Anglesey, No Limits track weekend.

Dave, Derek and Robbie all with new toys headed for a weekend in the North Wales winter sun.

With Dave joining the team and now running the 2010 Scottish Champoinship winning bike, Derek needing to run in his new RMKD engine and Robbie wanting to see how the investment in the suspension on the recently purchased R6 was going to pay off the guys were looking forward to a new track and a chance to play.

Friday night was a long drive down finally arriving in Rosneigr at quarter to one in the morning with a pretty unhappy wee Welshman at the door to greet us, at least he stayed open for us.

Next morning was up early and to the track (coastal curcuit today), quickly set the awning up, hook in to the power (no need for a genny, bonus!), bikes out and sign on. The "No Limits" guys were very organised during the briefing and signing. All of us nervous at the amount of race bike with experience of the track we enquired if we could drop in to the intermediate group, no space in the intermediate so in at the deep end it was.

Common practice in the "No Limits" track day experience is two sighting laps for the first session in the morning and the afternoon. Great thing for us since we'd only seen the track on youtube and motorsTV (with the Thundersport series). Also a wet start to the day worked in our favour, keeping the first session for the fast group nice easy learning session.

As the day progressed and the track dried the wets were swapped for something stickier. We started to think more of gears changes and corner speed. The 400's were well suited to this track and pretty soon they were out cornering the bigger, newer bikes. The number 53 rider was begining to gel with the R6 and reducing times.

Before the day was over we couldn't end without one "off" and this time it was Derek. After being stuck behind an R6 for three laps attention started to.... dwindle, and a when the fairing apeared to shake the number 38 rider had to check it out. So after a quick glance at the faring heading in to "peel" corner he looks up and find that the nice gray track has turned to green, muddy, slidy grass!! Weighing up the options at lightspeed is completely pointless when the front tyre really isn't suited to the conditions. Bike goes right, rider goes left and after a small bounce of the tyre wall everything's fine again. Two cable ties and the bike's ready to go again; tomorrow.

Sunday;

Anglesey, International circuit and a wet start to the day again. Two sessions out and the bikes are all going good. The last turn throwing us all a little bit and trying to judge entry speed. The international circuit has two more long sections, one heading on to the last corner of the circuit meaning shaving off the right amount to carry speed through the last corner. Once dry there was a slice in Derek's front tyre discovered from the previous day so 38 was retired for the afternoon.

Unfortunately it was Dave's turn to play in the grass. At the awkward last turn the front wheel was just turned in a fraction too much for the speed and the laws of physics won again! If you're going to crash make sure it's cheap. Dave's definitely been adhering to this rule as not even a crack on the fairing.

A couple of hours later and on the fifth session the number fifteen rider had a second off of the day but this time a little more animated. Dave saw ground, sky, ground, sky, ground, sky then ground.

Even with two thirds of the riders having "incidents" it was still a fantastic weekend resulting in a lot of fun on a great track and we've proved the bikes are almost ready for the upcoming season.