Random ramblings

Monday May 02, 2005

Truck drivers and the headlight flash death-ray

So you're a trucker, and this little tiny two wheeled vehicle behind you spots a gap in the traffic, pulls out, opens it up and screams past you. You think it looked kind of dangerous, it sounded dangerous certainly and, hey, you wouldn't try that in your Scania! So you exercise your $DEITY-given right to expunge the public roads of such menaces, lift your hand to the stalk on the steering wheel and press the headlight-flash-death-ray trigger and vaporise them into their constituent sub-atomic particles.

Or you see, about 500m in the distance, an oncoming truck on the other side of the road. In a similar fashion, you see a bike pull out behind it and start to accelerate quickly past the oncoming truck and towards you - on YOUR side of the road. Quick! Hit that headlight-flash-death-ray trigger before they pass that truck and finish the overtake!

• Your headlight isn't a death ray, it doesn't vapourise these little flies off the face of the earth, sorry to burst your bubble.
• You may feel you're justified in expressing your indignation at such brazen overtaking of trucks, however all you're doing is distracting this other road user. "Why is that trucker flashing their lights at me?" - they have enough things to focus their attention on, they neither care for your bright opinion nor need to have to spend cycles dismissing it at that particular time.
• Consider cutting back on truck-stop coffee and see a doctor about your possible blood-pressure problem.

Next time, just send me an email, ok?

Sunday May 01, 2005

From dole queue to podium at the Shanghai MotoGP

Ok, Olivier Jacques wasn't really on the dole, but after spending a year in the "sticks", racing SuperSport (600cc street bikes, restricted to only mild tuning, road tyres - not much faster than my 250 around a track.) and even some car racing, what a way to get back to MotoGP. Jacques stood in for injured Nakano on the still under-development Kawasaki, and made his way through the attrocious rain to Sete on the work RCV211 and hounded him until he got past. He then reeled in Rossi at a rate of about 0.5s to 1s a lap, to finish right behind him at the flag. He gave the Kawasaki boss palpatations every lap in his pursuit of Rossi, worrying his boss that he was going to throw away Kawasaki's best race position since probably the seventies or early eighties by spinning it up and stepping out the backwheel at the same corner, nearly lap after lap.

Be interesting to see how Jacques does in two weeks time at Le Mans, his home Grand Prix. Though, if it's dry then the Kawasaki's simply don't have the pace to keep up with the Hondas. If he does well there, it'll be interesting to see if the former 250cc World champion gets to keep the ride for the rest of the season.

Nederlander Jurgen van den Goorbergh, another rent-a-rider drafted in from World SuperSport, finished quite well in 6th place, given it was his first ever race on these prototypical four stroke MotoGP bikes. He had previously raced the two-strokes, usually on uncompetitive machinery, but he never made the most of the few chances he got on decent rides back then.

[Corrections: The surname should be Jacque, not Jacques, and OJ was standing in for Alex Hoffman, not Shinya]

Wednesday April 27, 2005

close racing

Some people think close racing involves Snoremacher sitting behind Alonso for 10 odd laps. Well, not really, this:

is close racing (image thanks to an unknown blogger). That's Rossi's right handlebar stuck into the back of Gibernau's shoulder (you can just see the left side of Gibernau's helmet), he actually injured Gibernau, who was still on pain killers at the next GP. twistingasphalt.com have an excellent animated GIF of Rossi's final corner, all-or-nothing overtake. Rossi obviously does not take prisoners, more interesting is that he was relying on blocking Sete - had Rossi arrived at the corner ahead of Sete, he would have gone wide and Sete would taken the inside line to win. Rossi had to arrive at it beside Sete to ensure Sete had to go wide, except of course he actually ended up using Sete as a "doorstop". ;)

In the interests of fairness, it must be noted that the second MotoGP at portugal wasn't as close. Barros took it by a mile after having stuck with Sete, who ended up crashing when the rain came down. Rossi finished second, but he had to make quite a pass on Biaggi to get it. (oh, the definition of "by a mile" in MotoGP is about 5s..)

Monday April 11, 2005

MotoGP: business as usual

GP season kicked off at Jerez yesterday, and what a race. Looks like this year will continue on in same vein as last year with Rossi and Sete scraping fairings (literally) as they battle for first.

Rossi clung on to Gibernau from the beginning of the race, keeping his slower Yamaha in touch of Sete's rocketship Honda RCV211. At one point in mid race he fell back a second and had to fend off Nicky Hayden (also on an RCV211). However he managed to claw his way back up to Sete and position himself for a challenge for the lead in the final two breath-taking laps. The lead must have swapped 5 times in those last two laps, with Rossi going really late on the brakes into corners and taking Sete but going wide on exit and letting Sete power past again, only for Rossi to stuff Sete on the brakes at the next corner or so again. Then Rossi, in the lead, made a mistake and ran very wide allowing Sete to get in front with what looked like a crucial bike length or two of lead on the last lap to take the win. Rossi is not the kind of guy to settle for the points and take second place, and went for an absolute do-or-die late-braking charge into the very final hairpin of the race, managing to get his bike inside and abreast of Sete who, unaware Rossi had magically appeared beside him, turned into the corner and hence collided with Rossi. Both of them ran wide, Sete going into the grass, Rossi managing to stay on the tarmac and accelerate down the straight to take the flag.

Rossi took the podium to a cacophony of boos and derogatory whistling from the Spanish fans displeased at seeing their "local" Sete beaten at the last by the Italian. Sete was obviously fuming; he wouldn't comment on the pass in an interview with Suzi Perry, and when he came into the paddock and got off his bike he stared furiously at the delighted Rossi who was celebrating with his team.

Incredible racing. Rossi is undoubtedly a motorcycling genius. 3 time world champion on Honda's, deliberately moved manufacturer to prove he can win even on a slower bike. 1 title with Yamaha and looking on-track for another. And only 26. He's apparently interested in taking on car racing in some form when he gets sick of winning MotoGP - he tested with Ferrari last year and posted times within 4s of Schumacher, not bad for a newbie. But it'd be sad to see such genius stiffled by Formula Snore... ;)

( Apr 11 2005, 07:20:31 AM IST ) Permalink Comments [0]