Ermelo Toyota 400 - "Ride Report"

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Joined
Sep 11, 2006
Messages
4,929
Reaction score
10
Location
Pretoria East - Home of Jameson
Bike
KTM 1090 Adventure R
Well, what an experience.
The nerves were eating me up a few days before the event already, and even Andri, an veteren of these events, mentioned to me on Thursday evening that he was as nervous as anything.

As he had entered the National, it was compulsory that he had to enter the time trials on Friday.
His position after the 50km event was 50th out of about 114 riders - a bit disappointing, but then he was also competing against the big 450's and especially the Yamaha's which are a force to be reckoned with this year.

Saturday morning dawn bright and hot, and it promised to be a scorcher. Little did we know that by about 14:30, the MOTHER of all torrential downpours and hail would decend down on the field

Andri had entered the National and Regional 250 class, Riaan the Regional 250 class, Kurt the Silver cup (Quads) and I the Regional Novice class (all bikes).
The National loop was 4 x 110km = 440km. The Regionals were 2 x 110km and the Silver cup 3 x 110km loops

The results were very positive and encouraging for our team and we came home with no less than 5 cups
Andri: 1st Regional 250 and 6th National 250
Riaan: 5th Regional 250
Kurt: 2nd Quad Silver
Myself: 5th Novice class

Picture_003a.jpg



The riders were very committed. We were in the gym every day for 2 weeks before the event, no alchohol whatsoever, and we were all in bed by 21:00 on Friday night. We bumped our fluid intake for 48 hours preceding the event and watched our diets very closely - and it paid off

Here are some pics:


Our Pits:

Picture_010a.jpg


DSC_5119a.jpg


Picture_018a.jpg



Myself (still got a lot to learn  ;D )

DSCF0309a.jpg


DSCF1107a.jpg


DSCF1108a.jpg


DSC_5850a.jpg


Picture_024a.jpg


Picture_026a.jpg



Andri

DSCF0831a.jpg


DSC_4260a.jpg



Riaan

DSCF0179a.jpg


DSC_5765a.jpg



Kurt

DSC_6016a.jpg


DSCF0513a.jpg


Picture_036a.jpg



A view from the air - our pits are roughly in the centre right at the top of the pic

Picture_022a.jpg



Although the event overall to our team was a resounding success, there were still some niggling things that possibly cost us some places in the results.
Our Bikes preps are still not upto scratch and we are going to have seriously rethink our approach to them.

Andri's bike died about 20m before the finish on the time trial which cost him quite a few places. We could not get it started and eventually decided to strip it down completely. We were shocked to find the entire airbox full of water and mud. We were stumped - how did this happen ? Soon it became clear - the air filter had not been fitted properly - the rubber ring which seals the filter to the airbox was clearly out of alignment and "bent" inwards - a big gap existed under it and was further evidenced by the lack of residue of filter oil on that portion.
The entire carb was stripped down and a lot of dirt has obviously entered it. We are concerned about the motor and a rebuild is planned
Andri had bent his bar raisers the week previously and these had been replaced. Whilst on the way to the  jetting strip his handle bars just folded forward - the bolts were loose. This was luckily discovered and tightened.
His jets were not right and we did not have the correct ones with us. We phoned back to pretoria and had a whole host of people run around town and source the correct ones. The KTM team also graciously lent us jets for the time trial

When we discovered Andri's airbox problem, we checked Riaan's bike and took a lot of dirt out of the airbox. For good measure, we stripped the carb and cleaned it out. Ten minutes into the race on Sat, Riaan's new handguards came loose and the bolt fell out. He lost a good seven places at the time trying to force/rip the rest off.

Also ten minutes into the first lap I discovered I had NO back brakes and very problematic front brakes. They would now and again come right but would fail me at the most inopportune moments. I must have had at least 6 or 7 very bad falls on the first loop where I overshot corners and end up in ditches and donga's. On the last one I thought I was a gonner and must have layed on the ground a good 5 minutes before I summonded the courage to get up. I definately heard something snap and am off to the Quack tomorrow to check ligaments.
Right there and then I decided to retire after the first loop.
I got into the pits and told everyone that I was done. My mate Jaghond had come to spectate and said that he would sort out the brakes. It took them 20 minutes to bleed the front and the back and put in new pads. The oil in the back was "useless" and they bled all the old out. The front had water in. They sent me out on the red technical loop and I had an exceptionally good round - the brakes were perfect.

The hail storm and torrential downpour 35km before the end messed it all up and I lost about 20 minutes due to a number of falls (it became SNOT GLAD), getting stuck in deep mud and fording two rivers which were in a mini muddy flash flood. I hear the carnage that happened behind me was awesome.

My first regional race and despite the problems - it was an experience of note. Getting a place was unexpected - but very rewarding.
 
Top