Cycle New and Motorcycle USA 600 shoot out at Infineon Racway

I was invited to attend this event to provide assistance with the Triumph 675. Originally, that was to support Motorcycle USA but on the morning of the event, Cycle News needed their bike taken care of for the day too. After a little running around getting a couple of stands etc and making sure everyone was on the same page, I prepped the bikes for day, and then found out who the riders were and what they weighed without gear so I had a good idea of what to do in baseline settings per rider prior to them taking the bike out on the track.

Motorcycle USA riders:
Jimmy Moore, Corey Call, Shawn Roberti, Michael Earnest, Adam Waheed, Ken Hutchinson

Cyc;le News riders:
Chuck Sorenson, Alec Dare, Paul Carruthers, Craig McLean, Steve Atlas

Brands present:
Triumph, Yamaha, Honda, Kawsaki, Suzuki, Ducati 848

Tire Vendor: Pirelli - Superbike Tires.net

The basis of the morning was to have all riders try out each bike and make setting changes as needed for each rider. At the conclusion of the morning session the two fastest riders from each group would run a superpole event with each bike to see what times each bike would do. Then the bikes would be run on the drag strip for 1/4 mile times in the late afternoon.

The difficult part is to create a baseline for each rider, based on their riding syle and that took a lot of guesswork as there was a 130lb variance between riders just to start with. Running 2 bikes seems like it would not be too difficult, but that includes tire warmers, fuel, suspension geometry changes and suspension adjustments prior to each rider getting on the bike and feedback after their session for potential superpole settings based on the eventual riders.

The complete report will go to both Magazines this week, and I will hyperlink to the artciles and put them on my site for review when they are published. Needless to say, the day very intense but in the end a really worthwhile experience for both myself, the riders, and CRST as a company.