22. MotoGP weekend

I have never been to any type of circuit racing in my life and when I say that I mean I have never been to a track anywhere and watched any racing. Lots of TV watching of course but as I found out that never really projects the atmosphere or the noise of the track.. So with the weather forecast set to be dry but maybe a bit chilly both Eric and myself derided to go on the bikes which made great sense when saw the traffic situation. So tickets were bought for the MotoGP at the Ricardo Tormo Circuit.

Eric couldn't make the Friday practice session so I went on my own.that was an experience in itself the noise was out of this world and so many motorbikes in the park.

And of course being a life long Rossi fan, I did say I watched it on TV, I just had to make my way over to the merchandise stall and get myself a little memento of the day.

So back the next day with Eric on his BMW R1150GS  and this time they would not let us in via the back of the circuit there were police everywhere sending all the bikes back the way we had just come and onto the A£ where we with thousands of other bikes used the hard shoulder as a lane I thought at the time that this was chaos LOL. It was  at this point I told Eric that the tickets he had bought were probably the worse ones you could get LOL we  were right at the front with a rather large hoarding blocking the view we eventually watched the qualifying from a standing position higher up which gave us a good view of 90% of the track,

As far as the weather was concerned it turned out rather warm eventually and I even got a little sun burnt overall a great day and we got to see Marquez crash. Bearing in mind the chaos in getting into the circuit we arranged to meet up a little earlier than the Saturday, so Sunday morning up and out with the dogs in the pitch black then off to meet  up with Eric, What greeted us at the circuit was just unreal however many bikes there were on Saturday you can now multiply that by 10 times my god it was packed with bikes and of course cars they were still trying to get into the circuit way after the racing had started??

The racing was great but it was a lot cooler than the day before in fact a little chilly to be honest but we didn't care we got there in time for the first race Moto1 then Moto2 then the big boys The Doctor did not have the best of days and once again Marquez won the race much to the locals excitement, Lorenzo retired from racing and lots of firecrackers were set off followed by a hell of a firework display as we were leaving the track.

I did make three little videos of the three classes to try and see if I could capture the noise but even my little camera has limitations but if you watch then you will see that I did try LOL.

Moto1, Moto2 and then MotoGP

All in all quiet a spectacle and something that I wouldn't mind going to see again, the only down side to it all was our seats but we know better now and the fact that all drinks were taken from us at the entry gate which included the brand new flash that Lorni had bought me, oh well can't win them all.

21, The problem with a bigger top box...!

It's great to have more room in my top box and I can now put two full face helmets in so no carrying around anymore for myself and pillion, also as most of you know I am a keen photographer and now I can carry more of camera equipment around with me, the only down side is as you can see from the picture the top box overlaps the lids of the side boxes more on the right side then the left due the to fact they are offset because of the exhaust.

So the left side box lid is still no problem it only just touches the bigger top box so you can just pull it around with no trouble at all.

The right hand side box lid gets more interference from the bigger top box but the hinge is still loose enough to get it around with little effort.

But on both the side boxes that I have on my bike there is another solution the front hinges can release the lid. on the front hinge look for the word "PRESS" do what ti says and at the same time push the lid towards the front of the bike, having unlocked the rear first of course and the lid slides forward not touching the new top box at all...problem solved.

Dam clever these Japanese fellows !.

20. Does my bum look big in this...???

Another week in paradise,well in Spain anyway and according to my friends and family in the UK this is probably paradise at the moment as it seems Winter is starting to hit England,getting cooler here as well but at 17 degrees today a near balmy Summers day int he UK. One of the great things with Spain is you can ride nearly all year long. One of the problems that I have mentioned on here before a few times is the fact that I don't find the Yamaha seats that comfortable and not just me according the some of the forums I have been on so....! I bit the bullet and ordered replacement seats from Touratech. The arrived very quickly and as soon as I got them into the garage I found a problem or two...

As you can see the new Touratech rear seat on the right is a fair bit bigger than the Yamaha standard seat on the left. This did lead to a problem as can be see in the piccies below.

The Touratech seat was designed to fit the Standard Yamaha XT1200 which does not come with a top box so it is squashed up against the top box mounting plate that has been retro fitted, The advice I received from fellow owners who also had this problem ranged from leaving it as it is, it would eventually tear of course, to fitting spacers to raise the mounting plate or brackets to move the plate further away??? In the end I managed to move the seat a little forward and then I filed off some of the plate to make sure there was enough clearance.

The other little problem I had was that I couldn't get the front seat to latch properly in the high position only the low which turned out OK as I am still on tippy toes with the new seat on the low position...so job done for now.

The next problem to sort out was the top box, the one Yamaha supplied was fine but a little small insomuch that you can only get one helmet in it and..well I never travel light, I found that there was a slightly larger version of the box that I had, mine is a 42 litre and the other box I found is a larger 58 litre so I thought about it and then..well ordered it from the UK and as you can see it is a bit bigger.

Does my bum look big in this?

Anyway I have not got the capacity that I want so another job ticked off, this bike is beginning to seem a bit like Triggers Broom anyway only another week and I will try both the new seats and the bigger box out when I go the the Valencian leg of the MotoGP next weekend.

I'll be in the Blue seats going for all three days and really looking forward to it as I have never been to a circuit race of any kind in my life let alone a major race meeting like this I'll be going with my BMW friend Eric for La Drova and of course I will get to see my hero race Rossi but don't tell my Spanish Friends that!!!!.