Quote:
Originally Posted by miker
So you've been back for 5 hours as I write, where's the pics!!!!
Mick  |
Been catching up with 200 work emails!
and getting back to normal life! Preparing the 1930NSD for the Banbury run
There's over a thousand pics between Mrs Nickwiz and me so be patient! Thats digital cameras for you!
TT was great. Upsides for me were all the classic biking events, VMCC manx rally, Laxey motorcycle show, The TTX GP electric bike race paddock. That was was hilarious and facinating. The American teams Mission1 and Brammo had all the gear, big tents, sponsors logos etc. Then there were the Brit and Indian teams mostly from universities and comprising of gangs of boffins. Right down to a madcap Austrian 2 man team led by the maddest proffessor. He realy was like something from a movie, and the bike was hillarious. All aluminium and gaffa tape. Priceless. The race was a bit quiet! and not yet the spectacle that the oil burners are but the technology and passion was fantastic.
Other highlights included running my Thruxton at the Ramsey sprint. Lined up alongside humpty back full leather ffhelmet sport bike jockeys in my jeans, waxed cotton and open face lid! Great fun. I set myself the tgt of beating the electric drag bike. I managed a best run of 9.16 seconds over the 8th of a mile, beating the electric drag bike by a tenth of a second! So old school paralell twin oil burners with a rider with the aeorodynamics of a barn door can still beat elecrtrickery for the moment anyhow!
Riding the mountain course at 6-30 in the morning when it was quiet and the crazies were sleeping off the bushy's induced hangovers. Approaching ramsey hairpin at 70 only to see a copper at the hairpin waving four fingers at me to warn me it was a 40 limit still, then giving me a thumbs up and waving me on towards the mountain. 120 flat out on the Truxton over the mountain mile which wasn't too shabby I thought. Though I definately need to get new rear shocks the standard pogo sticks are shocking!
Nothing quite prepares you for the first time a superbike blasts past you at 160 plus by a mere foot or so as you are balanced precariously on a grass verge. Gobsmacking. And the fastest lap 131 mph! I tell you having ridden the course its a hell of a lot narrower, bumpier, hilly and more technical than it even looks on TV. I realy don't know how they do it. Rossi et al? Wimps!
The real racers are these road race guys. Truly amazing.
Downsides? Douglas prom was a bit quiet. By all accounts the minister responsible in the Manx Tynwald is getting his Knuckles rapped. Serious accident for Nick Crowe and Mark Cox in the sidecars. John Crellin was killed on the last lap of the senior race after having scored a podium place in the TTX Gp zero carbon race earlier in the day. My father was taken seriously ill with a suspected heart attack while we were away. Nearly cut our TT short but he recovered and insisted we stayed on the Island to finish our holiday. It turned out to be severe angina and he's on the mend now though so hopefully stuck with the old codger for a while yet.
So not many downsides for the Nickwizzes, a great first time at the TT. We're going to do the Manx GP next year as aparently its more classic oriented. TT? I was sceptical about the cost and difficulty of getting there for years. Not any more. Brilliant! Just go.
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