December 2019 new e-mails arrive with Trackdays in my inbox and the need to book something fast is high! Alcarràs here we COME 😎

The last time I was at Spa was already 2 years ago. With 26 degrees and sunshine @Dennis and I where looking forward to the day. We arrived at the smaller paddock and it was FULL. They should not stay at that side of the track because is it simply to small. Luckily we found a small spot and from that point on all went ok. When I was mounting the camera I saw that my side mount was getting loose and had to the the mount on the fuel tank. When I went out on the first session the long straights prevented me to dive behind the screen and the camera was in the way. So no more video’s on the track :( The second the third session @Dennis and I where very competitive and had some nice overtakes. He has a Suzuki 750 and me a CBR1000RR so there are some differences in rinding styles, the straights are in my benefit but he was faster in certain corners so plenty of moments he could pass me and I could overtake him to. Those 2 sessions where asome! The 4th session was a disaster, on the second lap my body overheated and I lost all my physical power and had the end the session. The 5th and last session was good again by not as fast as the first 3 sessions of the day. My body was getting tired and the 2:51.827 was out of reach. But had some good fights with a other CBR1000RR but @Dennis was gone and I was not able to keep up with him. Spa is a special track and I love to ride there. No other circuit I can drive my Honda in the 6th gear flat out and the combination of elevation, fast corners, double corners are amazing! If you ever the the possibility GO!

And we are back again! The sun was 30 degrees and strong! Temperature was very good and the day started excellent. Together with @Peter we had 5 sessions of fun on the track. Started off with a 1:53 and ended with a 1:51.00. My physical condition is still not that good and I noticed this when moving my body on the corners. Leaning of and keeping in position was so tough… We rode in the fastest group and of 70 riders I made it to the 37th time. Not bad if I say so myself. Leaving the track with a big smile and lots of run and FAST laps.

First time back on the track at Circuit Zolder! The weather forecast was 10 degrees and cloudy, not ideal but doable for the time of the year. But after the first session the sun appeared and it became a very nice day. It was very good to be back on the bike again and started immediately with confidence and putting down 1:56 lap times. Not the fastest ones but it was still cold (track) and it felt like a good rhythm. @Peter was not that confident yet with his bike but we had some fun playing and making good video footage. Check our the videos in this post to. I did no workout during the winter time and my muscles started to struggle a lot in the 3rd session. During the rest of the day I could not go to the max due to not beeing fully fit. Have to go back to the gym!!! But rode all 6 sessions of 20 minutes and the fastest laptime I did was a 1:54 and felt comfortable with this start. The bike worked perfectly and was pretty fast, notices with other younger 1000cc bikes that it still has the drive. The sprocket changes helped of course to get the power down to the tarmac :P Now up to plan our new track day and go to the gym to put down some better times and compete with the field.

The last time on the TT Circuit of Assen this year. This year we had a lot of rain and mixed conditions. This day we are blessed with a temperature of 30 degrees and a lot of sun! First time out on the track felt really good. Did decent laptimes from the first until the last minute of the session. The last time I struggled a lot but not today. Had a lot of fun on every session and also had a good fight with @Dennis on the track. We where pretty close and he was faster on some parts and on other I was. Very difficult to pass because of the differences of the bikes. Me on a 1000cc could power off on the straights and keep the speed in it, but was slower in the long right corners (lefts are my favourite). Had a lot of fun riding and session 5 was a little to much. After 10 minutes I was exhausted due to the temperature and had to quit a little more earlier. Lets see when the next time we encounter each other on the track!

3rd time at Assen after our 4 hour race. I didn’t wanted to go on this track day very much because it was very short after our 4 hour race. This season I’m not as fast as the year before. The times I put down on the track are way off what I wanted of expected to be. The day started with a lot of rain. Due to not feeling completely fit I skipped the rain part. I went out on the 5th session and mounted the rain tires but it was not raining anymore. @Peter crashed in front of me (unknown reason) I went back in the pits to inform the other riders that it was a minor crash and he is ok. When I came back out he was already riding again. The 6th and last session was in the dry on slicks but did not have the feeling that I had. My body was hurting a little bit and not feeling fit reflected in the lap times. Ended at a 2:03. Did some good laps and had fun taking over some other riders during the session. Now holidays!

Our first endurance :O After we got our license @Peter and I thought lets do a endurance race! Made some phone calls and we got a team. Later @Dennis joined us to and we got 3 riders and a pit crew. It started with a meeting with all the team members to discuss what we need how it will go etc… Ended up in talking a lot and when we left there was a lot unclear. But it was fun. Normally we ride just for fun and our bikes do not meet the race standards, now they needed and we needed to make some adjustments. When doing maintenance on my bike we saw that the throttle body was nog mounted correctly and the spark plugs needed to be replaced. A full maintenance was applied to make sure we are race ready. My wife and parents also came to the day to experience how everything goes. So a little more exciting for me to hope everything goes well. We had first 4 training sessions that where very difficult, rain, dry, rain, dry etc… This made it hard to predict what tyres we needed and the crew changes them on and off. I did about 3 laps in the training sessions and we went straight into the qualifications. I was in the rain and after one lap my bike started to shut down every corner. Completely without any power. Because of this I decided to stop at the track because I didn’t want to stall at a fast part and other bikes hit me. Back in the pit they saw that the electronics where completely wet and the water pored out. They started to fix this immediately and the bike was quickly ready. Also Peter crashed but his bike was repaired very quickly by the team and only Dennis got a good qualification time. We started at 8th place! Due to Dennis not having a starter engine Peter was set to start on rain tires. But the start was delayed due to oil on the track. This delayed the start 30 minutes and in this time the track dried up. We waited to see which tyres the other rider went out and it was mixed, dry and rain tyres went out. Later the correct choice would be slicks. Jelle helped positioning the bike and Peter started. The idea was to set the bike in first gear with the ignition on. So just jump on and press the start button and release the clutch. Due to the excitement Peter thought the bike was not in ignition and turned the bike off and then on and put it in second gear. In other words a disaster! But he is good in taking over and late breaking so when he came in we where 6th!! Dennis went out on slicks and started a very good run, every lap he came through we saw him passing riders and after 30 minutes we where in 3rd place. My time to go out. Due to the very limited training and qualification time I struggled getting a good pace but I was making faster times every lap but lost 3 positions and came in after 30 minutes in 6th place. Peter went out and gained some positions again and then Dennis and we where back in 3rd. We had a good pace, the pit stops went good and my last run was up and it went better then the first run. Dropped from 3rd to 4th but took it back and at the end was still in 3rd. But then the a official came to inform us we had a penalty and the next rider needs to “pay” it. I went to the start of the pit lane and we had 3 penalties: 2 for speeding in the pit lane and a rider was to long on the track.This cost us 3x 180 seconds which we lost our position and fell back to a 9th place. Dennis went out for the last time and the competition was simply to far ahead to make up for some places. We ended up in 9th in our class of the 14 starters (in our class) and it was a very very nice experience! The whole team worked hard and it was a unique day. It certainly was fun and thats why we went to this event.A very high probability that next year we will be present again and this time we know where to pay attention on and might be on a podium place. Want to thank the whole team: Ben, Geert ,Harley ,Jelle, Peter and the fellow riders!

When we booked this day we did not that on the 6th of June 2017 we are going to ride the 4 hours of Assen. Therefore we took the opportunity to check out our pitbord, train the crew and do full sessions to see our physical endurance. The morning started out with rain, rain and rain. Because I totally destroyed my rain tyres last time and did not bought new ones I had to pass on the 2 morning sessions. The other crew was riding ok and @Peter had his motorcycle in the shop and drove a BMW K1200RS (not a race bike :P ) but left @Dennis and me for some good training. My first session was a good one, the track was dry and the sun appeared so we could but down a nice pace. Started with a 2:01, and ended with a 1:52. Every lap I did I was faster and feeling better on the bike. Tried to get comfortable with a riding style that I could keep up for 30 minutes and that 3 times for the endurance. Made progress and could keep the times consistent. The second and third sessions went better and better. Did many 1:50’s and @Dennis also dropped to the 1:50 and did even a 1:49 (a PR for him).The last session was 25 minutes and could do it ease but made some breaking errors so the times where not so consistent but my goal was to do the full 25 minutes. Had a good day even missing out on the 2 sessions and made some good improvement. Next time will be a race on Assen!

Zolder again, lets see what it will bring this time. And it did bring something… The day before we looked at the weather and no rain was predicted. So my bike was still on rain tires from Assen so I switched them to Slick. Of course when we got there RAIN… Switched back to rain and went out again. Very soon I noticed that the tires where not in a good condition anymore (used them to much on the dry) and the right corners the bike was dancing. So I kept the speed below the critical point and did some good laps. @Peter was much much much faster (7 seconds per lap) and no change to keep up with him. The second session was more like the same but @Peter decided to make huge highsider and crashend good. The bike was beyond repair for today (see photos). But despite the rain tires the track dried up and I could mount the slicks. Straight from the tire warmers on the track and I noticed that after +/- 10 minutes the tires where lossing grip and I knew that point I could not keep the heat in the tire during the session. The track and outside temperature was low but kept out for the full session. We had 7 sessions that day and the last 2 where the best. Track warmed up a little sometimes the sun appeared and the 7th session was the one I put down the fastest time 1:54. Definitely not the fastest I did but the pass was around 1:56 ~ 1:58 during the sessions. Not bad considered the conditions. In 3 weeks we ride again on Zolder, lets hope the weather will be better and everybody stays on their bikes ( @Peter )

It is time to step up and get our race license. When we arrived the weather was as always mixed. Due to the delay in the briefing we got late at the first session and did 1,5 lap. The second briefing was also delayed and it started to rain and we needed to switch to our rain tires which took to time. Getting there late again… The organisation kept telling us to prepare and take your time but the schedule and their delays prevented us from getting ready properly. Then one of the riders spilled oil on the track and we had to do a shorter version of the track and due to the number of riders we where limited to 60km/h. Can you imagine doing 60km/h on a race track doing training your breaking?? When we even thought of breaking you where at a still long before the corner. Not ideal. The 4th session seemed to be a dry one but some heavy clouds warned for new rain. @Dennis and I stayed on the rain tires (wrong choice) and @Peter switched to slicks (right choice). But even we where on the rain tires on a fully dry track we did some good laps. Got a 10th time of 49 racers and @Peter was in the first spot (i’m jealous). The 5th session was about starting and especially getting of the starting line. I tried some methods to which one matched my feelings and getting of the line good. After7 launches I knew which one was good for me and I could get a good drive. The 6th was one of my favourites, small sprints with pairs of 3 riders. They launched riders every 20 seconds and the goal was to get away fast and cross the imaginary finish line first. Every sprint I did I ended in the first place. Started 2 times on P1 and 3 times on P3 but I ways always the first one to enter the corner (Haarspedlbocht) and maintaining the position.I always had a very good feeling for getting away from the line, the front weel hoovering the tarmac quick shifting to 4th gear and then break hard for the corner. Loved the feeling! At the end we got our certificate and now we can (if we want) compete in the races ☺ No camera’s where allowed so no video footage this time.

Last day at SPA and our race group is complete again. When we arrived it was chaos. The normal (ster) entrance was not available and we had to take the other entrance to enter the paddock. (suggestion for the organisation: high vehicles use blanchimont, other can use ster).When arrived we found a nice spot, one all was our of the car a person from the organisation came by to tell us we cannot stay here and we have to move. Going to the sound test a standard bike had 103dB of sound with a 100dB of a limit. This is impossible and at track that have a 95dB limit I never had any warnings. But the person doing the measure was standing practically next to my engine instead of behind the exhaust and then of course there is more noise. Also a crash course would be good for them! Started on slics because the track was not that wet and looked dry. But when we entered the track it was like riding in ice. Had a big moment on La Rouche that was enough to enter the pits. Because I did not have a spare set of rims with rain tires I had to change the tires on the rims I have and that took a lot of time. The 3rd session was a good one. 6th time of all fast riders was nice. The 4th session the track was drying again and I went out on the rain tires, changing tires takes to much time and effort. Having done 2 laps the rain tires they got overheated and left me no choice to go back in again. The last session looks like it will stay dry and took the chance to switch back so slics. 10 minutes before the session starts it stared to rain a lot. The end of the 2016 year and see you guys back in 2017!

At the lat ART training @Peter was the fastest person with a 1:48. The last chance of 2016 to improve the time. Due to a event “Petrol Head” there where only 3 sessions in the afternoon but they where great 3 sessions! In the morning it was poring with rain but we saw on the weather forecast that it should stop at 12:00 and our first session would be on 14:00. When we started the track dried completely and we where driving in the sun. In the first corner I got a warning from the tires that where not yet at temperature and because of this @Peter was already gone. But had a nice fight with some other riders. Session 2 was very promising, after I got back in the pits I saw a 1:47.99 on my laptimer \o/ Very pleased by beating the time of @Peter and it was indeed a very good session but very hot. The last session was a nice session of overtaking. Our speed improved a lot and we start to notice that even in the fasted session we are riding from group to group. Passing riders is getting more and more easy. You can also notice the lap times are getting more consistent. All below 1:50 for 11 laps! The intention for this year was to get below the 1:45 but it seems to unreachable. Next year we will try to break the 1:45 at @Circuit_Zolder.

A second attempt for a training. Our last training fell into ☔ It was not possible for safe instructions and we did some nice laps of our own. The day started very well. The circuit was dry and we where in the fasted training frou with Nickey the Wit as instructor. The first session was to discover the track and build up the speed so that the instructor could see the level of speed that we could follow. Each of the riders could follow the instructor for 2 laps and see the lines he was doing. After the session we got instructions about how to attack the corners and the acceleration. The second session we started with individual chase of the instructor for 3 laps and receive comments about the riding style. Of course a day at @Circuit_Zolder cannot stay without rain and we aborted the session early. Some changed to rain tires and wend out for session 3 but we stayed in. I did not have a spare set of rims with rain tires and the rain was only briefly. Just made the lunch a little longer ;) The 4th session Nickey was follwing me to check out my riding style, they were fun laps but we could not use the curbs. They where still to slippery because of the previous rain and that prevented my for doing some fast laps. The final commend that @Peter an I got where the same. Put the bike up faster so that we can open the throttle even faster and break later. Our styles where good to start building up the speed in a responsible way. The last session was a free session in the sun and we all went on the track. Because we went on as last we could start our overtaking. @Peter always starts from the first corner very fast that caused to get caught up in some traffic. Tried to put the suggestion into practice and had a fun session. It was a nice day even with the rain.

After 3 years we where back at @Circuit_Park_Zandvoort. The weather forecast was not very good. During 11:00 and 14:00 there would be rain and therefore I had to skip 2 sessions. Session 1 was with mixed feelings. The track was a little wet and could not get the temperature in the front tire. The tirewarmer could not get the tire higher then 70 degrees and I noticed it right away. Because I could not get up to speed the tire got cooler and the grip decreased by every lap. I upped the temperature of my MotoGP tirewarmers to 100 degrees and got them up to 80 degrees because of the strong wind. Instead of starting with ease I started full throttle and it had the right effect. Got the tires up to speed and wend from a 2:12 to a 2:08 with a steady rhythm. Still getting used to the track (not my favorite) and each lap went better and better. The weather turned and had to skip 2 sessions. With only one session left (the race) all drivers where divided into 2 groups. Because the lack of fast laps I dropped back into the second group but on the 2nd start place. @Peter was 3rd. We had a rolling start and @Dennis told me that it is key to keep an eye on the rider in front of you. With that knowledge the first rider was not getting on the gas when we where cleared to start the race and that gave me a very good position and I could gain more speed before passing the finish line. Immediately we passed the finish line I passed him and lead the race from that moment on. With 17 seconds of difference I won the race. I didn’t notice that the race was ended because of the adrenaline rush. My first time to end up at the first place, very pleased with the result!

3rd track day at @Circuit_Zolder and as always curious about the weather. The gods where with us today and we had a beautiful start and only the first session was a little slippery. My personal goals was to break trough the 1:50 limit and I did it! 1:49.680 was on my laptimer the last session. The feeling was good with the fasted riders and could compete with others as well. The differences where small and I could do my best to keep up with them and even gain speed on them.