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LightSmith
Racing Team Newsletter LightSmith
Racing would like to say a special "Thank You" to the following: Alistair Leaves Atlanta with 2nd & 4th Place Trophies. While the Lights were out, due to a solar eclipse, Alistair, Steve, and Matt went to Road Atlanta for the races in August. The best finish of the weekend was the second place that Al earned on the EX 500 in the Sportsman class. The same bike took him to fourth place in the Lightweight Supersport race. On the larger bike, Al came in 11th in the half hour GTU and finished in 15th and 18th in the sprints. Fortunately, Matt was able to be there for the whole weekend. Even more fortunate was the fact that everything ran fine, making Matt's job easy. Summit Point Championship: Alistair
Ranked 10th of 146 Mid Atlantic Region Combined Points: Alistair
12th of 305 Summit
Point 9/18-19 We arrived Friday evening to discover that they were repaving nearly all of the track. Summit Point has been the butt of jokes for decades because of its bad race surface. Concrete patches afforded the best traction, while the greasier sections of blacktop were certain doom. In an effort to increase the grip on much of the pavement, grooves were cut in the surface like what they do on the freeways in preparation to paving. Seeing the paving crew working on the track until ten that night was a shock to us as we had come to the understanding that it would never happen. The sun shone on Saturday bringing the temperature into the 70's for the double points weekend. The morning started with the inconvenient discovery that the newly rebuilt engine in John's F2 was not right. Although we had sent the crank out to get repaired, there was still a problem with it and the bike didn't complete one lap of practice before quitting. Drilling holes in the number plates on Al's bike to allow the quick swapping of plates was the solution for the weekend. John raced first in the half hour amateur GTU event. Nuggets of loose blacktop flew amongst the riders like overweight bumble bees as the new track surface was broken in. John lowered his best lap time by almost a second and a half as a result of the new pavement. The race proceeded with only one red flag and John finished in tenth place. With another race between his and Al's event, there was plenty of time to change the number plates. Al's GTU race went off uneventfully except for the "meatball" flag that was awarded to Barry Thomas Jr., This flag, black with an orange spot, is thrown when a rider jumps the start and it means that the offending rider must come in for a stop and go penalty. Al dropped his times down into the 1:24's, improving on John's by a second. The race finished with Al in 12th place. The rest of the day was spent tuning, the Ex 500 and enjoying time with the friends and family who came on Saturday. Sunday was a busy day with a total of ten races between the two riders. The number of people who showed up to support the team rose to ten. The first race after breakfast (thanks mom) was a combined one that had both Alistair and John riding their lightweight bikes. John's Ascot 500 was in the GP Singles class and Alistair was racing for the championship in the Lightweight Sportsman class. Al got a good start while John missed his chance to put distance on the GP 125 bikes. Al's smooth riding brought him to a second place finish, which was good enough to put him in first place in the points. The Regional Championship was his. John managed to stay in the top ten with an eighth place finish in the GP Singles class. Alistair's 600 F2 was traded back and forth between the two riders for all their middleweight classes. John had it for two races, finishing 8th and 10th, and then Al rode it in two more finishing 10th and 12th. The Amateur and Expert classes of the Lightweight Supersport races were run at the same time, putting both LightSmith racers on the track at once. Al rode the borrowed Yamaha FZR 400 and John rode the 500 Ascot. As John fell back among the faster multi-cylinder bikes, Alistair was near the front of the experts. Even though Al had to pull into the pits for a stop and go penalty, he still finished in 6th place. Apparently he had allowed his bike to "creep" on the line before the green flag. They considered this to be jumping the start and were enforcing the rule for the first time in the season. Once again on the F2, John went out in his Middleweight Supersport race to get the first meatball flag of his career. After pausing in the pits to say hi to the starter, he went out to finish 17th. Getting a meatball is no reason to do poorly in a race; Alistair got one once as an amateur and went back out to win the race anyway. The last race of the day was John's Lightweight Sportsman race on the Ascot. A 4th place finish was a good way to end the regional season. Summit Point 9/18-19 Photos... Daytona Biketoberfest 10/21-24 "How fast does that thing go?" Whenever you go somewhere with a fast looking bike, people have to ask. Racebikes don't have speedometers, though, making it harder to answer. After Daytona, I got the 6th gear ratio from the manual, figured the final drive ratio based on our chosen gearing, measured the rear wheel circumference, and used the tachometer to come up with a figure. 167 MPH Team Banquet Bonfire 10/9/99 The team had its banquet celebration at John and Karen's house. In front of the bonfire, awards were given out including: Matt Schneider
- Chief Mechanic The evening was spent telling stories, riding motorcycles, drinking beer, and lighting fireworks. The 2000 Season: While things are still somewhat up in the air, we are planning on racing in the WERA (Western Eastern Roadrace Association) National Endurance Series. These will be single bike, multiple rider races of four or six hours in length. We will have newer Honda 600 F4 bikes (one as a backup) and more media coverage. Our tentative schedule has a total of eight weekends with five 4 hour events and three 6 hour ones. Of course, much of this depends on us getting more sponsorship which we are working on. |
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