Chris Northover

Chris Northover

Misano, San Marino - Race

June 24, 2006 in 2006, Chris Northover, Misano, Race Report by Mike Edwards

Chris Northover, 23/06/06 - 24/06/06
European SuperStock 600 Championship
Round 4

Italian run championship, Italian Track and lots of Italian Riders, this’ll be fun!

After the highs of Silverstone, Misano was one hell of a struggle. It was hot. Really hot. Like, oh dear my feet are burning from the heat of the tarmac through the soles of my shoes hot. As every good Brit should, we moaned that it was too hot, then moaned when we returned to England because it was raining! The heat didn’t even have the common decency to go away at night, making it impossible to sleep in the tent before 11:00 at night, and staying in bed past about 9:00 was akin to about gas mark 6.

Thursday

We arrived in Italy early Thursday morning and crammed into the worlds smallest hire car with Tricky (Walker the Stalker Fan Club Man) and headed for the track. Despite the Sat Nav playing a couple of little pranks on us, we made it to the circuit. Now I’m telling you, these Italians have it sussed;

“Heey, eeet very hot weather, we put swimming pool in paddock for racer to play in, yes?”

What a great idea! Mind you, I couldn’t imagine taking off my leathers after a race at Snetterton and jumping into an outdoor swimming pool, not without at least two wetsuits on!

Once we’d sorted the usual bits and pieces, it was 7 o’clock in the evening and as the paddock restaurant shuts at 6:30, I headed down to the nearest town with the guys from Pirelli for dinner. The Pirelli guys spent the whole time making threats to my hair, with the final deal being that every position I finished outside of the points, would cost me one inch of hair! Unfortunately, we didn’t get back until 10:00, by which time it was too late to walk the track with Mike’s guidance as I had intended. Although I had already walked the track on my own once, this cost me dearly the next day; lesson learnt!

Friday - Free Practice

First practice was spent learning reference points on the track and getting used to the, well, interesting surface. Whilst about a third of the track has been resurfaced in the last century, the rest of it appears to have been commissioned by a certain Mr Caesar, some time ago! Misano is not a forgiving track and wandering off your line not only knocks your lap time right up, but you shortly find yourself hitting nasty bits of tarmac that seem intent on matchmaking between you and terra firma. Having survived the first session, finishing 33rd on a lap time of 1′49.417, it was straight into the cold showers to get back to usual operating temperature!

Friday - 1st Qualifying

After much head scratching and going out to watch at the first bend (a corner where I had been struggling) I headed out to the track for the first qualifying session. Despite posting a lap time a second faster, I ended the session in 36th place, more commonly known as last. Disaster.

After the highs of Silverstone, this was a kick in the teeth with a big Doc Martin, to say the least. Friday night we walked the track with Mike, in search of the Holy Grail, well the right lines. The walk revealed several areas where improvements could be made, but as always, it is easy to talk a fast lap, but actually pulling it off is another matter!

Saturday - 2nd Qualifying

After a shaky start to the second qualifying session, also held back by having to bed in new brake pads, I pulled into the pits for some much needed Mike guidance. Once back on track I began progressively chipping away at my lap times managing a 1′47.331, over a second faster than the first session. Unfortunately my charge was ended by a slight discrepancy between the speed I intended to take one of the slow hairpins, and the amount of grip available Nonetheless, I managed to qualify 35th, so at least I wasn’t last.

With no injuries it was all hands on deck, even Kirsty (acting brolly girl) was roped in to paint the seat unit, doing a fantastic job! After much hard work from everyone, especially Uncle “Spanners” Clive and Uncle “Pure Englishman” Richard (you should’ve seen his white socks!) the bike was ready to race.

Saturday - Race

Lining up on the grid, there was a mass rush to get all the mechanics and brolly girls off the track, resulting in an overexcited Italian marshal breaking his umbrella and it landing on my team as they left! Anyone would think that the people on the grids were out to get us! On Mike’s instructions I made a steady start and after the usual first lap mayhem (ahem Matt!) I went for it. “It” in this case being a half respectable finishing position and getting the lap times down further.

I had a fantastic race in a three bike battle which I came out on top of when the race was stopped and declared a result with 2 laps to go. My final position was 28th, which was disappointing but I managed to go faster still with a lap time of 1′46.049. I also was pleased to learn that the bike I had been trading paint with was one of the PSG-1 Kawasaki Corse Junior team bike, have that ya flash sod in your big fancy team!!

Not very gentlemanly I know, but I can’t help laughing when Matt or Myself manage to stick it to a team that have four times the budget of us!

Conclusion

Overall it was a very difficult weekend, with the heat, tough track and endless lemon slushies (ok, perhaps not the toughest part!) and to finish 28th was, in all fairness, a bit poop [eng. Slang. /~ Not frightfully good, less than adequate]. Despite that, the race itself was a corker. Even if I left an inch of track unguarded, before you could say “Don’t stick it up the inside”, two bikes would stick it up the inside and it’d be time for a bit more overtaking practice! I may have resorted to riding round the outside of them once, possibly twice (apparently I’m not supposed to do that too often, something about a SV650 and Druids at Brands last season).

All I can say is roll on Brno and lets see if we can get back into the points where we belong!

Over and Out

Ten - Four

CG

Silverstone, UK - Race

May 28, 2006 in 2006, Chris Northover, Race Report, Silverstone by Mike Edwards

Chris Northover, 26/05/06 - 28/05/06
European SuperStock 600 Championship
Round 3

Thursday

11:00 Thursday morning. After a smooth flight with only mild M1 induced turbulence we landed at Silverstone and headed straight to the amusingly named “Suzuki Village” (for “Suzuki People” perhaps?) in the paddock so I could get all excited about my name being up on the wildcard board above the marquee for the Suzuki GSX-R 750 European Cup (Bit of a mouthful that, from now on I’ll call it the Gixxer Cup!). This is all thanks to Kenny Pryde of Superbike Magazine and Steve Booth from Suzuki GB. In each country the Gixxer Cup visits there are 4 wildcard rides available. For one of these rides it was down to Kenny to choose a rider. Being the kind gent he is (and somewhat susceptible to a cup of tea or two!), he gave me the chance to gain some extra track time benefiting my 600 campaign and to experience racing a bigger bike on a completely level playing field.

Once we were all set up it was down to business with team manager, Mike Edwards, walking the track discussing best lines and sections where most time could be made or lost. Unfortunately on one such sighting lap I out braked myself (on a mountain bike) into Silverstone’s tight chicane and ran straight on through a chasm of mud and water (well okay, a puddle), much to the amusement of Mike and my team mate Matt Bond!

Friday - Free Practice

Conditions: Decidedly Spring - Wet with dry bits!

On track I concentrated on reference points for lines, rather than straight out lap times as I felt that gravel excursions this early on in the weekend were best avoided for the sanity of my team! A quick few words in pit lane mid session with Mike and in the last 5 minutes of the session and posted my fastest lap time at that point, marvellous!

In between sessions on the 600 we checked out our little spot within the Suzuki village. Impressive is not the word. It was like someone had just said “Here, have your own little bit of factory team garage, fill your boots.”! Unfortunately my Sidi’s aren’t big enough to fit a fully stocked tool chest, paddock stands, a compressor, pit board, tyre warmers and a super trick GSX-R 750 race bike! Damn my puny size 9’s!

Did I mention the bike was trick? With enough carbon fibre pornography to put it on the top shelf in One-Stop, it seemed a shame to use it in anger, not that that was going to stop me of course…

After trying in vain to find the Space Invaders setting on the trick lap timer (It seemed to have every other function!), my mechanic Clive and I set the suspension on the 750 to match the settings on my Superstock bike.

Friday - 1st Qualifying

Next, it was back out on my Superstock 600 for the first of the two qualifying sessions. In the afternoon, I had sat down and scrawled notes over a circuit map as an exercise to help identify my weak areas on the track that I would need to concentrate on in the afternoon. With this in mind, I headed out to put together some consistent laps. Lap times improved, although with the front end doing a very convincing pogo stick impression, I was only 29th fastest.

As soon as I came in I jumped off the 600 and straight onto the 750 cup bike for the first qualifying session on that, no rest for the wicked you know! The sudden transition was interesting to say the least, not only having to adapt to slightly different tyres, but also to the increase in power and a quick action throttle. Cue several over enthusiastic blips going down the box and the odd unintentional (honest!) power wheelie! After a few laps, I had got my brain programmed correctly and began to really enjoy the 750. Every lap I knocked off another second or so off my lap time and halfway through the session was 15th fastest. After a few hairy moments going into Bridge (a fast, downhill entry, right hander) on one wheel I pulled into pit lane for some words of wisdom from Mike “Yoda” Edwards. As I mentioned earlier, the Gixxer cup set up makes you feel like a pro, this extends to the pit lane too!

“Suspension problem sir? Simply click your heels 3 times and behold, thine problems are solved by the wizards of Andreani Group Suspension!”

Good enough for Chris Vermeulen last year, then they’re good enough for me!

With a couple of suspension tweaks to make the bike more stable on the brakes going into Bridge it was back out on track to test the changes and consolidate what I had learned in the first half of the session rather than to go balls out chasing a faster time. I ended the session 21st fastest, but my favourite bit was being 2nd fastest through the speed trap; it felt great to see my name at the top of the standings, for at least one bit!!

After my first session aboard the 750, my grin was wide enough to stretch my Shoei! I really enjoyed riding the 750 and began searching for a way to sneak it out in the stock 600 race!

Saturday - 2nd Qualifying

First on the cards Saturday morning, was a fork rebuild for my 600, this time to match the 750. A different oil height inside the forks of the 750 gave it a much more planted feel, crucial over Silverstone’s mid corner bumps. Forks back in and it was back out on circuit for the second qualifying session in conditions that made the cancelled Mondello Park round of BSB look like a light shower! Swapping my Shoei for a snorkel and my Sidi’s for flippers we headed out on track, it soon became clear that those riders with webbed feet would be at a distinct advantage. For all the joking about the weather, however, I really enjoyed riding the track in such challenging conditions and the wet practice was welcome. A mid session pit stop gave us the chance to take advantage of Steve Jordan the team Suspension Guru’s skills and it worked! He gave the forks a stern talking to (well, he backed off the compression and rebound damping slightly) to give me a bit more feel from the front tyre and my next few laps just got quicker and quicker.

After a debrief with Mike, I spent the afternoon drying off and scrawling more notes on my circuit map for reference if it rained on Sunday.

By late afternoon it had (finally) stopped raining, although at the start of the 750 cup session the track was still wet with a dry line in places. In this series, you get two front tyres and three rears for the weekend, so a bit of tyre juggling was required to avoid any problems should it rain on Sunday. Going out on wet tyres and wet settings, we gradually stiffened the bike up throughout the session as the track began to dry, whilst keeping an eye that we weren’t destroying my last wet front tyre! With some riders on wets and others on dry tyres, combined with the drying track, the standings were jumping about for the whole session, but I finished the session in 14th place. This was all academic however, as the overall qualifying times were taken from Friday’s session where it was dry and hence faster, shame! Now, I’m not usually a fashion victim, but due to my good set of leathers and gloves being soaked from the mornings 600 session, I had to ride in my fetching, 90’s, green and purple leathers, which were nicely set off by a bright orange pair of gloves, tasty! To add to the embarrassment, Kenny turned up to get some photos of me, in such fetching gear! Oh, the shame!

Saturday evening was hilarious. Having taken advantage of the free energy drinks being given out around the paddock, Mum was like a small child with an excess of E-numbers! As such, the paddock Olympics was born, with such classics as the sack race, three legged race and hide and seek! The sack race saw a sleeping bag destroyed and a sickening amount of cheating from the girls team, but if we thought the cheating in the sack race was bad, as Bachman Turner Overdrive said, “We ain’t seen nah – nah nuthin yet!” Firstly, Mum and Sally used a quick release knot in the three legged race, which was a plan Dick Dastardly himself would have shunned for being too dishonest, and then their actions when playing hide and seek were just unspeakable. Mum commandeered a group of innocent Brits camping nearby, hid among them and then when it was her turn to look, flagged down a car and got a lift around the paddock searching for me! Parents eh? You can’t take them anywhere!

Sunday - Race

Sunshine and consistent weather at last! The original timetable put my 750 Cup race first with an hour break before my Superstock 600 race, but the pile-up in the first Superbike race put an end to such luxury! Instead the 750 Race was moved to immediately after the Superstock 600 race! Good job I’d had my weetabix then.

European Superstock 600 Race

Lining up on the grid, all I needed was a good start, a good race and a strong finish to see me preferably in the points! Sounds so easy when it’s put like that! Determined to put the misdemeanours of the last two rounds behind me, I got a great start and headed for the outside at the first corner. The whole first lap was manic, with my team mate Matt just missing me at the exit to turn one. On the back straight, another rider who shall remain nameless (for now!) decided to throw a hissy fittm because I was overtaking him and try to push me onto the grass at about 120mph! This is the same rider who nearly put me in a wall at Monza, so in a calm and gentlemanly way I stuck my elbows out, leant back on him and waited till he braked!

“Always an amusing tactic that one” I said to myself, as I sailed past three more riders into the hairpin, still wondering if I was going to stop in time! I did make it and stayed ahead of all but one of the riders, Matt Bond. Glued to his back wheel like a guitar to the hands of Hendrix, I tried my hardest to stay with him. I made a few mistakes and had to catch back up each time, making things nice and hard for myself! We were slicing through other riders like they weren’t there, with both of us getting out of the seat moments almost every bend, but on lap 7 our charge was ended by a red flag due to oil at the hairpin.

Back to pit lane again! We took the opportunity to make a couple of suspension adjustments to make the front end more planted over the bumps and to sort the rear tyre’s habit of trying to overtake the front. After some deliberation, it was decided that the race would be run as two heats with the second leg being over 5 laps, starting from our finishing positions in the first heat. This meant Matt and I were starting 14th and 16th on the grid respectively. Another good start saw me back on the tail of Matt again chasing hard. Despite my best efforts, I didn’t manage to get past him (I’ll get you next time, Gadget!) but our hard charging had placed us 13th and 14th on the road, making me 15th overall on aggregate! I was also distinctly chuffed to get a quicker fastest lap than Matt which I may have mentioned to him, once or twice! Fifteenth place also gave me my first ever European Championship point, which has had some interesting side-effects, namely skipping about with glee, smiling so hard it hurts and occasionally just leaping up into the air shouting “One Point!!!”. The doctors have suggested some mild sedatives to aid the sanity of my family and friends! After some Last lap celebrations, it was back to concentrating on the racing as the 750 Cup was about to get under way.

GSX-R750 European Cu

Ahh, Italian organisation! After sprinting the length of the pit lane in full bike gear, I rode round to the grid to discover a lack of mechanics, paddock stands and, some may say most importantly, brolly girl!! In London nightclub stylee, the pit lane bouncers, sorry, marshals had randomly refused entry to my team, no doubt claiming a “No Trainers” policy or some such rule! Dragging my brain back off cloud nine, planet party, from race one I set my mind back into first corner mode. Having wheelied off the line to almost the first turn (750’s are FUN!) I carved my way through and set about getting into a rhythm. With a keen eye on my pit board each lap, the gap behind me began increasing until I was out on my own in 16th place, with a 2 second comfort zone behind me. Just past the midway mark of the race and the nice comfortable 2 second gap became 1 second and then 0 seconds. Darn and blast. I pushed really hard but just kept having huge slides and losing the front so much I wore through my knee sliders! With a few laps to go I was mugged coming into Priory by German, Janakova. I decided to follow her for the last few laps, conserve some energy and try for a move on the last lap. My chance came as on the last lap, she made a mistake and ran wide at the hairpin. Unfortunately, in my attempt to stick it up the inside, I ran just as wide meaning I had to be content with 17th place. After such a long race the chequered flag was a welcome sight, although I mysteriously found enough energy for celebratory wheelies!

It was a truly great feeling to see everyone in my team, who’ve worked so hard and sacrificed so much looking so elated after the race. The “Thank you List ™” for this race is going to be huge, but still not as big as my grin right now!!! I can’t thank Kenny Pryde and Steve Booth enough for giving me this opportunity to double my track time over the weekend, I think it is clear from the results how much it has helped!

Misano is next. Mission: beat Matt and score some more points!!

And now, iiits:

The Thank you List ™

A massive thanks to :

  • Steve Booth for the chance to ride the GSX-R750
  • Kenny “Oreo Supplier” Pryde for gambling on a lunatic like me in the 750 Cup!
  • Steve “Skyline Stupidity” Jordan
  • Mark Bentley for some cracking photographs of the weekend despite the soggy camera!
  • Mike Edwards as usual for his Oracle-like powers
  • And everyone who came to see and help me at the weekend, superstars the lot of you!

Monza, Italy - Race

May 6, 2006 in 2006, Chris Northover, Monza, Race Report by Mike Edwards

Chris Northover, 05/05/06 - 06/05/06
European SuperStock 600 Championship
Round 2

Summary

Good Luck, Bad Luck and Hayfever!

So round two of the European Superstock 600 series brings Monza and the opportunity to build on what was learnt in Valencia.

Thursday

Having suffered at the hands of Barry Burrell (fellow Brit racer) on the plane (I now know not to ever fall asleep next to him again) we arrived at the airport and I was offered a lift to the track with MCN’s World Superbikes reporter, Michael Guy. This turned out to be one of the luckiest breaks all season, as we got pretty much straight to the circuit while several others in the team spent many an hour touring the town of Monza in search of the illusive track, <smug mode on!>. Smug mode was, however, soon cancelled due to one teensy little problem with the location of the track. Monza is in a lovely big park. Lots of lovely trees, lovely little flowers and lovely, lovely grassy stuff. This abundance of green stuff left me with killer (well nearly) hayfever all weekend.

We walked the track Thursday night and concentrated on possible lines. Walking the track also showed me just how important slipstreaming was going to be, given the straights going on forever!

Friday – Free Practice

I took the first session easy to give me a chance to work out my lines and pick various braking/turn in/apex/exit points so I could fully apply the techniques bestowed upon me in Valencia! Also Monza is not a place to mess up, a point proved over the weekend by the many spent carcasses of race bikes laying bleeding oil into the gravel traps!

Friday – First Qualifying

For the second session on Friday, we were made to feel right at home again (yes, it rained!) and I had the new challenge of learning to ride a 600 in the rain! Again, building up gradually I started to get some consistent times in and find a flow around the circuit. About 6 minutes before the end of the session, I had a minor mishap exiting the first chicane, prima variante – see I learned some Italian! I got on the power exiting the turn a tad to eagerly and high sided, albeit not in the usual fashion! As the bike snapped sideways I half fell off the inside of it, then when it came back in line (amazingly still upright) I kept hold of the bars and simply (!?) hopped back on, much to the amusement of the marshals! Once I had finished giggling I realised I now had a new dent in my knee, but decided to make the most of the track time and carry on lapping until the end of the session.

Saturday – Second Qualifying

Headed to Doc Costa for some leg repairs to be made from my shenanigans in Friday’s qualifying, came out with a shiny bandage and less leg hair than before!

Determined to gain a good position on the grid, I went out with a few points from Mike that I need to work on clear in my head. Counter-steer more positively, a revised line into the first part of the Ascari chicane and get in the slipstream of people to get a good lap time. I managed to put all(ish) of the above into practice and spent a good amount of the session chasing the Marcel van Nieuwenhuizen of Remar Racing. Once I had caught and passed Marcel I set about pushing a bit harder in the places where I had been held up. Unfortunately the session was red flagged due to a bike on the track and we all had to pull into the pits. When the session was restarted for the final five minutes, ill fate struck again, when the circlip holding the gear lever in place went awol leaving me to limp back to the pits in 6th gear. Qualified a lowly 31st on the grid, my mission for the race was clear: good start, survive the first chicane and then pick people off lap by lap, easy. Well, easy in theory anyway!

Saturday – Race

Lining up on the grid, I was fully focussed on the task ahead, with the most important task being to survive the (inevitable) first corner carnage. After getting a good start and passing the row in front, I picked a line to the first bend and stuck to it. Sure enough, the pack just ahead of me felt the need to indulge in a bit of skittley pinball action and about 6 of them decided to better acquaint themselves with Monza’s finest black stuff. Having picked a way through the mess, I set off on stage two of the plan – start picking off riders in front. Coming out of Ascari, I slipstreamed a yellow Yamaha (sorry not very specific I know!) and made a pass on it into the Parabolica. Having got a wheel ahead, the kind chap riding the Yamaha decided to turn in on me and ram my front wheel from the side, most decent of him! As I tumbled through the gravel I was, well, mildly annoyed to say the least. As soon as everything had stopped bouncing I ran for my bike, picked it up and was out of the gravel trap quicker than a stray dog in a kebab shop kitchen! Just as I was preparing for a boring 9laps on my own, the red flags came out due to a bike throwing oil over the track and a there still being a rider on the floor from the first corner incident. Lucky or what?

On returning to the pits it was a race against time to do what essential repairs we could to make the bike a bit less like riding a shopping trolley with a wonky wheel. The foot peg was replaced, bodywork taped up, gravel removed from bike and gravel removed from me! It was quite a sight to see everyone helping to fix it, including:

  • Uncle Richard (new record for the sprint across the paddock!)
  • Mr Polita (Father of Alessandro Polita of Superstock 1000 brilliance and Alessia from last years Superstock 600 series)
  • Eric from Suzuki Netherlands
  • And Matt’s Dad Andy

THANKS GUYS!!!!

Saturday – Race (Take 2)

Lined up for the second attempt, I had to be cautious on the first few laps due to cold, dusty tyres. This was a little spirit breaking, as I managed another good start and then had to let the pack get away as I waited for my tyres to come up to temperature. After about a lap and a bit, the tyres were up to temperature and I was able to start racing! I passed a couple of bikes and then tagged on the back of a Kawasaki. I was struggling to find a way past, as however well I got out of the corners, the kwak would just disappear on the straights. With something still not quite straight on my bike, I was unable to go for any wild lunges on the brakes and didn’t manage to find a way past. In the end I had to settle for 22nd place. Although initially disappointed with 22nd, given the circumstances it is by no means a bad result.

What did I learn?

Well, for a start don’t trust anyone at all on the first lap, or you end up on the floor!

Secondly, remember some hayfever tablets!

And thirdly, Monza is an amazing place and probably one of my favourite tracks so far.

And there ends another horrendously long tale of the misdemeanours of myself in what is turning out to be one of the most exciting seasons of my life!

Tune in next time when I will be heading to Silverstone with a newly fettled engine and even more determination!!!

Thanks to –

  • Michael Guy for his impeccable Italian Driving impressions
  • Everyone who helped me in the pits on Saturday
  • Roger for giving me the opportunity to get up to this much mischief!
  • Nan and Grandad for driving the race truck up from Valencia
  • Mark, Barry, Rich and Tom for making sure I stayed awake and revised on the plane!
  • The lady at Stanstead Airport for sending me to the wrong car park at 10:00 at night in sandals and shorts. It’s ok, I only walked around lost for about 45mins!!
  • Steve Jordan for making my bike work again!
  • Mike “F” Edwards for getting my bike to the track
  • All the teams sponsors and supporters
  • All my friends and family who watched back home on the internet!
  • Mum and Dad, sorry I smashed the bike up but thanks for everything

See y’all in Silverstone!

« Older entries § Newer entries »