The pressure was on for me this past weekend for the AMA races at Cal Speedway. I was asked to be Elena Myers Crew Chief on her RoadracingWorld.com RMR Suzuki team.
The team had the bikes ready for me. My job was to make sure Elena had what she needed and to dial in the settings. The team is a good one, you may have heard of Elena’s team mate, Danny Eslick, he has a big number one his bike. The same guys who build Danny’s bikes, Barry McMahan and Mike “Foot” Earhart also build Elena’s bikes.
We made a few small changes in practice working on our race set up and learning about the new Dunlop AMA Spec tires. We earned a front row starting spot for both races by being 4th fastest in Qualifying on Friday when Saturdays Q was canceled because of heavy winds.
Saturday’s race was a short one for us. Elena and another rider bumped on the start resulting a crash and some repair work for us. With help from all the RMR Suzuki and RoadracingWorld.com crew our bike was ready to go after the red flag but our rider needed X-Rays of her shoulder so we started prepping for round two on Sunday.
Sunday’s weather was perfect and Elena was sore but ready to try. Practice went well until we flipped the bike in T-4.
Elena got a good start from the outside of the front row on her B bike and the fight was on. We battled for 2nd early on but the sore shoulder held us back a little. We dominated the fight for 4th and held a big lead over 5th when a red flag came out on lap 15 of 17 ending the race early.
Working with Elena, her team and her parents was the best kind of challenge. We worked hard to accomplish a difficult goal and we did a good job.
Hyper Cycle had a track day at Cal Speedway on Monday and Dave hired me for some Personal Coaching. I had my RV at the track so Dave dropped his bike off with me Sunday night. We took advantage of my track gate knowledge and did a track walk Sunday night. Dave thought it was cool sneaking onto the track with Elena Myers Crew Chief.
Dave and I did lead/follow all day on Monday with debriefs after each ride. Dave now has a bunch of new skill sets to practice with and is already thinking about when we can spend another track day together.