Scott was running late, so I opted to head to the track and get our golf cart and as I was standing in line to do so at Gate 3, Scott arrived. I rented a four-seater this year with anticipation of a few friends potentially joining us over the next couple of days.
After packing up the cart we ventured to turn 1 to watch the remainder of the practice sessions and it was actually getting quite warm with the sun out, but not enough to take off the hoodie yet.
Since neither of us have been really following the races, as you need to pay to do so or watch much later after knowing the outcome on MotoAmerica’s U-tube channel, we were diligently trying to figure out the riders. I had more of a grip on it than Scott, as I follow MA on Facebook, and riffled through the standings the night before.
From there we headed for a walk through the paddock and found the bike which is just my size, but as someone pointed out, probably not fast enough. Hah! Walking through the paddock helped a little bit with figuring out who rides for what team, but only a little. As I mentioned in the main page, I was quite surprised to Jim Roach at the Yamaha home base in the pits. I kept staring at him as we walked by, but he was busy on his computer and I didn’t want to interrupt him.
It started to rain as we were leaving the paddock, so we ventured back to our vehicles to ride out the rain, and when it was done we went over to the backside of the carrousel to watch qualifying, but the track was so wet that only four bikes ventured out for super bikes. So when that session was almost over we cruised round the campsite near there to look at bikes, but they mostly were all covered up from the rain.
Not a very eventful day due to the rain, but always a pleasure to enjoy the freedom of getting around the track with less people on Friday, as the next two days will get congested with the beautiful weather also predicted.
Some pics from today:
