Taken it to the Track

It's time to go to the track. I was quite nervous about riding with a lot of other riders in a small area. Small compared to the real streets with real cars. On Friday, October 4, 2008 I attended my first track day at the LV Motor Speedway on the Classic Road Course. This track day was sponsored by Sportbike Track Time. The novice group was split up into groups of 3-4 and had female racers as instructors. This was the Femmoto 2008 but men also participated on this day. People came from all across the country to attend this event; it was great. Like I said, I was pretty nervous and wasn't sure I was up to the task but it was too late for that. My husband had put new race tires on my F4 so the bike would slide on the corners and it didn't. Partially due to the tires and partially because I didn't go fast enough to slide. I felt like I was flying around the track but it was not so. It didn't make much sense to me to fly up the straights just to slam on the brakes at the turn so I didn't. My husband kept nagging me I could go faster so on the last lap of the day I managed to pick up the speed a look slightly more respectable.

On Saturday, only women were allowed on the track. Different motorcycle manufacturers, i.e. Kawasaki, Aprilia, and Buell etc. brought their bikes to the track for the women to ride. There were street demo rides for the public, men and women, provided you had a motorcycle license. Riding the different bikes on the track was unbelievably fun. When you go to a dealer to look at bikes you can't take them for test drives like you can cars so this gives you a chance to try different types of bikes. I'm sure the manufactures are hoping you like a bike enough to buy one. I did learn that I no longer wanted to ride a standard motorcycle like my FZ6. I wanted to ride a true sportbike; it just felt right.

Bigger and Faster

I thought I would be ever so happy once I had my license and was free to come and go as I pleased on my new bike. I still needed to get used to street traffic and stopping and taking off at lights because it is embarrassing to kill the engine when you're supposed to be taking off. You know how people are when you don't go when the green light says to go. I stuck to the smaller streets but after awhile that gets boring.

As I got braver, I decided to use this as a mode of transportation to and from work. I drive up Decatur to Rancho, close to UMC and the traffic tends to go faster than the 45 mph that is posted. This is normal for Las Vegas and I'm used to it in my car. I, also like to go faster that the speed limit if I can get away with it. Not to long ago, I didn't get away with it and I was on Rancho on my way to work so I pay more attention now. This is when I began to be dissatisfied with the smaller motorcycle. It didn't have much pick up and go when taking off and you can really feel the pressure of the traffic wanting to get around you. This bike was not up to highway travel either, it felt very small and insignificant compared to the cars and trucks traveling the road next to me.

Time for a bigger, faster bike and it was a 2007 Yamaha FZ6 which made me feel much more competitive as far as speed and size goes.
With a bigger bike I felt more confident that I would not be crushed at any moment by a car or truck.

During this time I heard mention of an all female track day and this was very intriguing. I checked on the internet and found Femmoto.com. Femmoto is sponsored by Sport Bike Track Time and was due to be at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway in October 2008. This was something I was sure I wanted to do so I made that my goal and we started making longer trips on the bikes so I would be ready to ride when the time came. We also found a 1999 Honda F4 just to use as a track bike. This was it, I was ready to go fast and be cool.