Bikesales' endurance bender
Two long-haul events over three days: a 24-hour scooter race on the Gold Coast followed by a three-hour production race at MallalaBikesales did manage to watch the much anticipated MotoGP finale at Valencia early this morning, and we couldn't believe it only went for a trifling 45 minutes… The incredulity makes sense when you consider the 72 hours we've just come off: a 24-hour scooter race on the Gold Coast straddling Friday and Saturday, followed by a three-hour production event at Mallala (SA) yesterday.
Le Minz saw Team Bikesales crank up its Aprilia SR 50 R for another crack at the epic 24-hour, which the outfit featuring the swagger of A-grade hotshots Alex Phillis and former world endurance champion Steve Martin, with Marton Pettendy and yours truly continuing our incumbency from 2014.
After a couple of crashes, an unscheduled pit stop for an oil top up and a few other time management 'issues' — it helps to be suited up when a teammate comes into the pits for a changeover — Bikesales completed the event in 13th position, which is a whopping 16-spot improvement on 2014. Phillis, being the youngest rider in Team Bikesales by about 23 years, dutifully completed about nine of the 24 hours, with the balance shared between the old farts — just the way we had planned it…
We were as high as third in the first couple of hours as Phillis let rip, taking unorthodox passing maneuvers to a new level. However, it's fair to say our SR 50 R was very tired at the end, with Phillis and Martin, who were hitting turns with as much venom as Garry McCoy, Mike Jones, Troy Bayliss, Jason Crump, Callum Spriggs, Daniel Reardon et al, getting smoked down the straight. For me and Pettendy, slower corner speeds and more ample girths made our acceleration and top speed difficulties more acute. The SR 50 R has cause to feel a little exhausted though: of the 2400 clicks on it now, about 2370 of those have been at close to full throttle over the last two Le Minz events.
We had all the elements to contend with as well, including the ubiquitous Queensland heat and humidity, as well as rain and thunderstorms. And just to add some more intrigue into the mix, the track was reversed at the 12-hour mark.
Congratulations to the winning 'Penrite 1' team of McCoy, Jason Corney, Troy Smith and Adam Cini, which was followed home by 'TBE' (Bayliss, Crump, Luke Richards and Robbie Menzies) and 'Domino Tempo' (Mike Jones, Justin Hall, Adrian Wise and Bryce Kennedy). Bikesales finished 47 laps down on the winner, and the attrition rate amongst the entire field was minimal.
The weekend didn’t end there for Martin however, as he then jumped on a flight from the Gold Coast to South Australia to compete in Sunday's Adelaide 3 Hour production race at Mallala on a MV Agusta Australia and Bikesales-entered F3 800.
As well as Martin, MV Agusta had Chad Hern, Anthony Nicolo and 'Stig' in its stable. Running in the top five for most of the race, a jammed fuel drum scuppered the team’s chances of a better result and it finished in 10th position.
A big weekend, but now it's back to our day jobs…
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