2018 World Superbikes - Phillip Island Day 3 and 4

DAY 3 & 4 - World Superbike

Saturday morning arrived and I was pumped and looking forward to getting out to the track. Not only were the WSBK boys in town but it coincides with the opening round of the Australian Superbike championship with none other than 3 time WSBK rider Troy Bayliss competing in this years championship at 48 years old. It was only a quick 15 minute ride out to the track.

Troy Bayliss ASBK Superbikes

Colin Edwards WSBK

Marco Melandri's WSBK

Marco Melandri

A rather second hand MV Augusta

Sticky black donuts

We even managed on the sunday to do the pit walk where we actually got to meet some of the top riders. An excellent score thanks Doug. Even wandering around in the back of the pits you got to see some fantastic motorcycling exotica.

Alex Lowes - Yamaha Racing

Glen Alertons ASBK

ASBK Kawasaki Team

Aussie MOTOGP legend Anthony West now racing in WSS

ASBK - Yamaha Racing

3 Amigo's

Melandri after the race win

WSBK Kawasaki Team

Jonathan Rea's Bike

Tom Syke's Podium Ride

Bushpig's enthusiasm for the WSS race was overwhelming

Me and the Chaz

Two great days were had at the track with Marco Melandri taking out the honours in both races. He came from behind in race 1 to take the win with the kawasaki's fading with severe tyre wear. The Pirelli tyres were coming apart in race one with Dorna confirming that race 2 would have an enforced mandatory tyre change rule in force just like motogp a few years ago when Marquez was penalised for not pitting early enough. 

Tom Sykes Bike

The Honda Garage

Kenan Sofugolu and the Bushpig

Two fantastics days of racing with World Supebikes and Supersport, Australian Superbikes and Supersport. Good times for all with excellent racing, even though Geoff slept through an exciting World Supersport Race. I also love the fact that you can ride your bike around the outside of the track, which you can't do at Motogp it makes moving to different parts of the track to watch the racing a lot easier and quicker.

Cheers WSBK done and dusted

How cold is too cold to ride?

I've been reading Brenda's adventures over at the white shadow diary. For those who haven't read it a short synopsis they were riding over Mt Hotham (1861 m or 6109 ft) in the Victorian highlands when it rained then snowed on them forcing them to stay in a ski lodge for a couple of days.

They looked wet, cold but were still in remarkably good spirits. I've ridden through this same area and in similar conditions but not snowing. I vividly remember one time coming across the top of the mountain and coming down towards Harrietville and there was a huge storm sitting on the western side of the mountain. It was blowing pretty hard and it had that biting cold mountain air that goes straight through you. I nearly had to stop on the way down. I was riding so slowly and couldn't feel my fingers and most of my upper body had gone numb. It was hard to move and I couldn't shift about in the seat making me frozen in position. Not ideal to ride in at any rate. Luckily about 30 minutes of that I made it down low enough that it warmed up enough that I thawed out and could move again.

The following photos are from two separate rides across the top of Hotham in very poor conditions. The first one was in 5°C (41°F) in thick fog with snow on the ground. We were headed for the motogp at Phillip Island.

5°C at Hotham central

The next 2 photos are of me on a group ride with friends on our way to Phillip Island for the World Super bikes. Another wet foggy 1°C (33°F) morning on the mountain.

1°C again at Hotham Central

The last one is my very first blog header picture. It's somehow one of my favourite photos from my riding in the early years. I don't have many photos from those days as I never thought to take many. Thanks Brenda for bring back the memories and made me dig up these old pics. When have you ridden in the cold and thought that it was too cold to be riding?