I have a lot of respect for anyone who can ride like these guys do. But I find this race even more entertaining to watch. Particularly the blatant cheating at times. All in good fun, of course.

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Until now. With nothing more than my existing RAM Mount, plus a well placed zip-tie as extra security to keep my phone from falling out on the track, I recorded most of my sessions from last week’s non-sportbike track day at Palmer Motorsports Park. It wasn’t until I was setting up the app at the track that I realized it even had some motorcycle specific features, like measuring lean angle. I didn’t bother setting up a rear facing GoPro this time, so you can get the functionality you see here with the less expensive Petrolhead Edition.

I skipped recording the first follow-the-leader session of the day by choice, and my fourth open session didn’t record at all for some reason. I think the dog ate it. But it recorded everything else just fine. It took a bit of time to render, trim, and upload the video, but here it is.

Session 1

Session 2

Session 3

Session 5

Session 6

Even I haven’t watched all this yet, and I created it. But here I can watch what I did and how I improved, analyze what worked and what didn’t, and give myself a refresher course before returning to Palmer the next time Tony’s Track Days runs a non-sportbike track day at Palmer. Because I will.

You may have already read what Jason Macierowski had to say about it. I, like Jason, was riding on a track for the first time, and in the fast run group as well. But I had an advantage that Jason and most of the other riders didn’t. This wasn’t my first rodeo at Palmer Motorsports Park. Last year I spent two days driving this track with Chin Motorsports in my Subaru BRZ. I already knew where to go.

Though this was my first time taking a bike to the track, I’ve done about fifteen track days in cars, as well as countless autocrosses, ice time trials, and even two days of training at Team O’Neil Rally School. Because of this, I’ve long considered myself a rather good driver, yet a merely adequate rider. I’ve pondered taking the MSF Advanced RiderCourse at some point, but never quite got around to it. I’ve known about motorcycle track days, but I ride for the enjoyment and experience of riding, not for speed. Besides, racing leathers are expensive, and my Honda PC800 isn’t designed for the track at all.

I totally blame Kate Murphy for changing my mind about this, partly because of her article about it. Her Yamaha Super Ténéré is no more a sportbike than my PC800, yet she had a blast at one of these events at Thompson Speedway last year. Additionally, although we’re riding on a track, the emphasis is on skills for the street rather than racing. So with all that in mind, I decided to divert my track day fund to the bike instead of the car.

I’m SO glad I did. Again, read Jason’s article for a good overview of what it’s like and what you get out of it. I, too, feel like my riding skills have improved by quantum leaps after the track experience. But I’m equally surprised by just how many of the techniques I learned from performance driving translated over to the bike, many of which I’d already started using before the track day.

What Was The Same

The racing line is the racing line, regardless of what you’re driving or riding. I first learned how to pick the proper line through corners during my teenage bicycle racing days, before I even had a driver’s license. It’s been more years than I care to admit since I last raced by pedal power, but when I ride my motorcycle on the street I follow the outside-inside-outside line through the curves while staying in my own lane. That’s much of the fun of riding for me, in fact. I don’t need to be going fast or on a track to get the thrill of nailing my line through a tough corner, because it just feels right when you get it.

My previous experience at Palmer in my BRZ helped, too. Though some techniques on a motorcycle were different, I already knew where the track went, unlike most people there who were seeing it for the first time. In fact, one CBR rider told me after a session that since I’d driven here before, he’d tucked in behind me for a while specifically to follow and learn my lines. His bike is much faster than mine, but this isn’t a race, and there’s nothing wrong with slowing down to try something different.

We often talk about weight transfer when it comes to performance driving. Though side-to-side weight transfer works differently when you only have two wheels, the same theory still applies between the front and back wheels. It’s far more effective to squeeze on the front brake than to jam on it instantly, since more of the bike’s weight has a chance to transfer to the front wheel and give you more traction as you add more braking. Similarly, you want to roll on the throttle when leaving a corner, rather than whacking it wide open, so that weight will shift to the back wheel and give you more traction to handle the power you’re adding.

Along with weight transfer comes trail braking. In the past, on a bike, I’ve typically done my braking in a straight line, released the brakes, then turned into a corner. I’ve been afraid of exceeding my traction limits by asking the front wheel to turn and brake at the same time. But part of the classroom instruction focused on trail braking on a bike. The process is really no different than a car. You start to let off the brake as you start to turn in, blending from braking to turning rather than stopping and starting like I’d been doing. During one particular session I struggled to get the bike turned into the apex of turn 7. I was probably carrying more speed into the turn than earlier in the day, and I couldn’t seem to get the bike closer to the apex than the center of the track. Then we discussed trail braking. I tried it during the next session, and doggone if it didn’t work beautifully. Just a little bit of trail braking added enough weight and traction to my front tire to turn the bike more effectively and clip the apex just like I should.

In a car I heel/toe downshift. It’s the process of blipping the throttle in the middle of a downshift to match engine speed to wheel speed in a lower gear. My heels and toes don’t perform the same functions on a bike, but the general concept of rev matching my downshifts worked well. It’s a more advanced technique that they didn’t even cover in classes geared toward street riding rather than racing skills, but it helped a great deal. The bike reminded me of this one time when I messed up my rev match, let the clutch out too quickly, and engine braking caused the back wheel to lose grip for a second. That was a pucker moment, but I knew exactly what I’d done wrong and didn’t repeat it.

What Was Different

That leads to the biggest difference between driving a car and riding a bike on the same track – there’s so much more room on a bike. The track obviously hasn’t grown larger, but it feels larger on a smaller vehicle. There’s much more room to work with. As a result, I was actually more willing to take some chances with different lines and techniques on the bike than in the car. There was more room for error. And I made a few big errors. In class we talked about double apexing turn 7 rather than using a single late apex. I tried it, but I couldn’t get that line to work for me at all. I actually ended up pretty close to the outside of the track when I was supposed to be at the “real” apex near the end of the turn – a classic early apex result. But in a car, the same mistake would probably have put me at least into the grass, and possibly into the wall, because a car is so much wider. In my case, yeah, I screwed up big time, but I had enough space on the track to slow down and compensate for my mistake without incident. I can’t say the same about my favorite twisty back roads. Another technique that doesn’t translate is countersteering and leaning into turns. This is how I learned to ride in the MSF course, and I’ve been riding this way ever since. But never before had I leaned so hard into the turns. There are too many hazards on the street for me to commit to a corner at the edge of my personal riding skill, with nothing in reserve. But as Tony’s Track Days‘ slogan says, “No cops, no cars, no limits!” Plus I was hitting the same turns every two minutes and forty seconds or so, over and over and over again, so even though many of Palmer’s turns are blind, I knew exactly what was on the other side and could commit to them safely. Plus I had a lot more room for error if I didn’t nail every apex every time, which I assure you I didn’t.

One of the major differences I had to get used to was passing. At track days in a car, passing is tightly controlled. The faster car is not allowed to pass the slower, leading car until given the proper signal, a point-by that tells the faster car to pass and on which side. Then it’s up to the faster car to make the pass safely. But here, passing was only prohibited between turns 1 and 2 (with the track narrowed by cones to create more runoff area for safety), and after a rider tipped the bike in toward the apex you were not allowed to pass on the inside. That’s it. Plus, our mirrors had to be either removed or taped over to force us to focus on what’s ahead of us, not behind. There was no way to know if there someone about to pass, so it was 100% up to the passing bike to do so safely. I was probably the slowest bike in the entire group, so I got passed frequently. I got passed on the outside of turns regularly.

Someone coming from track days for cars might think this is ludicrous, especially with newbies thrown into the fastest run group with basically open passing. But it worked. There was plenty of room on the track for everyone, and since bikes accelerate more quickly than cars we were side-by-side for only a short time. In fact, this avoided the issue I always see at track days for cars where there’s “that guy” who’s going slow and won’t give a point-by, causing a long line of faster cars to get stuck behind him. I was “that guy” here, and it was no problem at all.

Finally, the instruction here was different, by necessity. You’re not going to take an instructor as a passenger on your bike as you would in a car. Instead, instructors – experienced racers on sport bikes – rode with the rest of us. Sometimes they’d follow someone and watch what they’re doing before zooming by. Sometimes they’d tap the back of their bike as a signal to follow them. This is exactly what happened to me when lead instructor Ken Condon caught up to me during my second open session.

The Bottom Line

What amazed me most was how many techniques from performance driving I’d already carried over to the bike, and that they were right. If anything, I needed to apply even more of them, like trail braking, to improve my riding further. Having track experience in cars definitely helps on the track, but it’s still a very different experience on two wheels. Plus, without a metal cage around you, there is a higher element of risk if you should crash while testing your limits. That’s why full riding gear, head to toe, is absolutely mandatory. But I didn’t see any yellow or red flags all day, which meant that everyone rode more cleanly than they drive at the automotive track days I attend. Maybe being inside a car gives some people a false sense of security that leads to spins and off-track excursions. Everyone I rode with was well in control of their bikes, and rode intelligently enough to leave a margin for error when trying something new.

The final piece of knowledge I took away from this event was that I don’t have to worry about having to choose between being able to attend more events like this or my current desire to buy a cruiser. There was an entire run group for cruisers, and it inspired me to see all those flashy Harleys, Victories, and such out there on the track doing their thing. Cruisers are the slowest of the three run groups, but that doesn’t matter to me. I’m not out here to go fast. I’m out here to learn, and I can learn on a cruiser just as well as a PC800 or any other bike.

I’m already looking forward to going back for more next year, whatever I’m riding by then.

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Oh Jeepers H. Chrysler, not again.

See, this happened to me a few years back when I took my MSF course. I had never ridden a motorcycle before and it had been over ten years since I had been on a bicycle. I won’t even bother counting the few times my 50cc Jawa actually ran long, long ago in college. Our instructor split us into groups of four so some could watch while we went around the cones. Who does he put me with? The three Harley firefighters who had each been riding for 10 years or so on permits. Oh, great. No pressure there. Somehow I survived and passed. I didn’t drop the bike. I didn’t embarrass myself. Oh please, please, please, just let me have that same modicum of success again today!

I had never been on any track before in any sort of vehicle. I’ve done no other proper training since my MSF course, just riding a whole bunch for a few years. Before the track day I was thinking, “Yeah, I definitely want to be in the middle/intermediate group. I have no desire to try to be the one setting fast laps.” Since I had a good case of nerves and on/off sleep the night before, I had plenty of time to confirm this decision. I’m now thinking there’s something about my face that maybe instructors dislike that makes them throw me in on the deep end. It’s probably the nose ring. Technically, I know it was because I showed up to the track day on my Bandit 1250. That put me into the sport touring category, which was the fastest of the three groups. Cruisers/Baggers with floorboards were the slowest group. ADV bikes and a lot of other random bikes were the intermediates. Whatever the case, there I was. And when they announced during the initial introduction that the intermediate group was slightly larger than the others, I felt bad about thinking about asking to switch down sooo…. suck it up buttercup.

Also, is there some unknown Murphy’s Law about track days that totally random things will go wrong? Before I even went to pass tech, my metric allen key multi-tool broke on the first bolt trying to get my mirrors off (it’s required to remove or tape them up). Luckily I had brought my SAE combo allen wrench, which worked well enough. Then, upon firing the bike up during tech, my throttle stuck open at about 4000 rpm. This has never, ever, ever happened before on the bike. I shut it down, checked the cable, nothing… Fired it back up, perfectly normal idle. What the Franklin? Now any shred of confidence I might have had was gone and I felt like a complete idiot. Oh, and a bit later, my visor mechanism jammed taking my helmet off and a screw popped out. Apparently I had a loose screw. At least this one was literal, not metaphorical. I found it on the ground and fixed the helmet mechanism.

Anyhow, after some briefing, we were off on a follow the leader set of laps. Sweet, just a simple mellow trot around the track to get an idea of the layout. Umm… Ok, so this is less mellow than I thought. I’m already feeling overwhelmed by the amount of corners and the speed they come at. How the heck am I going to remember any of this? Thankfully, they mark important points on the track with white X’s, so what you really need to do is just try and connect these points and look for a small orange cone at the apex. Oh, and one thing about Palmer – the apex is never, ever where you think it’s going to be. It’s further than that. Nope, further than what you thought was further than that. I know they don’t move them between laps, but it sure as hell feels like it to a newbie.

Speaking of the layout at Palmer Motorsports Park (aka Whiskey Hill Raceway)… There are a lot of corners. And some half corners. And three hairpins. And a LOT of elevation changes. It felt like a cross between Monza, COTA, and Mount Panorama to me. Oh, and with a good couple dashes of the Laguna Seca corkscrew thrown in at the beginning (uphill) and end (downhill). (Palmer actually has more elevation change than Laguna Seca! -Ed.) There’s a straight, but it’s not a straight. It’s just a long kink coming off the carousel/corkscrew feeling combo at the end. This looks amazing on paper, and pants ruiningly nerve-wracking your first time around with a VFR breathing down your neck.

After the follow the leader session, each group fell into a rhythm of 15-20 minute classroom sessions followed by 15-20 minute track sessions. Repeat every hour. I’ll let Justin Hughes and Kate Murphy go into these in more detail since they are probably better experienced to. Me, I was trying to keep my head above water, the shiny bits right side up, and my heart/anxiety rate at a non-lethal level, at least until lunch. That was included in the price of the day, and I didn’t want to toss it back up – especially not in my just repaired helmet.

Throughout the day, I just kept trying to get a better idea of “Where the hell am I?” In the classroom sections they would talk about corner 7 or 9 or 12, and it wasn’t until towards the end of the day I could remember which hairpin they were talking about. By the end of the day, I understood that the carousel (turns 11 and 12) were my nemesis. I got them OK maybe two or three times, and thankfully made it through them the rest. This is a very good thing, because coming out of the left handers of 11/12 you NEED to miss the concrete curb on the right hand sudden apex of 13. I’ve watched enough Laguna Seca auto races on TV to know that you do not get a semi-corkscrew combo messed up. It’s amazing what shear force of will will do to enable you to toss your bike from one side to the other.

And that’s the thing I think I took away from this track day.

Force of will, of willing yourself to push your boundaries further. Not in outright speed, but pushing yourself to try just one thing and get past that comfort zone. In fact the faster I tried to go, the worse I would do. I know the old racing adage: slow is fast.

I know a lot of people were talking about trail braking by the end. I had enough problems getting my Bandit slowed down before some turns without jacking the back end about (NOT FUN going into the turn 9!) I was simply not in a place to concentrate on trail braking or some of the other more advanced items. I had read about them before and could understand them, but I had too much on my plate (and again, didn’t want to throw up lunch). What I was doing was leaning more, and more, and WAY MORE than I ever have. And looking so far into turns, trying to get my head down to “kiss the mirrors” as either Ken or Jeannine Condon put it, that the day after the event my neck was the sorest it’s been since my metal listening, head-banging youth. Looking back today at some footage another rider took, maybe a minute or so before he passed me, I realized I’m moving my torso over but not letting my neck flow with it and keeping at some weird angle.

That, right there, is absolutely what sums up the track day for me. One simple bit of advice – trying more. REALLY trying (ow). Then seeing how you weren’t doing it right. That’s given me so much to learn and grow with, so much more valuable than the roughly $300 I spent for a full day of track time and instruction.

I definitely woke up a better rider. A rather sore, but better rider. I kept pushing myself to do things I knew a bit about, but do them better and harder. That, alone, has given me much more confidence in how to move the bike around. On the ride home from the track and into work the next day, I can honestly, 100% completely say that I felt like an almost completely different rider than I was before the track day. I think that’s the highest compliment I could possibly give to this event. I know the phrase “game changing” is overused, but this experience truly was. If you love riding and want to get better at it, do this. I’m not trying to make this sound like a commercial, but there’s absolutely no friggin way I can honestly write something about this day and not say that it was worth every penny and more.

Just don’t tell Tony. I don’t want him to jack up the prices like I did to the back end of my Bandit a few times.

No one at this event knew Gillette Stadium as well as Gronk – Rob Gronkowski of the New England Patriots. He was the Grand Marshal of the event. Of course, it had been transformed from the immaculate gridiron he’s familiar with into a tight dirt track full of bumps and jumps.

It was a great show, with plenty of fireworks – literally. When they lit up the huge torches I could feel the heat all the way back in the middle of the stands. There was plenty of commentary between races as well as during them, and explainers on how the event worked, including the flags and such. There were plenty of ads and blatant product placement, too, but it’s how they pay the bills, so I’m OK with that. I like how there are many levels you can watch the race on. People like me can enjoy analyzing the passes and the different lines the racers took. Others who are more interested in the overall spectacle can just sit back and enjoy the huge jumps and crashes.

Because yes, crashes happen. The great thing about being there, as opposed to watching it on TV, is that you can see all of the track all of the time. If there’s a crash in the back of the pack, or an intense race for sixth place while the podium positions are already pretty well set, you can watch those instead of the leaders that the cameras focus on.

I was super impressed by 250SX points leader Malcolm Stewart. He placed third today, and was one of the best sports about losing that I’ve ever seen. While of course he wants to keep his points lead, his whole attitude is basically “I’m just happy to be here, man.”

The 450SX race went similarly, with points leader Ryan Dungey also taking third place.

Ken Roczen and Eli Tomac fought their way past Dungey fair and square. I ride motorcycles but have never tried dirt, and I learned a bit by watching these guys. For example, Roczen is way off the traditional racing line here, but by dropping his wheels into the ruts he can literally corner like he’s on rails, maintaining a higher speed despite the less optimal line. Slower riders tended to clip the apex in a more traditional line.

I had a great time. Watching Supercross on TV is fun, but being there is well worth it. You can see so much more of what’s going on, and you can watch what you want to watch, not just where the cameras happen to be pointed. Even if you’re just a casual fan like me, I recommend checking one out sometime.

(Originally published on Oppositelock. Reposted with permission of the author, who just happens to be me.)

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The 1964 Honda Cub on the end is for sale.

As usual all makes and models were welcome, regardless of age. My Honda PC800 fit in perfectly despite not being “vintage.” The Triumph in front of it is also for sale.

There were so many bikes that they lined up along the side of the building as well.

Among the oldest bikes there was this Harley – 1949, I think the vintage license plate said.

This Honda CB650 Custom caught my eye, since I had a CB750 Custom myself. The stacked pipes, unique to Custom models, were the first thing I noticed. (They also get in the way of saddlebags. Ask me how I know.)

This Triumph Scrambler looks ready to hit the trails. The Indian next to it looks beautiful, too.

Harleys and Kawasakis mingling together. Who would’ve thunk? The one in the middle belongs to a local cop who discovered this meet by accident and has been attending ever since.

Opposites attract, like this Gixxer and murdered out Indian.

Local artist Melissa Morin brought her vocal and ukelele talents to provide a unique soundtrack for the meet.

Good times, as always. My wife has already given me permission to bring her Savage when I get it on the road. Once that’s done, I’m getting ideas about putting a vintage bike that I technically still own back on the road…

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Truth be told, my PC800 is actually the first non-vintage motorcycle I’ve ever owned. I’ve had a number of Suzuki GS models ranging from 250 to 1100cc, with a few Hondas sprinkled among them for good measure. On paper, I still legally own my 1982 Silverwing GL500i, mostly because I’ve completely failed to sell it at my friend’s shop for the past couple of years. So I’m a fan of the old UJMs like these.

It wasn’t just old UJMs, though. This Beemer looks ready to tackle a road trip right now. A couple of modern sport bikes joined us, too. They were as welcome as anyone.

This 1964 Honda Dream is in such good shape it looks like it leaped through a time warp into the future. It’s even wearing a proper license plate from 1964.

And then there’s this. I have no idea what it used to be. It may be tiny, but it’s crude, garish, and LOUD, just like a chopper is supposed to be.

It was a small, laid back, friendly gathering that was exactly as advertised. I definitely plan to go back to check out more vintage oddballs, as well as show off my not-so-vintage oddball. Check out the Northeast Moto Society on Facebook.

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