Round 5: Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda
August 8, 2022 Adam Miller
I have a silly tradition involving cheetos. Many years ago, I was quite a junk food fiend. Eventually, as I got older and became a little more health-conscious, I started eating healthier, exercising, and cutting things out of my diet, such as cheetos. However, I do still allow myself the occasional bag of Chester the Cheetah’s deep fried treats on a few occasions: achieve something meaningful for rider growth at a track day? Bag of cheetos on the way home. Snag a podium on a race weekend? Bag of cheetos on the way home. Race win? Gimme those cheetos! There were no cheetos this weekend on the way home.
It seems like I’ve been in a bit of a funk since concluding Round 2. At the close of that outing I had bagged a win, I was second in the championship by a piddly 2 points, and I was brimming with confidence going into Round 3. Then there was the big crash in Round 3 practice that got me out of sorts. Round 4 was a no go from the ER adventures for the Miller family and the pain has, unfortunately, continued through Round 5. I have to face the fact that, if there was a sliver of hope going into Round 5, at this point it’s getting very close to numerically impossible for me to win the championship. I’ve simply changed my focus to race wins to keep me motivated.
Facing Reality, The Miller Brain, August 2022
Last year’s experience taught me that missing even a single round will put you behind the curve. If you’re trying to run with the front group and you miss a race, you have to remember that the lead pack doesn’t stop getting faster until the last lap of Round 7. So, having putted around the track in survival mode during Round 3 and completely missing Round 4, I went to work trying to get my mojo back. The leg was getting better so I started busting my ass with physical training again, maybe even harder than before. I found that hunger to get out and win again and let it push me forward. Most importantly, I started getting out on the bike as often as possible in search of my lost confidence.
The weekend before Round 5, I went to Pueblo Motorsports Park (PMP), where Round 5 would be held, to test my mettle. I put on a fresh rear slick, reverted back to my old front tire setup and, after a garbage morning session, I started finding some old familiar feelings on the bike. I pushed extremely hard in my last session to understand clearly if I could be competitive and the answer was a very empty “maybe”. I was close, but something was missing. Ever the engineer, I went home that night and looked very closely at the data. I even went so far as to apply some kinematic equations of motion to run through hypothetical improvements to my setup and riding style. After a few hours of running numbers and trying to poke holes in what I thought I’d found, I came to a revelatory conclusion and immediately made some plans to change the suspension setup for something a little different. Everyone has a method, and I’m a very analytical guy, so this is mine:
The Whiteboard, Miller House, August 2022
Aside from on-track changes, I also needed to change my race weekend prep. Arriving completely hosed on Friday is very detrimental and it really needs to stop. This time, I kept my bike prep goals modest and started chipping away at them Monday night instead of starting on the 11th hour of Thursday night. As luck would have it, I found some problems with 3 smoked clutch steels that were blued from heat, warped, and below thickness spec. Starting as early in the week as I did gave me the time I needed to get that problem fixed.
Quick aside: I have to give a shout out to Clem at Boulder Motorsports for recommending I check the clutch assembly after finding some unfavorable colors in the oil during the last shift linkage adjustment. At his advise, I found the clutch issue. Thanks again, buddy!
Although starting early helped, unfortunately the workload turned into a classic case of scope creep that, once again, had me arriving for Friday practice completely exhausted. Luckily, I had the foresight to just book an afternoon session in anticipation of just such a scenario rather than trying a full day or, God forbid, just a morning session.
At any rate, I rolled the bike out of the trailer on my well worn scrub tires and broke a 1:42 on the first flying lap of the day while contending with lap traffic. Clearly, my homework had paid off. I did one more session to verify my pace. Low 1:42’s this time, in spite of lap traffic again. In total, I did 6 practice laps on Friday at a proper pace. As I sat in my trailer in bemused disbelief at such a big step compared to my last time out and contemplated my exhaustion, and also my crash at Round 3, I wised up and called it good for the day. Sometimes less is more. That decision allowed me to get new tires from our Pirelli guy, Kory, get the bike prepped and teched, take a leisurely drive into town for proper dinner food, and get my trailer moved next to my buddy Ryan so that we could park our bikes together for the night. The hope was that having a group of MRA riders banded together would keep the riff raff away from our stuff; we were sharing the paddock with local drag racers that night. To their credit, the drag folks were quite civilized, no problems to report that I know of other than inexplicably driving right through the middle of our paddock after each race instead of the much more logical ‘go around’ route. At any rate, I felt a lot more comfortable pitching my tent with the MRA folks. Almost the second I got the mattress inflated in the trailer, I was out; utterly exhausted from a week of the standard grind with hard physical training and bike prep piled on top. This remains a big weakness in my racing. I need to start finding a way to feel well rested days before race practice starts up. I digress. I woke up feeling as well-rested as I could have in that situation. I wasn’t ready to run a marathon or perform the NFL 225 test, but I felt good enough to go racing and maybe I could even fight for a win.
Miller Racing Trailer, PMP, August 2022
The warmup sessions went well. My first time of asking, I did 2 flying laps before coming back in and broke into the 1:41’s without feeling like I was pushing hard at all. Since my first stint was so brief, I had time to come in and look at everyone else’s times while the session ran out. According to my Speedhive app, I actually held the 4th fastest time of the morning for the entire paddock for about half of that first session. Ofcourse, the folks who stayed out longer than I did went faster to end the session and my time fell down the order a bit, but it felt damn good to see my time stand for as long as it did. Now we’re talking. A solid time without fully tipping my hand; truly there is a bit of poker that happens in Saturday warmup. In the second session I did just 3 laps to keep my body limber for the race. There was a lot more traffic the second time out so, for me, I didn’t care about lap times anymore. I knew that I was in the hunt and I was eager to get the race started to make good on what I needed to prove to myself: that I can still win races.
Beautiful Shot by Kelly Vernell with Rockies in the Background, MRA Round 5, PMP, August 2022
In typical pre-race fashion, Kori (not to be confused with Kor”y”; completely different people…) showed up in the nick of time to give me the re-assurance only a loving, supportive partner can. We’re deep into the 3rd trimester of pregnancy for our second son and she still watches our first on Friday evening, wakes up early Saturday, and drives for hours to watch me race for minutes. I don’t have words anymore to express my gratitude for her support; I couldn’t do what I do without her.
The pre-race routine has become second nature. With a grandfather who served during WW2 and a step father who served in Vietnam, I always remember what the anthem is really about and I pay my respects to the flag as the Star Spangled Banner hums over the PA system. First call for Nov U goes out, my routine ensues, and minutes later we’re all on the grid. It’s a little funny how I don’t really get butterflies anymore until I see the red lights go on and hear the revs go up. At that point there is no turning back and there is no more prep time. The red lights go out and you just go. Or, in my case, you STALL THE FUCKING BIKE!!!
After years and years of riding on the track, I’ve lost count of the number of “big moments” I’ve had; times I’ve almost crashed and times I’ve actually crashed. When I first started out, these moments would frighten me, but you have an odd way of normalizing this kind of thing the longer you ride on a track. It’s gotten to the point, now, where the “big moments” aren’t really frightening anymore, they just happen and then they’re done. Even when I crash, it’s just another thing that happens, although it’s occasionally very painful. However, stalling a bike on the grid of a race is utterly panic inducing, especially if you’re starting near the front. Any semblance of control you get to exercise when actively racing is completely gone. If you’re not actively defecating yourself, you try to remember to put your hands up as visibly as possible and basically wait and hope for everything to be alright. It’s terrifying. Once was enough, it’s a life goal to NEVER stall on the start line again; I’ll completely roast an entire clutch pack before that happens. Somehow, my fellow MRA racers avoided hitting me, for which I’m extremely grateful. Equally as mysterious, because I don’t remember it very well due to my brain being in full-on reptilian mode, I got the bike started and putted pathetically off the line in pursuit of 18 other riders just in time to watch them disappear around turn 1, about 1/2 mile down the road. This was bullshit, but I’m not a quitter; I had to try.
Sometimes after a good scare, anger is quick to follow due to the fight-or-flight response, and I had a very large shot of adrenaline running through my veins to burn off. By turn 5 I could smell the exhaust fumes of P18 and by the entry of turn 1 on my second lap, I was deep on the brakes making my first 2 passes. With a straight nearly 1/2 mile long filled with empty space between myself and the pack ahead before I’d even started moving, it was not a small thing to catch the back riders that quickly. This especially considering that, at this point in the season, there are riders who are faster than others, but there isn’t anyone out there who can be considered “slow” compared to a garden variety trackday rider. Everyone has had some time to get faster, which they’ve all done.
I rode at 110% for about 4 laps and somehow clawed my way back to 8th place before I saw a single flying lap without a ton of lap traffic. Unfortunately, the excessive physical effort put into those laps wore me down. In spite of initially closing down on P6 and P7 for a few turns on lap 5, I felt the old familiar forearm fatigue associated with hard braking that drastically increases the amount of time it takes to go from throttle to brakes. I knew I had to increase my braking markers to avoid running off and, therefore, had to drop my pace. Ironically, the lap times didn’t change much because, at that point, I was no longer having to carve through traffic. Luckily I was taking data and, therefore, don’t have to speculate about what my lap times “would” have been. The Solo 2 DL will put together good parts of different laps for you to estimate what you “could” have been doing. Suffice to say that I “should” have been fighting at the front with the lead guys. Woulda. Coulda. Shoulda. Other than stroking my ego, those numbers don’t mean a thing with a start to the race as garbage as mine.
Tangent: The shot below is a great showcase of how I’ve grown as a rider this year. Still braking hard at 45 degrees of lean, the front end of the bike is good and compressed, which helps me track to the apex, which is exactly where I’m looking, and my body is already offset in a position to take the turn without having to reposition myself. This stuff is starting to become second nature to me, which is not something I could have said of myself in Round 1 at all, much less of my riding in years past. The coaching and the ferocity of the competition have conspired to make me a half decent rider (sometimes). Although the championship is highly unlikely right now, I fancy myself as a competent contender among the white plates in the future. Even if I’m not going to be a dominant rider moving forward, there’s a yellow wave coming for the white plates who have not yet reached their peak capabilities. White plates, consider yourselves warned about the upcoming Novice riders. Trust me, they’re fast as all get up. I’ve never had to ride at this level to get on a podium before, including my time riding with the WERA folks.
Trailing Deep Into 3, Another Great Shot by Kelly Vernell, MRA Round 5, PMP, August 2022
END TANGENT! I really hate it when Petrucci (or anyone, for that matter) pulls out an excuse list at the end of a race to describe why Jake Gagne (or whoever won) just kicked his ass, so I’m not gonna. The guys who placed at the front of Round 5 earned it 100%, and I take nothing away from them. However, I do remain deeply disappointed that I wasn’t able to join that battle, because I’m sure it would have been fun. The Duc is such a unique bike to ride fast so it always makes the racing more interesting to dice it up with fast guys on sweet-handling bikes like Rick, Steven, Ben, Jesse, Ryan, Conrad, and anyone else I’m offending by failing to mention. Have I mentioned that the front of Nov U is packed this year? Any given race is up for grabs by probably 6-7 riders. Mike, stop making my rivals so fast!!
I haven’t really been able to battle the lead guys since Round 2 and that competitive drive is a big, fat, fun part of racing for me that I miss. It’s like a Greyhound sprinting without a Hare to chase; good exercise, but not as much fun, and probably not running as fast as he otherwise would. I’m really hopeful that I can bring some fight back to them in Round 6. I’ll be sure to practice my launches this time on Friday. Who knows? Bandimere is a stone’s throw away from my house, maybe it’s worth a trip to the strip.
If you’re enjoying the updates, please consider purchasing me a pair of Vesrah RJL XX brake pads, because I’m roasting sets of those pretty quickly these days and need a new set for Round 6. If interested in making this purchase, please contact me at adammillerracing101@gmail.com. For general support, which is also always welcome and much appreciated, visit my Give Now page to see what’s available. Everything helps and everything is appreciated.
Cheers,
Adam Miller
