on Saturday.

			     Sunday Races

Plans for Sunday included a visit to the track from my brother William
and his son Matthew who live near Seattle, and my father Jim who was
visiting them from Huntsville, Alabama. I looked forward to their
getting to see me race; unfortunately their return flight had been
changed and they wouldn't be able to stay as long as planned.

They made it to the track and found me before my first race, which was
the third race of the day, 750 production.

I was on pins and needles for the races on Sunday. All the pieces were
in place to jinx me into a spectacular crash: I was in a good
championship position in 250 production that would be destroyed by a
crash, I had family visiting from out of town to watch me race, and I
had just spent hours of my own and Mike Norman's time to swap a motor
-- hours that would be wasted if I didn't finish the 250 production
race. Crashing always sucks, but a crash this day would be especially
heinous.

			    750 production

I keep thinking my starts on the big bike are going to improve, and
they keep not improving -- at least not by much. This start continued
the trend. I was gridded eighth, and I went into the first turn about
twentieth, I think. Oh well, more passing practice. I made my way
steadily forward through the pack until I reached a group of three
riders in front of me -- Alan Fortin (#200), Kenan Rappuchi (#910),
and another rider I can't identify. S/he was on a red '96-'99 GSX-R
750 with white plates and a three-digit number, possibly 4xx. I wasn't
able to make my way past any of these three permanently. I got in
front of Ken a couple of times, but the only time that was going to
stick I blew a shift going into turn 7 and let him back by. I was
disappointed I lacked the commitment and focus to pass these riders. I
finished the race in tenth place, last in our group of four. Although
my fastest lap was improved from August, it wasn't improved by much; I
was expecting much bigger gains based on the improvements in the
bike's handling.

			    250 production

This was one of those races where so much happens that you can't
remember it all, or even come close. When the flag flew, I made it off
the line in the lead but it didn't take long before Frank Mazur (#10)
and maybe one other person motored ahead of me into turn 7. I wasn't
able to get back by Frank until the entrance of turn 9, and until that
time I got to listen to his strange-sounding motor. I don't remember
when it happened, but Dan Kimble (#689) motored past me at some point
in the first lap, and started looking like I was going to have trouble
passing him back. Going into turn 7 on the second lap (remember that
turn 7 is the first turn in each lap because of the oddly reconfigured
under-construction Sears Point setup we were using), Tom Dorsey (#63)
passed Dan and me both for the lead. The pass was impressive. He got
by me easily because I was slacking in left field for some reason. But
the pass Tom put on Dan at the same time was beautiful and
aggressive. It was exactly the kind of pass I was unable to make for
the entire race. Now I had gone from the lead (I think) to third place
in under one lap. I had no trouble staying with Dan and he was holding
me up in several spots although I couldn't pass him effectively. There
were several places where I could pass Dan but it never seemed to
stick; he would just motor by on the next straight. I was worried that
Tom would get away with Dan holding me up, and I wouldn't be able to
catch back up to Tom if I ever did manage to put Dan behind me. My
worries were unfounded somehow, though. I'm not sure how it happened,
but I got by Dan for long enough to mount an assault on Tom. Or maybe
Dan got by Tom and I got to try my hand at Tom. In any case, I passed
Tom going into the new turn 9, and just at the apex of that turn I had
my only slide of the weekend. Tom later told me it looked like I had
dragged part of the bike across the curbing because he saw sparks; I
was unaware of that at the time. At that point Dan and I went back and
forth for the lead a few times but as the end of the race neared, Dan
got back by me and held the position until the end of the race. His
corner speed was good in some places, not so good in others (obviously
these are subtle distinctions; his speed everywhere was good enough to
set the fastest lap of the race at a 1:29.770). But what little he
lacked in corner speed he made up in horsepower and braking
skill. Although his mid-corner speed in turn 9 was a bit slow, for
example, I was never able to pass him there because he braked late
enough to keep me from getting by. I just didn't have the focus it
would have taken to outbrake him there.

I stayed in front of Tom for the remainder of the race, too. It was
disappointing to come in second, but I was ecstatic to have clinched
the 250 production championship for the season by finishing ahead of
Tom. Dan and Tom both rode a great race. Dan collected his first win
and did it in an exciting dice, and Tom really made me feel I should
have stuck with the bias-ply GT501 tires. He flies on those things! It
was fun getting to talk with Tom and Dan together after the race and
congratulate both of them on a great race and a very exciting dice.

My father, brother, and nephew got to see both my races, but they had
to leave the track before they could be sure of the results of the 250
production race -- the finish line isn't visible from where they were
in the turn 2 grandstands. I was really glad they got to see me race,
and I was especially happy I didn't crash! All in all it was a good
day. I didn't win any races or set any lap records, but I improved my
times slightly on both bikes and did what I came to do points-wise.
And to top it off, I had the most enjoyable dicing I've had all year,
courtesy of Dan and Tom.

I owe HUGE thanks to Mike Norman of G-Force for his emergency
assistance with my Saturday-night motor swap. Because of his help, it
went quicker and smoother than I could have imagined, and I was able
to reach my main goal for Sunday, which was to lock up the 250
production championship one event early. I also owe special thanks to
Phil Douglas of Aftershocks for his help with the GSX-R 750
suspension. Thanks to his advice and setup, the bike is much less
daunting to ride now, and I hope to capitalize more on its heightened
friendliness at next month's Buttonwillow races.

		     Attitude and Skills Analysis

My aggression level was generally low all weekend, and I particularly
noticed it during the 250 production race. There were a lot of
opportunities to pass Dan that I simply couldn't take because they
seemed too scary. I could see they were opportunities that I would
have safely taken in a different frame of mind, but I felt like I had
to listen to that little voice inside. On nearly every lap, the more
agressive Robert could have gotten underneath Dan going into turn
9. Same thing going into the carousel on several laps. At one point
Dan got slowed by a weaving lapper in turn 5; the better Robert would
have passed them both then, but wimpy Robert was worried about hitting
the lapper so I just stayed put. These and many others were the right
and safe choices for me to make under the circumstances, but the fact
that they were is an indication of my state of mind.

Sometimes I just have weekends like that. I'm not sure why it happens,
but I think a couple of things might have contributed to it. First, it
seemed like this was the first time that my lack of confidence on the
big bike really affected my confidence on the little one. Second,
there was no Friday practice and I guess Saturday didn't really afford
me enough track time to get my head screwed on completely straight.
It's true that Saturday practice was about the same for everybody, but
probably everybody besides me had their attitude more in order to
begin with. Certainly Dan and Tom seemed to have their shit together.

Another thing I noticed was that I was making a lot of mistakes in the
races. In the 750 production race I blew a perfectly good pass on
Kenan Rappuchi by trying to take an extra downshift going into turn
7. In the 250 production race I found myself in mid-corner with bad
body position a whole bunch of times, and I would have to shift my
body off the bike mid-corner to get my toes to stop dragging so
much. I set up to pass Dan into the carousel once and took the corner
a gear too low instead. Stupid things like that. I just let myself get
too distracted by the dicing.

I was disappointed in my finishing position on the big bike, but even
moreso in my big bike lap times for the weekend; I had hoped to
improve my times significantly, but in spite of the bike's better
handling on corner exits, my times improved only by about 0.4 seconds,
with my best lap for the weekend being a 1:25.127.

Maybe lack of sleep contributed to my performance not being as sharp
as I would have liked. Maybe lack of Friday practice and the
delay-shortened Saturday practice (in which I skipped parts of
sessions because of weird motor noises) had something to do with it.
Maybe it was just a slow weekend for me -- those happen from time to
time. I guess there's something to be said for doing what you can do
under the circumstances, and not falling down.