Battle of the Streets Paeroa 21st February 2010

Because of the workload in the last 2 meetings and the BEARS Sound of Thunder being the following weekend I had no Classic bikes for Paeroa, which felt strange.

The Ducati 749 was entered in the Supersport races and the 999 was in the F1, King of Paeroa and BEARs races. Eight races was a bit of a holiday for me but we were kept busy with bike problems and my duties as Riders’ Rep.

The weather didn’t disappoint with the customary cloudless skies. This must be one of the only race meetings to have never had a wet day in its history.

Practice went well and we qualified on the front row for all but the F1 races and our main threat in the BEARs, Peter Tanner’s Aprilia, dropped a valve.

In the first Supersport race I was running a close 4th and getting ready to make a pass for the podium when the 749’s clutch failed. The KTL boys did a quick swap to a spare clutch for the 2nd race. It made it to the end but it was starting to slip in the closing laps. Fourth, under the circumstances, wasn’t too bad.

In the King of Paeroa I was running just behind Tony Rees and Ray Clee and again as I was contemplating a pass the gear lever clipped the curb and broke off. I managed to keep my spot by doing the last 4 laps stuck in 3rd gear.

The F1 race was a disaster as well with 8 out of the 14 teeth breaking off the front sprocket on the start so another DNF.

The BEARs race went to plan leading from the start to finish with no real pressure so there was time to entertain the crowd backing the big Duc into turns and sliding her out.

We prepared for the last round of races only to have the meeting abandoned due to the number of crashes and lack of time. A couple of non-racing accidents off-circuit also stretched the ambulance resources.

The next meeting is the BEARs sound of Thunder in Christchurch. What could possibly go wrong there?!

Thanks to Pommy Dave and both Rob Taylors as well as Kerry of KTL for their help and support - it’s greatly appreciated.