Daytona By Bimota
Daytona by Bimota
On the high banks, there's no substitute for speed
THE TROUBLE WITH GETTING OLD IS THAT YOU THINK TOO much. As if the notion of piloting the stunning Corse Bimota SB8RC (CW, April) in the AHRMA Sound of Thunder race at Daytona wasn’t daunting enough, I had to deal with all the “advice” I got from well-wishing spectators. If I heard it once. I heard it a thousand times: “Wow, nice bike-don’t crash!”
I had no intention of crashing. Not just because I didn’t want to wad builder Shin Kondo’s pride and joy, but because I didn’t want to wad myself. For me, racing at Daytona is bittersweet. While there’s nothing like the adrenaline rush you get running wide-open on the 31-degree banking, the place is haunted by bad memories, the worst of which was seeing my Long Island homeboy Jimmy Adamo killed during the 1993 Daytona 200 (I raced with the number 26 this year in his memory).
Of course, the flipside is the good stuff that happens, and there was a lot to be thankful for at Daytona. Between the guys from Corse Japan, Moto Point, Supermoto Italia and the Bimota Owner’s Club, I had a larger cheering section than at any other time in my 17-year roadracing “career.” Motorcycle racing is all about confidence, and every little bit of encouragement helps.
My race was the biggest of the day, with an international field of 33 riders. I was gridded on the outside of row six, so a good start would be essential. Sometime between the 1minute board and the green flag, however, a rider stalled his bike, and spent what seemed like an eternity attempting to bump-start it. Kondo had warned me that 80 degrees Celsius was the acceptable maximum water temperature for the SB8’s Suzuki TL1000R motor, and I watched helplessly as the digital readout climbed past 100 and began flashing. “Danger Will Robinson!” Or something to that effect.
When the green flag finally flew, 1 launched the Bimota hard and threaded my way past the slower-starting riders into Turn 1. With fewer than 20 laps of practice under my belt, 1 was essentially still learning my way around the 3.56mile circuit during the race, and it showed. The hardest part about racing at Daytona is judging your braking distance into Tum l, made that much more difficult by the Bimota’s indicated 179-mph top speed.
Did I mention I didn’t want to crash?
The eight-lap race was a give-and-take affair, as riders repeatedly stuffed past me in the infield, only to be repassed on the banking, victims of the SB8’s 130 rear-wheel horsepower.
But while the SB8 was plenty fast on top, it wasn’t accelerating as hard as it had in practice, and was emitting an odd, metallic ringing noise. Sure enough, a post-race examination revealed that the rear exhaust header had snapped clean off at the flange. If it hadn’t been for that and a lack of practice, I’m confident I could have improved on my seventh-place finish-though it would have taken some doing to unseat winner Jeff Nash or runner-up Bill St. John on their rapid Duc 748s, or third-placed Jonathan Glaefke on his TL.
I couldn’t help feeling depressed after the race, as if I’d let the team down. Yet to my surprise, Shin was pleased. “I am very happy,” he said at dinner that evening when I presented him with the plaque we’d earned. Maybe it was the wine, but last I heard, he and Moto Point’s Bob Smith were discussing building a 1973 Bimota HB1 for next year’s Formula 750 vintage race.
If they promise to paint it primer-gray, I might consider riding it. -Brian Catterson
