The 1098S race bike

The 1098S race bike
A Ducati 1098S street bike converted to a race and track bike.

söndag 4 maj 2014

First track days, Mantorp Park. May 1-2

So, finally, snow has melted and my old friend Magnus (Former Endurance rider and now track day geek and fellow Ducati 1098 rider) lured me into 2 days of track day. Really early in the season- May 1-2. In Sweden it can be summer or snow at this time of the year. We brought 4 kids, 2 motor homes, 2 Ducatis and one wife to the track for 2 days of riding and socializing. It was really cold 7-11 C (low fifties F for Americans). Thanks Lena for being there for the kids!

In the race group things where OK for most people but a lot of people falling in the middle group. I guess people with slicks and maybe not able to have enough speed to keep tire warm enough? Magnus and I have about the same speed so we had great fun riding together and figuring out how to best pass the BMW S1000 RR´s in he corners.

The bike worked really well. New pistons and serviced suspension was what what we did this winter, not much so instead I decided to work on my riding position on the bike to find speed and to my surprise I carved our 5 seconds from my personal best. Very crowded, so it was hard to get a lap without traffic, as seen in this clip. Far from the lap record , of course, but only 3 seconds of the fastest rider that day. 1.25.6 was my best lap winch I was able to capture on camera.