After signing on, we donned the obligatory boiler suits & knee pads, and
carpet-taping the id numbers to our sleeves. Alan McFrame taped his road knee
sliders on the outside of his Mini-Moto knee pads, for just that extra little
bit of street cred.
Proving that she's astonishingly slow to learn from past mistakes, Amanda
trusted me to set our leaving time, which meant we had 45 minutes to make it
from Bedfordshire to Acton in our slowest vehicle (used for travelling to
the big bad city).
The poor thing isn't used to being caned, and blew a hole in its exhaust and was suffering terminal clutch slip by the time we arrived at Formula Fun at 4:02 precisely.
The ixies were all able to park their bikes inside the warehouse, so there were no security worries there. Next to the sign-on desk were some gorgeous minimotos, including red & yellow 916-bodied bikes, white & blue R1-stylies, and a green meanie ZX9 jobbie. They have 6.5hp and do 65mph: yours for £1500.
Here's us. God, we're so cute.
After signing on, we donned the obligatory boiler suits & knee pads, and
carpet-taping the id numbers to our sleeves. Alan McFrame taped his road knee
sliders on the outside of his Mini-Moto knee pads, for just that extra little
bit of street cred.
Then we were out for 10 laps practice. Already there were some crashes,
including Peter Marshall, who came out of the pits, rode the length of the
straight, and then without turning at all went straight into the
tyres. Ha ha ha.
The format of the event was that everyone got 4x4-lap heats, with the top 20
going to the 5-lap semi-finals, with the top two riders in each of the 4
semi-finals going to the 10-lap final.
The heats proceeded with the usual complement of crashes, and MiniTragedies
and glories as points were won & lost. In one heat, Alan McFrame stalled
on the grid, set the fastest lap so far, and then had the crash of the day
when someone tickled him coming on to the straight and he went into the tyres
in a big way a few yards later.
Left-to-right: Liam, Adam, Dunno, Ben, Sol, Crispin, Alan
Some of the bikes were better than others, with grip, power and brakes
varying considerably between machines. Sol found the braking performance of
one bike somewhat lacking when the lever came back to the bar at the end of
the straight and he went ploughing into the tyres ...
I got a lovely red one with good brakes and power for my last heat, and I managed to nab it for my semi-final too :-)
Here Amanda shows that there are some two-wheelers on which she can get her feet down ...
Starting 3rd on the grid in the final, it didn't take long for me to realise
that the competitive spirit had raised to another level, when by the second
lap I'd been pushed wide by one undertaker and while I was struggling in the
tyres another 2 bikes went past. Yet another overtook during the next couple
of laps and ... well, let's just say that if it hadn't been for Bonzo, I'd've
been last.
In the end, Liam (sporting a weight-saving skinhead style) was the class of
the day, winning every one of his heats, his semi-final and the final,
setting fastest laps all the way. Git. Amanda was ladies champion.
The management were a lot cooler than those bastards at Ixi-does-karting, and
I don't think there was a black flag all day. (Apparently Ben had told them
that we were all good mates and unless we actually pulled guns on each other,
we were probably OK)
They could do with a bit better ventilation in the warehouse though -
those 2-stroke fumes did sting the eyes! As a bonus, Ben didn't crash on the
way home like Kee Wei did after karting.
After the MiniMoto most of us went around the corner for some ten-pin
bowling, beer and food. This was probably the shortest Ixion run in history
(under a quarter of a mile), although due to the high-speed and Advanced
Progress Making involved, some managed to take almost half an hour and
execute many, many U-turns along the way.
Left-to-right: Mel, Alan, Moj, Chris, Adam. Dennis, Flossie, Dunno, Kevin, Dunno
The bowling was kewl, this time with Nik Alway showing that he'd done it a
couple of times before and achieving scores after 4 frames which most of us
didn't get in the whole game :-)
Here Simona closes her eyes and
prpares to do something unspeakable to the handlebar of a TL1000
Next door again to Chiquitos, when fifteen rock-hard baby-eating bikerskum
intimidated the management into rearranging the restaurant and accommodating
us immediately. Mmmmmm Margarhitas & Beef Chimichangas. Amanda had TWO (2)
cocktails, which of course meant that she couldn't be restrained from
demonstrating her world-famous Tongue Trick to anyone, regardless of whether
they'd finished eating or not.
So: Thanks to Ben for Organising. Let's do it again, but let's not tell Liam.
