Race Report

Round 3 NZ Superbike Championship

Ruapuna Raceway, Christchurch, Feb 12/13, 2011

Words by: KC Bernard

Photos by: Dallas Alexander

Round 3 - NZ National Champs, Christchurch

After the disaster that struck the Team at Teretonga at round 2, Brian and Dan drove straight to Christchurch to begin repairs on the damaged Yamaha R1. The whole team at Trevor Peirce Yamaha pitched in and after three long days, the bike was back and looking as though nothing had happened.

Practice on Friday went well with Dan getting used to the complexity of 3.44km Ruapuna circuit in his usual short time. By the second official practice on Saturday, Dan was second fastest, just .018 sec behind Andrew Stroud. Qualifying saw the group of riders at the front close up and Dan ended up 3rd on the grid, .69 sec behind Stroud and .61 sec behind local James Smith. Only a few minor changes were made to the R1 stock suspension and the Team was ready for race 1.

The first race on Sunday saw Dan jump out in the lead and appeared to be pulling away from Bugden in second place. After the first few laps it appeared that there was a problem with the bike, after leading the first four laps the group behind were catching fast. Slowly Dan was passed by a few riders and ended the race in 5th. It wasn’t until Dan tried to get off the bike after the race that we realised the issue wasn’t with the bike, but with Dan. He had a massive case of arm pump at lap two and by lap four was struggling to open his fingers, by the time he got to the pits after the race, he couldn’t let go of the right handle bar!!

After a quick search of the pit area, a very kind lady was found that knew massage and immediately began working on Dan’s right arm. After a couple of sessions, the arm was feeling great and he was ready for action in race 2.

Dan again got a great start in race 2. Then – more bad luck struck the Team as Dan pulled into the pits mid race and parked the bike. There was a problem with the front of the bike and not enough time to fix it and get back on track for points. The whole Team was pretty disappointed as we all know what Dan and the Yamaha R1 is capable of, Brian said Dan was the most disappointed of all. “This is the unfortunate side of racing, the highs are so high and the lows...well you just have to take it as it comes, we just had some bad luck, time to focus on the next event and move on.” The next event will be the “Hacksaw GP” in Paeroa on Feb.20th.

The point situation now has the Team in 6th position. Stroud has an almost unassailable lead, some 43 points ahead of Bugden in 2nd and a further 20 points back to 3rd place. Third in the championship is still quite achievable for us with only 10 points separating 3rd to 7th, so all that can be done now is to go out and try and win as many races as possible and hope that the Team have had their bad luck for the season and some good luck will return from here on in, they say it comes in three’s so we should be good.

Thanks to the guys and gals at Trevor Peirce Yamaha and Jamie Young from Benbrae Resort for all the help with everything while we were in Christchurch, also to the Team and the continued support from our sponsors.

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