September 20th, 2011
Race Report Round 1 King of Ruapuna Jeremy Holmes
The first round of the popular King of Ruapuna series kicked off in the weekend, featuring warm spring temperatures and full grids in most classes including the combined superbike/600 class which I had entered. It was just the spot to kick off my racing season.
The off season had been a long one, being that the last time I threw my leg over a bike was in February at the national round at the same circuit.
I had several goals for the weekend: blow out the off season cobwebs and get comfortable on the bike again, work on rear grip which we had trouble with last year and try to learn as much as I could from local racers Charlett and Ross (2011 NZ 600 Champ and runner up respectively).
Qualifying felt great and I immediately felt comfortable on my CBR600. I posted the 2nd fastest time behind my Castrol Honda team mate, Ryan Hampton on the CBR1000. I knew that the day was going to be hard, especially with Ross and Charlett beside me on the grid.
Race one started off well and I settled into a good pace in 4th right on the back of Charlett and Ross, on the third lap I got a bit keen on the throttle and ended up low siding out of the infamous dipper corner. Fortunately neither the bike nor I were damaged badly. I was able to make it back to the pits and carry out some repairs in order for my bike to be ready for the next race. A special thank you needs to go out to my pit crew Gary and Liz for making this possible.
For some reason the grid order for race 2 was rearranged as the finishing order for race 1, which meant starting at the back of the grid in position 20 with 6 laps to make ground. Nothing like a good challenge! Race 2 kicked off with a great start and passing half the field into turn one. My race was a busy one and great passing practice, in the end I had made my way up into 4th position which is where I finished. This was a bit of a confidence booster heading into the last race.
The third race saw temperatures tumble into single digits and track temperatures fall to the low teens. After discussion with the grid marshals and thanks to my fellow racers, I was allowed to start off the end of the front row. The race was fairly uneventful, but saw me finishing in third after Charlett had a mechanical problem and slowed down late in the race.
Overall, besides the small crash, it was a very productive weekend and it was good to know that even with a long off season layoff I still had pretty good pace. We have a bit to work on over the week and a few repairs to patch up in preparation for the final round of King of Levels in Timaru this coming weekend.
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