Race Blog - Doghouse Racing

Well folks, June and July brought some very close racing between the Doghouse team members. We first visited Road America in scenic Elkhart Lake, WI with AHRMA. This is a beautiful, rolling, four mile stretch of pavement through the Wisconsin countryside.  Thursday night brought a wicked storm that ended up destroying the infamous Doghouse Makita canopy. This meant that instead of practicing on Friday, I bought a new canopy. Bummer. While we were out getting a canopy, the infield entrance tunnel flooded!! The alternate path to the infield was to drive through the pedestrian tunnel under the front straight. Poon’s Ghost made it in his race hauler, so I figured the Subaru could make it.

The racing in the Sound of Singles 2-Stroke was close on Sunday between Marc and I. There were multiple passes per lap and we were pushing each other to now limits. Mark passed me going down in to the carousel on the last lap. I had a little speed on him there, but thought I would lay back and save the pass for the final turn. I moved along side coming out of 13, to get the inside line for the final corner. Marc wasn’t having any of it as he forced me to back off at the apex. This hurt my drive out of 14 and it was a drag race to the line. Marc ended up beating me by .05 seconds at the line. This is about 6 inches at that speed! What did I learn? Next time, pass on the right so my left hand is free to (insert race related shenanigan here). It was on for Mid-Ohio.

The next stop was Mid-Ohio. This track is like a little sister to Road America. In Saturday’s race, Marc unfortunately went to the beach in the Keyhole right after the start. I rode to a pretty lonely 2nd place as Geo checked out on us. It was fun, however, to ride through the SVs and Thruxtons.

Sunday’s race, however, was a very different story. This race was a close replay of Sunday’s race at Road America. Late in the race, Marc passed me on the brakes at the end of the back straight. After that, we were both held up by an SV650. My plan was to get the drive dropping down in to Thunder Valley and pass on the outside in the turn before the carousel. I got by Marc going in to Thunder Valley, but did not get the SV. I set up for my outside move and got pushed all the way on to the paint. I had to shut it down and Marc was able to get by. Once again, he nipped me at the line. However, two Doghouse bikes on the podium was great!  Marc took 2nd and I took 3rd. The picture above is Marc and I going through the keyhole at Mid-O at some point in the race. Thanks to Dan Focht for providing this image.

The races on Wednesday at Mid-O were the Amateur Road Race Grand Championships. These were fun races with a different group of friends. I took 4th in the Lightweight GP race. Tyler, Bill and Glen made the podium. I was, however, able to drop four seconds off my weekend lap times. I am really starting to come to terms with the GP chassis and the Bridgestone slicks.

This is me leading Bill and Glen through the keyhole. This was probably during practice because they beat me in the race. More photos can be viewed in the photo galleries from these events.

http://www.doghousegpracing.com/media/index.php

Next up are a series of mini races with OYL down at Circleville and at BeaveRun in PA. Hope to see you out there!

“The comical thing is saying Hopkins is a weak rider because McCoy did more on the 500 than John. Let’s see, John was a GP rookie, started that season at 18 years old, and someone with a good bit of experience was better than him on the nastiest bikes ever invented.

Yeah, that’s a fair comparison…”

Great quote from someone defending Hopper (rightfully so).

Well boys and girls, this past July was the AMA Vintage Motorcycle Days held at the beautiful Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in Lexington, OH. This road racing at this event had traditionally been run by AHRMA, but this year WERA wasa putting on the show. All in all, I think everything went very well.

Saturday, well what can we say about Saturday. It rained………a lot!!! Luckily, I got the last set of 125 rain tires off the tire truck. Now Mid-Ohio is notoriously slippery in the wet, this was my first time on this bike in the rain, and my first time using rain tires. So really there wasn’t too much to worry about. Race time comes, and it’s still raining, but not nearly as hard as it was earlier in the day. Needless to say, I took it pretty easy out of respect for the conditions. I was able to bring it home for a third place! My first time on the box with the 125! Actually, it was and all C-Bus rostrum, with Jordan “Tuna Boat” Reid on the top step and Marcus “M-Dog” Matthews in second.

Sunday turned out much better as far as the weather was concerned, it was warm and sunny for race time. Jordan pretty much ran away with the race and that left me, M-Dog, and a nice guy named Scott from Canada with some close racing for 2nd and 3rd. M-Dog unfortunately pulled off on the last lap with a mechanical problem and I got caught up in traffic, allowing Scott to take second place. A big congrats to both Jordan and Scott for a great race!

Based on the results of these two races, Jordan was crowned National Champ!! Good work Tuna!

Next up is the Road Race Grand Championship and USGPRU race at Mid-Ohio on September 12-13. You should come check it out! The other half of the Doghouse crew, Marc “The Mantis” Purslow, will also be in action at this event. Look for us in one of the garages.

There are some great pictures of the racing action in the media gallery. (link)

There are also some videos of the close racing on Sunday. (link)

Thanks for reading,

-The Captain

Well, here we are in the off season and it’s a whopping 2 degrees here in central Ohio.  I’ve been working diligently on finishing my basement to create guest quarters in preparation for the arrival of our second child.  I am happy to announce that our son, Daichi John, arrived on November 25th!!  The basement, on the other hand, is not quite finished.

Once we get the boy going (read sleeping regularly), I will be putting some time in on the race program.  The bike has been moved to the basement shop and is in need of some TLC.  I want to give the old girl the once over and hopefully find the water and gear lube leak that has been haunting me for the last few outings.  I think the Ohio 125ers are planning a Dyno Day sometime in late January or early February.  This will be a good time to make sure everything is up to snuff and get some good baseline tuning info with the new weather station.

Have a Merry Christmas everybody!!

-The Captain

Well, it was off to Mid-Ohio for VMD and a bit of racing. There was a strong 125 turnout to participate in the Sound of Singles and Open 2-Stroke classes. The weekend started early with Tuna Boat and I heading up on Thursday morning. I was signed up for a limited endurance track day on Thursday. If you have never done one of these, it is well worth the money. The groups are small and you get an insane amount of track time. I put in Hayden-esque work logging over 50 laps, but man was I beat when the day was through. A big thanks to Tuna Boat for hauling my machine, going early, and helping out in the pit all day.

After the track day, jokers started showing up for the weekend activities. Our crew made a strong showing with 7 guys on 125s. Steve-O, M-Dog, Ian, The Mantis, Tuna Boat, Sandbagger and myself were all there. It was cool that everyone could make it, and especially cool that Merle brought the Yuengling.

In the Sound of Singles race on Saturday, the Doghouse crew managed top 10 finishes!! The Captain crossed the line in 8th and The Mantis took the checkers in 10th! Big props should be given to Jordan “Tuna Boat” Reid for taking the second step on the rostrum, and also to Steve “Steve-O” Belknap for taking third. Merle should just be ashamed of trying to keep up with the kids.

The Open 2-Stroke race from Saturday seemed to be doomed from the get go. Delay after delay, we finally were able to run it on Sunday at about 1:00pm. The track was quite slippery. A patch of oil was laid down on the racing line over 3/4 of the track. It was like a wet race in the dry. Who knows, we may have been better off using rain tires. I was too sketched out by the conditions and pulled off after lap 2.

I decided to go out for the Sound of Singles race on Sunday and see if the track had improved. It had improved quite a bit after having a few races run and I was able to manage another 8th place. Tuna Boat managed another second place.

The final race of the weekend, Open 2-Stroke, had The Mantis in his preferred starting position. POLE!!! Marc took advantage of this and was able to get the hole-shot. Unfortunately, his day ended with a mechanical DNF. The Captain crossed the line in 12th position.

All in all, it was a great weekend. The weather was outstanding and many friends and family members came to be a part of the weekend. I would like to extend a big thanks to everyone that showed up in support of Doghouse Racing.

See you at Barber?

-The Captain

An interesting weekend at Summit point to be sure. After a full day delay which caused us to miss an entire day of practice, Captain, Smallwood, and my self crammed our bikes and gear into Scott’s van and made the treck out the West VA wonderland. The weather was great, and we arrived in good spirits. After last minute adjustments/maintenence/repairs to the doghouse machines, we chilled aout and drank some beeeeahs in preparation of the next days raging two wheeled shred session. I for one did quite a bit of shredding……if by shredding you mean crashing!!! Two crashes in two practice sessions!…mild crashes I might add, but crashes nonetheless. The captain ripped it up, and Smallwood turned some blindingly fast lap times…SHAZAAAM!

The race….hmm, how did the Mantis do you ask…..oh……HE CRASHED!!!! THATS RIGHT! ANOTHER CRASH!!! As I tried to get a good drive out of one to set up for a pass in turn three, I quickly found myself careening across the pavement on my keester…..what a weekend!

The Captain did battle and came out looking tough as nails (ask him in person what that means). And Smallwood placed 5th.

125ers are a unique breed of people…super rad, super friendly, giving, fun folks who really will go out of their way to help a fellow racer. What a great scene…With out their help I would have never been able to go back out on track….(to crash for the THIRD time!!!!)

OK, time to go clean the 10 lbs of dirt out of my bike. I’ll see if I can keep myself under control at VIR!

See you at the track!

Mantis

High speed reverse racing with a short trailer on your car isn’t as fun as it sounds.

The Doghouse bike hauler now has a bit more “Doghouse style” i.e. smashed tail-light, quarter panel, and bumper. The pole I hit doesn’t look much better… win it or bin it.

Mantis

Well folks, I have lately been working on getting the website up and going. The look and feel of the main site is pretty much dialed, still need to work out the look of the blog and the media gallery. Check out the media gallery to see some pics from events so far this season.

We’re coming down to the wire on preparing for the Summit Point USGPRU round, I’m still waiting on a few parts to repair some crash damage from a practice day at Beaver Run.

See you at the races!

-Captain

Final race prep is underway for the upcoming weekend at Summit!!!! The Captain,  Smallwood, M-dog, and myself will be attending and it should be a super rad weekend. I am anxious to get on the track again after a minor “off” at Mid-ohio, and am excited to ty out my new “super stretch limo” setup (extreme extended seat subframe) to see if I can get my 6′3″ frame on this rocket a bit more comfortably.

Hope to see you there!!!

-Mantis

Captain and The Mantis are prepared to hit the 125 scene hard!