New Race Bike

My racing efforts in 2007 had some highs and lows. In two of the races I finished I placed on the podium. The problem was I didn't finish many races. In fact I think my start to finish ratio was less than 50%. Why? Almost always engine overheating. I tried and tried, and tried to get it worked out, and in the last race weekend of the year I finally got it all sorted. But with that I just wasn't sure if I wanted to keep going.

The 2007 season had started pretty positive (scroll down through the blog, and you'll see). So with 2007 coming to an end I was trying to make sense out of this racing thing. I was really considering giving it up all together. I was tired of riding the 500. I had put as much money into it as I could stand, and still I was not going to win any races. Even though my bike is highly modified it is still based on a 20 year old design, and there are newer bikes in the class that no matter how well I rode I was not going to overcome. So a new thought entered my head. Why not buy a new race bike? I didn't think much of it at first because a modern race bike that was remotely competitive would be in the $6k range, and that was not an option. But then I worked my ass off (see post about Oracle). In fact all I did for three months straight was work, and at the end of all that a new race bike wasn't out of the question anymore. So I started looking at Suzuki SV650's. They could be found fully race prepped with competitive modifications, like a front end swap, engine mods which would include carb's (if first gen bike) cam's, exhaust ect... I hadn't found the perfect bike for the right price until one day I was trolling through a thread on barf, http://www.bayarearidersforum.com/, about a trackday I was looking at attending. I had posted a comment about how I was thinking about getting a new bike, and a well known bike builder named Zoran, http://www.twinworksfactory.com/, let me know that their Kawasaki 650 was for sale. With a couple of days some e-mails where exchanged, and the new bike was mine. I picked it up Thanksgiving weekend at a trackday at Thunderhill. Below is the bike as it was delivered to me that day.

It's difficult to explain how great it is to ride this bike. My old race bike was never easy to ride. The great thing is I didn't know any better. My 500 had an old style square steel tubed frame that even though it was braced flexed like a wet noodle in high speed turns. This made it challenging to get the bike to change directions at high speeds. It took a lot of strength to wrestle the bike over. The new bike is not like that at all. It goes where you point it, with minimal effort, uses modern, suspension, brakes, and fueling.

The bike: A 2006 Kawasaki EX650. It is a 20 year newer version of

my old race bike. It uses a 650cc parallel twin cylinder 4-stroke motor. Fed by fuel injection (my first FI bike), and with after market cams, and a modification to the air box it makes just under 80hp. The front end is off a 2005 Kawasaki Ninja 636, as is the rear wheel. It was bought new in 2006, and immediately turned into a race bike. One of the main benefits of buying a new bike is that it doesn't need much. The suspension is going to get redone to my weight, and the body work has been dropped off at the painters to get it's customary blue. While riding at Sears Pt on Saturday I noticed a little clutch slippage in 5th gear so I think I will put a new set of friction plates in before my first race. Other than that it's change the oil, add gas go race!

Acquiring this bike has opened new doors. I alway wanted to race with other organizations, but my 500 would usually be in the same classes as the 650's and thus being no where near competitive. Now that I have a 650 it's time to put it out there. So with that I hope to race with WERA in Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and Utah as well as AHRMA at Willow Springs, and my regular AFM here in Northern CA. My first race is in January at California Speedway. That's not even three weeks from now. Yee

Ha!

Oracle 07

Oracle has come and gone.
What an ass kicking. Yet another mega show, but this one has a special element. We build the main tent in the middle of one of the busiest street in SF. Howard Street. Right between the the two main buildings of the Moscone Convention center.
The Oracle Howard Street project is not so much about beautiful, cool, or even extravagant lighting. It's really an exercise in logistics. How do you build a tent in the middle of the street, get the lights up, the carpet down, and the tables set ready to open in 3 days? Very carefully.

One of the most difficult aspects is just getting gear into the venue. There is no loading zone. We had the meters on 3rd street bagged, but between 4pm-6pm that lane is open to traffic. So we had windows that we could load and unload trucks.
Like I said it's tough. Add in the the rain, on the 2nd day, the long days, and short nights, and it adds up to a tough week.

Did I mention the other big tent in the garden?

Oh and the tents on the terrace?

I don't even have pictures of all the tents like on the upper deck of the Metreon or outside of Moscone West.

It takes a really tight team of people. Producers, technical directors, tent designers, even down to the person who manages getting the trash collected and into the correct recycling bins. This group spends 17 hours a day together during the week, and really come together to pull it all off. It's an amazing display of teamwork.

I know one thing for sure. We have less than 300 days until load in of Oracle 08

AFM Round 5

I raced last weekend. I really thought I was going to take home a trophy, and I almost did. Here's a brief race write up of the 500 Twins race.
I gridded up in 5th just behind class leader John Forman. I thought I might really have something for him this weekend. Two board, and my visor clicks into place. 1 board, and I put the bike in gear. The one board goes sidewaaaaays! Green flag and we're off!
I got a great start but for some reason turned chicken as we powered through T1, and 3 guys came around me. I was mad at myself so I stayed on the gas through T2, and ran it up the inside, cutting off my friend, and teammate Eric. That put me in 4th with the "Lenny" in front of me. I was right behind Lenny through turns 4, and 5, and was pulling around him through 6. His bike has some serious motor work so he pulled a little gap on me in the short straight into 7. I knew I had him though because he didn't pull enough of a gap, and as I got on the brakes much later, and harder than him I went right by him into 7.
That's how it would be for the next 6 laps. I'd keep him behind me for most of the track, and then he'd gain on me between 6, and 7, and lose it all on the brakes. A couple times I saw him try to show me a wheel, and I'd move over a little, and get on the brakes blocking him.
I really had it until the last lap. That's when my bike overheated. Bummer....
My bike started running rough, and I knew from the droplets on my face shield what was happening. "come on baby one more lap, just hold it together" I was yelling in my helmet. But it was not to be. Into T6 "The Carousel" my engine started to sputter, and he got around me going into 7. I got on the brakes really really late, and literally pushed him wide. I had regained the position for a brief moment for when I twisted the throttle my engine died.
ugh
I coasted for a few minutes, and considered pulling off the track, but instead I tried to start it, and indeed the bike fired up, and I limped it home running on one cylinder for a 4th place.

I think I know what's up, and I will make some changes this week. I've got another race in two weekends so hopefully this time we'll bring it home.

Make it RED!

When Virgin America finally got the OK to start flying their new airline out of San Francisco airport they wanted to make a local statement. Something non traditional to let everyone know they where here. So when they contacted the mayors office of SF they where told in no uncertain words that if they wanted to do this they'd have to work with Hartmann Studios, and in turn Impact Lighting. So I got the call to make San Francisco Red.
OK what exactly did they mean? Well threw out some pretty wild ideas: Golden Gate Bridge, Trans America building, City Hall, Coit Tower. I thought "yeah right" everyone wants to talk big. Well it turned out they didn't just talk. So we settled on 5 civic structures. SF City Hall, The Opera House, the Veterans Building, the monument in Union Sq, Coit Tower, and The Ferry Building. Oh, and as a bonus they didn't want to disturb the daily activities around these buildings so could the lights go away each night?
Um Yeah, sure. ..?
So how does one light up 5 major civic structures for 5 nights in a row and not have any lights visible during the day? The answer: Trucks
The main focus was City Hall, and the Ferry building. We would prebuild a lighting rig on a flat bed truck and drive it into place each night. Rather than making this a case study of how I did this for each building I'll just show some cool pictures, and those of you that are lighting nerds, can post questions.

I used a variety of equipment Source 4 pars, Varilites, Mac 2k washes, and Xenotech 7k's.








The trucks where all prebuilt in the impact shop, and driven to the two locations each night. Can you imagine a parade of 8 trucks packed with movers heading down the freeway? I watched them cross the Bay Bridge and I couldn't help but laugh.

First up is Coit Tower which was not done with trucks, but with pars mounted on the roof of the lower museum. It was the only place that we didn't have to take the lights down each night.




Next is City Hall



I seem to have exceeded my photo limit.
I'll put some more pictures up at later.

The Allstar Game

San Francisco hosted the MLB Allstar game earlier this month. I was the lighting designer and project manager. I got back from Italy on July first around 8pm, and I was on site at 9am the following morning. It was not easy going from the super chill Tuscan lifestyle right back into "the pace" but I didn't really have much choice.

I have to say that if one is going to have to go right back to work this was as good
as it could be. A rare sunny warm week by the bay. The project was massive. I had I had 6 other Impact project managers working on it each paired up with a union head electrician, and I designed, and oversaw the whole thing.

The tents started being built on June 22 (the day I left for Italy) and the first day

of lighting installation was July 1st. The first of the two events was July 9th. We took one day off for the 4th so it was 8 days of install for a 3 hour party. Yee Haw!
The end product was definitely one for the picture books.
I've posted a few of the pics from my camera. I want to get some others.

In other news I plan on racing mid August. Unfortunately I've got another monster event to deal with first. Virgin America "Paint the town Red" Can you believe I have to light 5 SF civic buildings in red for 5 nights. Not an easy task.

Italian Adventures

I recently got back from a trip to Italy.
It was great. I got to join Sophia's family for a reunion abroad. The combined extended family made up 42 people. We rented 4 farm houses on a converted 15/16th century abbey in the Tuscan country side.
http://www.abbaziadispineto.com/
It's difficult to put into words all the fun that was had.
We flew out of SF, through Frankfurt landing in Florence. We spent a night there before heading down to the abbey on Saturday June 23rd (yes I spent my birthday in Italy).
Saturday morning we (Sophia and myself) picked a KTM 640 Adventure from a company called Stradanova. They where a cool group of people real enthusiats, but a little less than organized. It's good to see that motorcycle people are the same all around the world!












Once at the abbey the week was mostly spent doing very little. A day trip here and there, lots of cooking, but mostly lounging.


























Everyday there was at least a little riding. Some days the riding was more. The roads on the abbey property are all dirt, and there where some really fun and challening "tracks" as well. Around the abbey is the heart of Tuscany, specifically a national preserve called The Val d'Orcia http://www.nautilus-mp.com/tuscany/presentazione/valdorcia/indexing.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Val_d'Orcia
http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1026
It made for some of the most breathtaking motorcycling ever. I spent a lot of time twisting my way through this amazing landscape. Some days I would go for a ride in the morning, then come back to the abbey, pick up a passenger, like Sophia's brother Steven, or sister Eva and head right back out. Many of the roads I explored where groomed dirt roads that would past ancient farm houses.
Amazing stuff.






It was a great trip, and I had a lot of fun being there. I honestly wasn't ready to come home.

Race 2

Full race report coming soon. Here are some pics in the short term.

The First Race

I haven't done much of a write up of my first race weekend. I guess maybe I just didn't want to talk about it.

I did really well in my first two races of the day on Sunday. Both of them where classes my bike isn't competitive in, but they where fun, and I diced with many other riders.

For 500 Twins, my main class, I got a fairly poor start, and went through T1 in 6th of something. I picked off a couple of bikes in T2, a couple more including my racing partner Eric in T4 and that left me in Third place. We went through turns 5-8 and I was gaining on the 2nd place guy. Coming into turn 9 I closed the gap in a hurry. I'm really good on the brakes. I knew for sure I could get him into T11, and take 2nd place. However exiting T9 my bike started running on 1 cylinder (it's a twin) and I looked down and I could see that it had over heated. So before I got to T11 I pulled off the track totally dejected. There went my first AFM trophy.

So we loaded up the bikes, and went to Tommy's to drown our sorrows in tequila.

Racing season starts this weekend

My first race of the year is this weekend, and amazingly I'm almost ready for it.
I wanted to keep this post short as I'll do a much longer race write up, but I wanted to get some pictures of the bike out there.

Easter Sunday

Today is Easter Sunday, and in the bay area that means the Mt Tam Easter Sunrise Ride. This has to be my favorite ride of the year. The ride started years ago as a vintage group but has grown to all motorcycles, and is now a bay area tradition where people would ride to the top of Mt Tamalpais to watch the sun rise . People gather up at Tam Junction which is where Hwy 1 splits off from Mill Valley, and heads up the mountain. The SFMC folks gathered at the club house at 4am, and left just after 4:30am, and we arrived at Tam Junction just before 5am.










There must have been 300 bikes at Tam Junction. We chatted with folks, and kick tires for a few minutes before beginning our ascent. Riding up Mt Tam is a wonderful challenging ride in the daylight, at night it can be treacherous. The ride is tight, twisty, often covered with leaves, or dirt, and everything is damp from the famous bay area fog. So with that said it's every bit of a race to the top of the hill. The first group to leave are usually the fast guys on supermoto's that don't want to get caught in the in the main pack. Riding fast at night is a whole new test. You want to go as fast as you can to keep the guy on your tail at a distance, but you need to leave enough room for error to correct when you think the road turns right, but actually goes left. It happens it's dark.

So when the first group left I wasn't quite ready and I knew I had my work cut out to weave my way through them. It turned to be pretty easy. Once I got past that group I hooked up with rich from "The Wreckin Crew" a local club, and we quickly put some distance between us. Rich was on this ratty old BMW that he's owned for years. He really shouldn't be that fast on this beat up old bike, but the extra headlight he mounted was useful.







A short while later Allen Zino passed us riding us KTM Adventure. It made me laugh because he passed us with all this bravado like we where so slow. Let me tell you it's not easy leading in the dark. When you're following someone you have their tail light to follow, and you can use their headlight to see further. When you're in the lead there's nothing to see except what your headlight is doing, and with the dark, and fog it isn't much. so Allen blasts by us, all elbows out tough guy looking, then immediately slows down. Yup I thought so. The three of us motored away and where the first ones to the parking lot on the top. Not bad. One CCM supermoto, one KTM adventure, and haggard old BMW. That does a pretty good job of summing up the kinds of riders here in the bay area. The poser sport bike crowd won't be out of bed by the time I get done writing this.

Once at the top most people with either walk up to the look out tower, which is a treacherous hike to itself, or the end of the foot path. Either one offers stunning views of the bay area.

Like I said before I love this ride. Only the most dedicated of riders are willing to get out of bed when at 3am to ride their bikes up a twisty mountain road at night. Most of these people are skilled riders representing all walks of life, and styles of riding. It's great to see how motorcycles can bring together such a diverse group of people.





Last years ride was brutal as it was pouring rain. Still about 100 die hard folks showed up, and rode that twisty mountain road at night in the pouring rain. It was damn fun!
For more info about Mt Tamalpais check out: http://www.mttam.net/

Health Care in Vegas

I just got back from doing an event in the fabulous town of Las Vegas. The event was a a presidential forum on health care. Both parties where invited, but only the 7 Democratic front runners accepted the invitation.
It may not sound exciting, but if you think that one of those 7 people is going to be the next US president it actually was. One thing about it that was really cool is that I hired my of one old college buddies (from Junior college mind you) to be my head electrician. Below is a picture of Vince hard at it.



The event was televised, and web cast so it was mainly about TV style lighting. I've become much better at it, but I still need to develop in that area. considering I've had no training other than trial and error I think I'm doing pretty good. The venue was the Cox Pavilion adjacent to The Thomas, and Mack Arena on the UNLV campus. Below is the rig starting to come together.


We had a really tight load in as there was only one day for install, focus, and rehearsal. The morning went well. I'd flown in the day before, so I was well rested, and ready for what ever might pop up. We used union labor for most of our installers. That's IATSE Local 720, but the venue provided the riggers, and they where not very good, and as such the install didn't go as rapidly as I'd have liked. Actually all the departments, lighting, video, audio, and scenic where behind so at least I wasn't holding anyone else up. Below the rig is finally up off the ground.


We ended our day at 11:30pm which was at least an hour, and a half later than hoped, and I hadn't really accomplished much as far as programming goes, but the rig was up, focused, and ready for the show. Below is what it looked like when it was too late to think anymore.



I got to the venue extra early, like 7am, to finish up some programming, because I just wasn't satisfied with where I had left it, and the press was being let in at 8:30am. I had noticed a small dark spot downstage center, and there wasn't anything I could do about it, as the light hitting that area was directly over a seating area that had already been occupied by some early press arrivals. I told myself it would be fine, but I should have forced the point, and made them move to get the scissor lift out as Hillary Clinton decided to park herself squarely in that dark spot. Lesson learned.


John Edwards, there where more people taking pictures of his wife than him.

















Obama





























Hillary













I have more pictures, but they all start to look the same, just different candidates. It was an interesting event to be apart of. There was definitely an air of excitement from everyone involved. I like doing gigs like this. Thye have much more meaning than just making a party look good. Later that evening instead of partying it up with my old college chum, I'm old, I crashed out in my hotel room, and I watched the event on the local news. It looked pretty damn good I thought.