Adding Horespower By Shedding Pounds

Well my friends, I have to be honest, there have been no epic rides to pop up since my last posting all those months ago.  As of late I've been working on a different project all together.  A few days after my last post I took a health assessment which was part of the new Health Account Plan that PG&E has migrated our healthcare to.  The results weren't surprising but they did renew a motivation for physical fitness in my life, it seems that maybe I need to do these more often because if I go too long without one I always start to slack off.  I had pretty much been "phoning it in" since I moved here and while the weight wasn't too much out of spec, even before I took the assessment I knew that I weighed in at 215lbs and while I've been a healthy 215 before, this time I knew it wasn't that sort of weight.  The results echoed that feeling my % body fat was too high and my blood pressure wasn't out of the good spectrum but it was dancing on the line of concern so I decided that it was time to right the ship before it got too far off course.  At one point in my life (more than 9 years ago) I tipped the scales at 264 pounds and I definitely do not want to go back there.


So back in mid-November I set a goal to drop down to 190lbs.  I don't think I have been that weight since before high school even at my most fit I have always been comfortable at around 205lbs but I want to see how hard it would be to reach and maintain the 190lbs.  It's not that it would be odd for someone my height to weigh 190lbs technically... If you give the Body Mass Index any credence (which I don't) I should be at 180lbs to be fully "in-spec."  According to my scale that measures the % body fat, % hydration and BMI when I weighed in at 200.6 lbs this week (yay almost 15 pounds gone) I was at 19.6% body fat that would meant that I'm carrying around 39.3 pounds of body fat that.  So losing the next 10 pounds (of all body fat) would put me at 15% body fat which I think would be sustainable with the level of activity I am at.  In the back of my mind I am am setting a stretch goal of hitting the 180lbs and 10% body fat, we'll see how that goes that level of fitness may require too much time and effort to be sustainable I don't want to live in the gym and I don't want to have to say no to every sweet, glass of wine, pint of beer that crosses my path either.


I will say that I am feeling the effects of being on the better side of the fitness spectrum.  Last week I did four strength training days three of which I ran 2 miles in the process of and one of which I ran three miles in the process of.  On top of that I ran a 6.5 mile run one day and my first 10 miler since I have started this process on another day!

The real challenge is going to be keeping up a similar level of activity once I delve into our 12-hour shift rotations that my co-workers voted into place last year.  I start my first set of 12-hour shifts this week with a run of four night shifts.  I'm pragmatic about the switch... I definitely felt like I was always at work while working the rotating 8-hour shifts but it was much easier to find the motivation to do other things on a work day with that extra four hours of free time to yourself.  It just takes a different level of focus to force yourself to work out on those days when you'd rather lay around after working for 12 hours.  For myself "work" means being sedentary, sitting in a chair and thinking really hard so it's not a physical tiredness it's more that you're mentally drained and you're body is entrenched in that lethargic static state that you really need to harness your mental motivation to bust yourself out of not the easiest task when you're brain-tired.

I have experience with this before, my previous job was 12-hour rotating shifts and I was able to complete the P90X program and that takes a lot more time and intensity than the routine I am on right now and getting results with.  So I know that I am capable it's just a matter of the execution now.  I am confident I can reach the 190 and we'll see about the 180.

So that's the non-moto Juan update...


In solo-moto Juan terms things have been going pretty well.  There are times where I do really miss having a car, but they don't hang around too long.  When I am on the bike it always puts a smile on my face and I did add a little extra comfort to the FZ this last Saturday.  I installed heated handgrips on the bike.  Truthfully it's not necessary for the short ride to and from work but I can tell that if I was to go on a longer ride in the sub 40s that I my gloves would not be enough protection from the cold.

I actually bought the Trackside Grip Heater kit back on Dec 6th at the Cycle-gear store in Fairfield as an impulse buy of sorts.  I've written about my experiences at this store in the past and suffice to say I don't hate the place but I don't like it either, I nothing the place.  But the day before we dipped into the mid 20s overnight and that morning the FZ's battery did not have enough juice to turn the engine over.  No big deal I was able to push-start the bike relatively easily that day.  It's just like any older battery they start to show their age when the temperatures drop.  I had hoped that when I rode the bike that it would get enough charge back into it to limp her along until it got warmer and when I left work that day the bike did start with a little effort.  I figured by the time I got home it would be good to go the next morning.

WRONG!  Once again we had a mid 20's night and once again the bike did not want to start this time the relays just clicked there wasn't even enough juice for the starter to even attempt to turn the engine over.  So for those who ride all year 'round it goes without saying that if you are riding your super-standard motorcycle in the sub 30s you are wearing pretty much all you gear.  I bring that up because while that is fine and dandy when you hop on your bike thumb the starter button and go.  But after the fifth failed attempt at push-starting your bike you are sweating your ass off under all of those layers.  Add to that the frustration of trying to throw your leg over the moving bike without kicking the bags and ending up under the bike it's not the best way to start your day.  Thanks to my poor Wife (who had to deal with a tirade of profanity directed at my bike) and my obvious agitation I was able to jump start the thing and get to work on-time but that was enough.  At this point in my life there's no reason to try and "limp along" a dying battery until it gets warm again  I decided that after my shift I would be heading directly to the nearest cycle shop (Cycle-gear) and buying a new battery.  Of course that day was the day it decides to rain and rain hard.  Undaunted, after my shift I got on my drenched bike with all my gear and headed to Fairfield.  The gear did it's job and I stayed perfectly dry so that is a good thing.  It was about 40 degrees which with the rain and wind was enough to remind me that I should look and see about heated handgrips while I was there.

Seeing that the grip heater kit was only $29.99 I grabbed one while I was buying my $112 battery.  By the time I got back on the road it was dark and still rainy and the traffic was stop-and-go heading from Fairfield to Vacaville so I got my first taste of lane splitting on a 4-5 line highway, in the dark, in the pouring rain. Truthfully I felt much safer splitting than I would have in an actual lane stopping and going with the cars.  I kept my pace to roughly 10mph faster than the cars and kept my head on a swivel and made it through none-the-worse for wear. The next day I installed the new battery but didn't find the motivation to attack the hand-grips.


I did make one attempt a few weeks later but had no luck at getting the stock handgrips off and I gave up that day.  I feared that if I did manage to get them off that were the odds that I would be able to get them back on with they slight increase in diameter that the heaters would add?  Plus I was worried that I would need a compressor to get them off which I didn't have so they sat and waited for an increase in motivation.  So this last weekend I did a little research and found a youtube video of a guy with a Gen II FZ who was able to get the handgrips off with just a heat gun (which I did have) that was the inspiration I needed.




I went back to the cycle gear and bought a set of Pro-grip handgrips in case I couldn't get the old ones off (I'd just cut them off) or I did get them off and they wouldn't go back on I'd have a new softer set to try and put on.

I was able to heat up the grips enough to soften the glue and pull the grips off the bars with a lot of effort in the twisting and pulling department.  I did the same as the guy in the video I applied heat directly to the grips until I could see a little bit of shine on them from the heating then I switched to blowing the heat into the bar itself alternating between these two for a couple of minutes taking extra care when pulling the throttle side off so as not to damage the throttle tube.

You want to be mindful with this kit of the fact that the wire leads are just soldered to the heating elements so you don't want to have too much of a bend in the wires lest over time the soldered connection breaks.  You can see that the clutch-side I have mounted it pretty close but since this one is stationary (no twisting) I figured it would be okay.

The throttle side I mounted the heater a little more outboard so there wasn't such an extreme angle at the soldered connection.

Wiring up the kit wasn't very clear with the instructions provided.  I wired mine into the positive and the negative wires going to and from the right side-marker light in the headlight cluster the same strategy I used when wiring up the accessory socket to the left side-marker.

I placed the switch fore of the accessory socket on the left-hand side inner fairing.  You are able to tell what side of the three-position switch is the high and low by placing the hi-lo plate on the switch there is a key/slot on the threaded portion so you can tell which way to wire the switch. My kit did not come with an extra female spade connector to connect the two of the terminals to the shared middle male terminal so I just soldered them to the terminal but you may want to check your kit if you decide to buy one of these to see if yours comes with one and perhaps buy one if you don't want to solder the ends onto the switch. The kit also made a point to mention that you shouldn't place the ceramic resistor on anywhere that would be heat sensitive so I used some zip ties on the wires entering and exiting the resistor and attached it to the metal portion of the fairing stay that in my mind would get enough air flow to dissipate the heat and keep it away from any other heat sensitive wiring.  Other than that it was just a matter of making sure your wire routing does not conflict with the moving of the steering components and cutting away some of the sheathing on the positive and negative wires going to the side markers and soldering the other wires together.  All of the wires are black in the kit so make sure that you have the right ends going to the right places.

I decided to install the new handgrips.  I ended up having to use copious amounts of grip glue to "lube up" the handlebars/grips enough to get them to slide on all the way.  I would recommend either having an air compressor to ease them on or wearing some nitrile gloves for that part of the job because all that extra glue ended up on my hands and I had to spend a lot of time at the sink with the acetone to remove the dried (basically krazy) glue.

I am happy with the end result and so far have found that the best way to use them is to get them started on the hi setting and then adjust them to the lo setting once they get to the desired temp.  I normally ride covering the brakes and clutch with two fingers though so those two fingers still get cold.  If I were on a longer highway ride I would probably just hold onto the grip with my whole hand if the traffic was clear to keep warm.  It wasn't that bad of a project, I think I spent a total of 3.5 hours to get them installed and working.


In my last update I teased that I would cover my new seat cover install.  It's been a while and I almost forgot I did it.  A member on FZ1OA suggested I try an HT-Moto Custom Seat Cover when I had mentioned the idea of buying a new stock seat.  I realized that my previous repairs to the seat, while holding did not do enough and that other parts of the same seam were starting to fail due to age and brittleness of the seat cover material.  The new seat cover only cost $80 and I figured I'd give it a shot.  The results were outstanding and I can't say enough about the quality and finish.  But you can see for yourself...

All you do to install it is stretch the new cover over the existing cover (their recommendation) and staple as you go pretty darn easy.

That's the moto-update for now.  I hope to have something more interesting to share moto-wise with you on the next update.  Thanks for checking out the update none-the-less.  Until next time...

Front Suspension Refresh & Other Updates

So it's been nearly a month since I last posted on here and it certainly doesn't feel like that much time has passed.  In truth it has been a very busy month.  A lot of my time has been taken up with prepping to "go live" at work; meaning that I am untethered and making reliability decisions that for the electric grid that can affect hundreds of thousands of people.  So a lot of my time was spent with my nose in company standards and procedures to make sure that I know what I need to do for different scenarios.  Also Anne and I had our second visitors to our home last weekend which was a nice change of pace for us; Her sister Kate and Fiancée Alex came up from San Diego and stopped for a couple of days on their car tour of Northern California.  Its great to have visitors because it gives you an excuse to indulge in the finer things of life, copious amounts of wine...

    Me & Anne

    Kate & Alex

...a delicious lunch at a high end restaurant; Chez Panisse in Berkeley a delicious home-cooked dinner including an outstanding Tri-tip purchased at The Local Butcher Shop also in Berkeley and enjoying some great company!

    The FZ after a washing and sans bags.

I haven't been doing much moto-wise other than commuting and day-to-day use.  The main reason for that is an issue I became aware of when I was replacing the steering stem bearings on the FZ.  It was pretty evident that the left fork seal was shot.  There was a good amount of fork oil streaked on the inner fork tube and some  collected around the dust seal as well.  I didn't really spend a whole lot of time dwelling on it when I was working on the steering stem bearings. I didn't have the parts and I would need to order them online so there was no stopping the and running out for some fork seals, I also needed time to do some research to determine if I could even take on the task myself and there is always the fact that I need to have my bike back together so I can get to work in the back of my head.  I'm not sure if it is a valid point but the fact that the FZ has standard forks instead of upside down (USD) forks also made me feel that this was an issue that could be taken care of at a later date.  My thought process being that, "at least it's not going to be seeping out all the time just when the forks move are moving."

I have to be honest, after I did the steering stem bearings the last thing I was motivated to do was to tear back into the bike.  Plus there was the whole push to get ready to be on-shift at my job.  It was about a week and a half later before I would actually order the parts.  A disconcerting thing that I found was that  on a lot of the sites I normally go to to find parts, Partzilla and Ron Ayers; I found that a number of key parts that I needed were listed as obsolete/discontinued and were not available for purchase.

Eventually I found all of the parts I needed available in one place, PartsPak; a site that I seems more oriented towards boats.  I ended up ordering the remaining non-yamaha parts from my go-to site Motorcycle Superstore since they were so kind to send me a 10% off entire purchase code and they also had free shipping at the time:

Ratio-Rite Measuring Cup
Motul Factory Line Synthetic Fork Oil 5W 1 Liter
Race Tech Ultra Slick Grease

I also picked up a few replacement parts for my helmet as well

Scorpion SpeedView Sun Visor for EXO-1000 Helmet
Scorpion Faceshield for EXO-500/1000 Helmet

When I was recreational riding only I would have never went through a face-shield in less than a year but I think that was because my post ride ritual at back then involved draping a soft towel soaked in hot-soapy water over my helmet to soften up the bugs and grime before I cleaned them off.  Now I don't have time to do that every time I get off the bike.  I held off replacing the shield as long as possible kind of like my last Gillette Fusion blade but eventually the late afternoon sun and the night time headlights illuminating the scratches on the shield inhibited my vision so much that it was becoming unsafe to ride!  The speed screen (flip down inner dark visor)  that came with the helmet did nothing to protect my eyes from the setting sun so I decided to try the "dark smoke" version and I am sad to report that while it is better it's not as dark as I had hoped.

    The FZ in the morning after a night shift.

Everything made it to my front door quickly except for the fork oil which was drop shipped from a different warehouse and was going to take longer and it turns out that longer turned out to be never.  A product of apartment/condo living I guess... either the UPS guy delivered it to the wrong apartment and they decided to keep it or someone stole it from my front door.  Either way Motorcycle Superstore has initiated a lost package investigation with UPS where they send a guy to check other apartments for the package and he also stopped by my place to have me sign a form stating that I never received the package.  I am assuming at this point that they did not find anything and per Motorcycle Superstore's policy, I will be receiving a refund for the oil as they do not re-send another item if it is lost.  Which is just fine by me as I ended up buying some BelRay 7W fork oil from the Cycle Gear store in Fairfield the day I did the work on the forks.

    Just a nice view outside of Vacaville

Incidentally; I have two of more 10% off your entire order codes that I do not plan on using before they expire at the end of the month and I figured I'd share them here with my readers on a first come first serve basis!

Another item that I purchased off Craigslist was a Black & Decker Workmate 425 for $20 it was well worth the money and afforded me the "extra hands" i needed to get the job done.  If you decide to buy one of these you'd be a fool to pay full price for one as they have been made for years and hardly changed at all and consequently they are lots on Craigslist.  This particular one goes for around $110 new.

Back to the forks, that's what we were talking about right?  I have basically been riding for the last month with the knowledge that I had front suspension issues.  Which also meant limiting my riding only essential trips.  It's interesting that towards the end of this time I could definitely tell that they performance was dropping off exponentially as the oil level dropped continued to drop off.  You got a lot more "talk" from front end and not in a good way; too much chatter.  While commuting to work, where you merge onto the 505 from 80 the interchange is very bumpy and I could tell that instead of the fork assisting the front wheel to comply with the roads surface it was compressing and on the first bump and then rebounding into the crest of the next bump, magnifying the bumps rather than minimizing them.

Of course the day I decided would be the day I worked on the FZ's fork ended up being the third rainy day in the five months that I have been in California and the rainiest thus far (also technically the first day of fall). I took video clips of each step as I went along through the first fork leg and combined them into one video which you can see below and I'm pretty sure there are points in there where you can tell I am getting irritated with the weather.

While I did the work myself and made the video myself, I really am standing on the shoulders of others in this video and would not have attempted this job without a number of different members posts over at Yamaha FZ1 Owners Association:

RavenRider's "$14.50 Suspension Upgrade" gave me a good good idea of what goes on inside the forks:


His thread "Gen I Fork Issues Exposed." also gave me a good understanding of what can go bad on a set of forks:

arkie6's thread "Time for front fork overhaul and upgrade?" holds your hand and walks you through the entire process in detail including the special tools you need to make to do the job:

and FZeno1's post #17 in this thread re hashes some of the details of the job and tools as well as includes the parts list that I used when making my parts purchase.

So a big THANK YOU to all of those guys and I hope that this video will help to add to the collective knowledge base on this sort of work and allow for more Gen 1 FZ1s to remain road worthy and continue to rack up the miles!

As far as the end results go, the only thing that I changed from stock on this job was to go with a heavier oil 7wt vs 5wt and I have noticed on the first ride after the install that I will probably end up backing off the preload one more notch than my normal setting as the front seems a little stiffer at my basic setup but the improvement over before is a marked improvement and I am satisfied with the days work!.

For the next installment I will have an update on my "luggage rack" as it will be heading to the local welding shop to have some supports that have broken re-welded properly and now that I have no lingering maintenance issues with the FZ maybe I will actually go for a fun ride.

Thanks everyone for reading and stay safe until next time!

A Torn Seat & Some Bad Steering Stem Bearings

"A good moto/owner relationship is measured in stories per mile, the better the ratio the more you love the bike.  This incident is just bringing the two of you closer together."

I shared this belief of my own with a friend of mine who is going through a post-track day-crash rebuild a couple of weeks ago.

As someone who bought my first bike in March of 2003 (a 2002 Suzuki SV650s)...

...and then kept it for nearly a decade I do truly come from a school of thought that believes that you can build a relationship with a bike. For me, I value knowing each and every nuance of a bikes character over having the latest and greatest technological showpiece.

The FZ and I are still quite early in our relationship.  I bought it her on June 29th last year but I would say that if I continue on the solo-moto path that I will easily rack up a better story per mile ratio than the SV and I ever had.

When I first bought the FZ there were a few obvious issues with the bike.  The dent in the tank was the most obvious there was also a tear in the seat which had been repaired with some sort of bonding agent and a few other cosmetic nits that could be picked.  The previous owner did disclose that as some point he felt that the steering stem bearings might need to be replaced.  At first I didn't notice anything that would suggest that sort of work needed to be done.  Having already gone through this with my SV I knew what bad steering stem bearings feel like but as my California solo-moto adventure has been progressing I started to notice some shuddering being transmitted to the handlebars on low speed braking.  Further on along the timeline this would be accompanied with a noticeable slight shift forward for the handlebars as if there was a pivot in the steering stem allowing some front to back movement of the front end as well as some clunking when going over larger bumps.  I knew it needed to done and was putting it off but one day on the way to work after the MotoGP trip I took my hands off the handlebars at the same time to adjust the zipper pull on my jacket and noticed that the bike would develop speed wobble if I let go of the handlebars.  That was the last straw; I was finally going to have to deal with it.  I set about the internet and bough the necessary parts which included some new parts for to make my Pit-Bull rear stand compatible with the FZ's swing arm which did not have rollers for a rear stand.

While that stuff was on the way I decided to address a cosmetic issue that had developed over the previous weeks before it got out of control.  The seat repair that the previous owner had done had given out and the tear was back.  I decided that I would do my best to make a permanent repair.

The first step for me was to pull the cover off the seat and get a good look at what was going on with the cover. That meant getting out the needle-nose pliers and doing a lot of pulling.

It turns out that it was a good thing that I did because to the right of the tear in question I discovered another portion of the same seam had a portion that was about to tear as well!

The next step was to stitch up the offending areas with some strong threat.  In my case the strongest stuff I had had was red.  No matter it wasn't going to be visible when I was done anyhow.

This was the product recommended to me by the ladies at Jo-Anne Fabrics (BTW if you're an an adult male and you want to feel the most out of place possible I suggest a run to Jo-Anne Fabrics) it is a fabric and leather repair that basically bonds to the material to be repaired and the patch medium which then combine to form some sort of super bond.  The patch and the glue get applied to the inside of the seat cover.

The next step was to glue some of the same material I that the seat was made of (which I also found at Jo-Anne Fabrics) to the outside of the seat using Gorilla Glue.  The excess glue you see in the above pictures is already wearing it's way off.  Time will tell how well the Gorilla Glue holds up, thus far it is doing a good job of it.

The reason that I didn't rush right into the job at the first telltale signs of the problem was that it's a lot of work to replace your steering stem bearings.  Specifically if you are going to attempt to do it in a shade-tree type environment.  Using the race stands are out since the front stand has a pin that goes right into the hole of the steering shaft at the bottom of the triple clamps so you can't very well take out the triple trees if there is a stand underneath it with the weight of the bike pressing down onto it.

You need to be able to suspend the bike from it's frame high enough so that you can lower the triples out of the steering stem headstock.  If you have a garage with exposed rafters I have heard of people throwing a "come-along" over the rafters and suspending the bike that way.  I have also seen pictures of an industrious shade-tree-er that filled a cooler with bricks, put the cooler behind the rear wheel and then used a ratchet tie-down to from the rear sub frame to the handles of the cooler.  This kept the bike from tipping forward on it's center stand when he took the front wheel off and then removed the rest of the front end.  So there are many ways to come at this task.

When I first had to do this job on the SV I was living in an apartment as well so I didn't have a garage and that is when I came up with my bike hoist solution.  I used pipe to make an overhead lift that would allow me to lift the motorcycle from the frame with ratcheting tie downs. Thus far it has never failed me and the FZ is definitely the heaviest bike that I have had on the hoist.  So naturally I had some apprehension when I was beating the bottom race out of the headstock with a five pound hammer, but I am getting ahead of myself.  I don't really want to go into too much detail with how I made the bike hoist for fear of liability if someone has a motorcycle fall on them so let me add this disclaimer, that should you decide to make your own that you are doing so AT YOUR OWN RISK and that my results may not be replicable.

So the basic process to take the front end off the bike is:

-Removing the fairings (possibly not necessary)

-Remove the front brake reservoir and lever from the handlebars (this way you don't have to bleed the brake lines

-Remove the handlebars

-Take off the top triple clamp

-Loosen the jam nut and then the retaining nut below the jam nut

-Hoist the bike up however you choose to do so.

-Remove that retaining nut and the front end should just lower itself down (be ready to catch it so it doesn't roll away on you if you decided to keep the front wheel on (I did)

Once I got the front end off the upper bearings were resting in the headstock and the lower bearings were on the steering shaft with the front end.  I removed the upper bearing revealing the race.  For the uninitiated; a bearing race is a hardened precisely-machined steel ring that ball bearings or roller bearings (hard steel as well) will seat into and roll along.  They are such a precise fit that they need to be pressed into the softer headstock and are held there with only the pressure from the tight fit.  I used a five-pound hammer and a large round steel punch to inch the old races out of the headstock.  Even if I had chosen to use a new ball bearing set I would have had to pound out the old races and replace them as there is no telling what was actually worn in the old set.

When I did the steering stem bearings on the SV I upgraded the ball bearings to tapered roller bearings and was so happy with the results that I knew that I would always look to do that upgrade whenever the opportunity presented itself.  So there was no question when I knew I was going to be doing the FZ's steering stem bearings I knew I would be putting in tapered-roller bearings and I knew they would be All Balls Racing brand (the product I have experience with from my SV install).

After removing the outer bearing races from the steering stem I had to focus my energy on getting the lower bearing race off of the steering shaft.  The top one is simple as it's not pressed on the shaft just slides out of the top inner race when you lower the front end out.    But the lower one was a pain in the behind when I did the SV and it wasn't much better when I did the FZ.  Not having access to a torch that would heat up the inner race enough to expand it I used the same method I did in the past.  I use a hardened chisel and the hammer to slowly work my way around the contact point of the race and the bottom triple clamp until the race works it's way up the steering shaft and frees itself.  It's a tedious process and it mucks up the lower triple clamp a bit but nothing some time with a file can't make better.

After that it's just a matter of pressing in the new bearing races on the headstock.  I laid the same chisel across the race and hit the chisel in the center rotating it until the race was flush with the headstock.  But you have to seat the bearing which means pressing it in past flush which for me meant careful blows around the outside of the race with the large punch I used to remove the old races from the headstock.  THIS MUST BE DONE CAREFULLY because if you score the inner portion of the race you're bearings will destroy themselves eventually.  You will be able to feel a difference when the bearing is seated s you are hammering it down.  I did the top first and then got under the bike and did the lower one.

I know in the video I said I was going to take an "after" one but I never got around to it but I have to say that while you wouldn't think that something as simple as bearings would make a big difference I can tell you they do.  The front end feel is completely different, in a good way!  More of the interference from the road is transferred to the frame and not my hands and the turn in is much surer and the bike feels a lot more planted. Not a bad upgrade for $32 for some bearings and 6 hours of my time.

Well folks, that actually brings you up to date with what I have been up to moto-wise, I did replace the brake fluid and bleed the front brakes this weekend but I did it really quickly and didn't take any pictures or generate any content but that is pretty self explanatory.  I hope the readers enjoyed reading the update and perhaps found some of it useful as well!  Stay tuned for my next update!

Red Bull U.S. Grand Prix: Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca

I woke up at 3am that Sunday morning on only about 4 hours of sleep.  True to form I had only really started thinking about the trek to Monterey the day before departure.  Looking at the weather it was clear that I was going to need to be ready for an array of riding conditions not to mention that I would need to plan for comfort while taking in an entire day of racing. Temperatures for the ride south to the race were going to be in the mid 50s and windy after just four months of living near The Bay Area of California I know that I should be prepared for cold and damp conditions at a moment’s notice any time I go near the coast and looking at the time sheets for the Free Practices and Qualifying Practices on MotoGP.com and comparing that with the forecasts seemed to confirm that it would be a mild day in the mid 70s for the race.  For the trek to the race track I decided to go with the Transition Series 3 jacket with the full sleeved liner installed, the Caliber Pants sans liner as I was going to wear jeans underneath them, Cold-Tex 2.0 gloves and the and the Solution Waterproof 2.0 Road Boots. I planned on bringing a scarf to keep my neck warm on the roughly three hour trip to the will call office in Monterey which opened at 7am (which explains why I was leaving at 3am) but I ended up forgetting it. I packed my normal riding gloves for the much warmer trip back and figured that losing the liner out of the jacket and going vents full open would provide acceptable comfort.  Other than that I threw a pair of shorts in one of the saddle bags along with some regular shoes my old school Rossi Fiat Yamaha pit crew shirt and visor and sunglasses for the race.

This whole trip was a last-minute thing.  I knew the race was coming up but normally going to a MotoGP race is a full weekend camping deal (at the Indianapolis GP) where Anne and I both get to go and take in all the action. We had figured that this year would be a throw away year since she was still in Chicago and I was here.  Never-the-less I found myself looking at the tickets on the Monday before the race.  Monday was the last day before the general admission tickets went up from $60 to $70 for the run up to the race and I hatched the plan to ride down to the race day-of, watch the race and ride back that same day. A blitzkrieg race weekend!  A couple of text messages later just to get the ok from Anne and I had my ticket purchased!

Since my plan was to do this quick, dirty and on the cheap I also prepared and packed up a lunch and snacks and not enough water (it would turn out) so that I didn't end up spending a bunch of money to eat at the track. I strapped the smallest of my folding chairs to the bike which still stuck out farther than my saddlebags but I figured I might want the chair once I decided where I was going to watch the race from.  I laid all of the gear out that I didn't want to sit in the bikes saddlebags overnight so that it would be harder to forget the in the morning.  I hit the hay at 11pm.

I woke up two minutes before the 3am alarm was supposed to go off hopped out of bed put the coffee pot on and started to make breakfast.  Once I finished eating I poured the coffee into my trusty
"Contigo AUTOSEAL Stainless Steel Vacuum Insulated Tumbler" I have to mention this thing specifically because it is an item that you can buy for under $20 that will amaze you every time you use it! For instance: I put my coffee in the tumbler,  threw it unceremoniously into a saddlebag, went on a 3 hour motorcycle ride with sub-50 degree temperatures and when I got to my destination the coffer was still hot and none of it had spilled.  It's just one of those things that perform exactly as it is supposed to every time and things like that are rare.  If you're a coffee drinker and a moto-rider I suggest you pick one up!

I could feel the chill in the air as I walked out to the bike and but it felt good I since I had started to warm up as I was walking around the house in the gear grabbing the last few things I needed.  I have been getting pretty good at starting the bike and getting out of the condo complex with minimal irritation to the neighbors (I think).  I turn on the choke, back the bike out of the spot fire the engine, pop the bike in gear and let the clutch out so the bike never really hits the higher RPMs that having the choke on causes, I let the bike idle build as I am heading towards the gate and by the time I grab the clutch to stop for the gate to open I can shut off the choke and let the bike idle normally with minimal time sitting at any one location for too much time to irritate any sleepers.  It's important when you’re leaving for work at around 0520 or thereabouts and even more important when you are leaving for a MotoGP race on Sunday morning at a pinch before 4am!

Once on the road I thoroughly enjoyed the novelty of being on sparsely populated roads that go along with the very early morning.  That enjoyment was tempered with the awareness to give oncoming cars and cars that were coming up on me a wide berth on the outside chance that they be a Saturday night Reveler that finally decided to call it a night and make their way home after one too many beverages.  There was only one person that I suspect may have fallen into that category and I came upon him on 680 a little bit before the Benicia-Martinez Bridge.  The moon loomed large and low in the sky adding an extra helping of light on some of the otherwise sparsely lit expanses of open road.  The cross winds I have come across when traveling by interstate highways here in California still impress and intimidate me a bit with stronger gusts able to move my fully loaded FZ1 and myself almost into an entirely different lane!

I had printed out my directions my and had them in the tank bag but it turns out it was so dark that I couldn't really read them with the way that the tank bag sits on the bike.  I had to take small opportunities when going under an overpass to read the next direction and was able to suss things out pretty well using that method.  Since it was going to be a lonely three hour ride I had brought my old 2nd generation iPod Nano and put earphones in but in the end it turned out I had the volume adjusted too low to really hear the music very well and made myself new game of trying to guess which song was playing next on the shuffle mode.  By the time I had made it to the Gilroy area the FZ was hinting that it may be getting thirsty and my hair had somehow worked its way down so that it was matted into my forehead and the weight of my helmet plus the pressure of the 80mph wind was really irritating me.  It's funny it's just hair but somehow it occupies your subconscious and by the time I had gotten to the Gilroy exits I had convinced myself that I the hair was cutting into the skin on my forehead!  Eff it... I grabbed the first exit that had a gas sign and decided it was time for a stretch.  I stopped at the Gilroy Safeway gas station, filled up stretched my legs adjusted my hair, lost the headphones (they were irritating my ears too) and at about that moment I realized that I was surrounded by a powerful but somewhat familiar stench.  I looked around and the few people that were out and about seemed to be going about their business oblivious to it.  I would later learn that the smell I smelled was Garlic and that the super powerful odor is ALWAYS present in Gilroy because of the garlic farms and processing that goes on there!  I'm sure the people there don't even notice it anymore but man it was a powerful smell!

By the time I got to the point where 156 splits from 101 to take me to 1 the temperature had dropped even more and I was riding through a light mist.  This was when I had really started missing my scarf that I had left on the dining room table.  But other than the small portion of exposed neck skin I was comfortable and warm.  I had only been down that portion of highway 1 once before in a rental car when Anne had come to visit and we went to Santa Cruz.  The one thing I took away from it was that the portion of road was twisty and would probably be fun on a bike but it was definitely not fun for me that morning as the light mist had become a thick fog that was causing beads of water to form on my visor that I had to turn my head intermittently to allow the wind to brush them away.  I couldn't see very far in front of me and took it very easy the rest of the way to Monterey.  Even with the fog I made it to the hotel that had the will-call office a half before they opened and the FZ got to take it's place in the moto-only parking for the fans that were staying at the hotel.  I grabbed my coffee from the saddle bag and as I mentioned before, was pleasantly surprised that it had maintained most of it's temperature along the ride and the warmth and the caffeine helped me shrug off any of the fatigue that the ride and the lack of sleep had brought on.

A half an hour of MotoGP banter with some of the other fans waiting in line to get their tickets and I had my ticket in hand and was excited to get to the track.  When I walked back out to the bike it was still in the mid 50's and the fog was still everywhere!  It turns out that the directions that I had printed to get to the free "purple" parking were in conflict with the way that the race-day organizers wanted me to go so I followed signs and some bad directions from some of the volunteers that were directing people around until I made it to the parking lot.  I decided that I did not want to use the gear-check to avoid any possible rush when I decided to leave.  I used my lock and cable to secure my riding pants to the bike, changed out of the riding boots into some regular shoes I had brought along, lost the liner for the jacket and converted my tank bag into backpack mode and headed for the track.  I made the decision to not bring the chair at that point because I didn't want to be lugging it around the whole day.

After some wandering around the early-morning paddock I made the walk up the hill to the corkscrew, it was at that point I realized that I would not be leaving that area for the rest of the day.  There was already an ample amount of spectators setting up there and I had myself a nice spot right next to the track.  I wished I had brought my chair but I came there for the racing not to be comfortable I had my spot and I was not going to relinquish it to anyone.  I had enough food for the day and I while I only had my one bottle of water I figured I could ration it out for the rest of the racing.  After all it was still in the high 50's and the last two days it was on the low to mid 70's as a high.

I

I don't want to get too much into the racing as it's been nearly a month since the race happened now and anyone who cares already knows what happened and has overanalyzed it death like I have but I do have a few comments.  The riders that took to the foggy track for their first session had big balls no headlights and cold temps can't be a good combo.  It was irritating that Dorna would not allow the support races to be shown on the big screens even the announcers had no idea what was going on when the racers were out of view. Electric bikes need to be way faster to ever be entertaining.  It got WAAAAY hotter that I had ever anticipated and sunburned the tops of my ear and while I didn't explore the track to the extent I would have like to I definitely enjoyed Laguna Seca and can't wait for next year’s race!!!

The ride back home was a mixed bag.  With all the vents open on the jacket and the riding pants back on over my jeans and the riding boots back on and the lighter gloves on it wasn't too bad at highway speeds.  Once I hit highway 1 traffic was STOPPED!  The same thing had happened when I was in the rental car with Anne on a non-race day so I wasn't too surprised but this time instead of being in a Ford Focus I was on my FZ1 time to split some lanes!!! I was a little nervous because the folding chair stuck out more than my saddlebags and I was afraid that they would take out someone’s mirror or cause me to fall but in the end there was no issues.  Splitting lanes heading back from the race was a trip!  In the really dense stopped traffic of highway 1 there was a point where I swear I was in the middle of a 100+ bike lane splitting train that snaked it's way through all of the stopped cars.  From time to time I a faster bike would come up on the back and I'd get over to let them by but everyone kept things in check for the most part and played nice with the cagers.  It was nice being in a "train" because all the cars were already anticipating more bikes which made things go very smooth.

I made it to San Ramon before I needed to stop for a brake but at that point I REALLY needed a break I was spent.  I stopped at a McDonalds (which I hardly ever do) and ate and then stopped at a shell station for some gas.  When I got back on the road the bike felt like an entirely different animal!  It accelerated much more smoothly and freely and the butt dyno seemed to indicate that it had more power too!  This was something I had not anticipated since I hadn't noticed a drastic drop in performance previously.  Having some time to think about it the only thing that I can deduce is that the Safeway gas I had bought in Gilroy was shite!  The Shell gas made a huge difference!  I've been using it in the FZ1 ever since that day!

I made it home at around 7pm and I was beat but what a day!  I don't think that I could have crammed more into a single day if I tried.  Definitely one of the more epic moto-days I have had since arriving in California.  I hope that you enjoyed my write-up as well as the photos and videos.  Sorry for the delay, I am making a big push before taking shift as a transmission operator so I have been trying to cram as much as possible before that day.  I have more material already in the cue for you guys from a seat repair to replacing the steering stem bearings in the FZ1 so stay tuned!