The Oschesleben 24 hour Speedweek festival. What an event. I’ve gotta be honest and say that I reckon it’s may favourite event of the year when it comes fun. Those Germans know how to party, know how to drink, and love getting into the spirit of the festival which you can really feel being there. It’s a party, and a good one!
Our weekend there begin with the road trip from England to Deutschland with our mate Ray in his 3 seater van. For the first time for me, we took the channel tunnel, which to my surprise is not a tunnel you actually drive through. You park you car in a train which transports you from one end to another, bit like the ferry to be honest, but it’s much quicker. Got to France then drove on to Oschersleben with no drama’s.
Checked into the hotel down the road from the track using my broken German, then smuggled my friend and former team mate AndI Notman in via the back staircase as he didn’t have a room, and the hotel was booked out! So there we were, Me, Al, Ray and AndI in one double room. Ray got a single pull out bed, AndI perched on one of our swag’s on the floor, and me and Al were spooning each other in a double bed. Thankfully Al only spent one night there before staying with his team for the rest of the weekend. His farting has to be seen to be believed…
'Now tell me the truth, who had the keys last?'
Practice and qualifying went pretty well once we sorted the bike out, and I managed to qualify us 4th on the grid. I’d have got 3rd I reckon if I didn’t have a leaking front brake caliper seal which I had to pit to have fixed, and I missed my 2nd chance with a soft tyre. But it didn’t matter really, lets face it, what’s 3 feet on the grid before a 24hour race?
My weekend only took a bit of a dive when the team decided to use the ‘fresh bike’ on race day, and after riding it in warm up it felt nothing like the one we’d been riding all weekend! The forks felt terrible, and my confidence in the front end was shot. Not the perfect lead up to the start of the race…. I made my feelings about the bike pretty clear, but it didn’t make any difference to the situation. The team tried their best to make it as close as possible to the other bike, but at the end of the day they felt completely different. But, that was it. We’d have to ride it like it was. Tough shit.
So I pulled my head out of my arse and got on with it.
The race turned out to be the race of year, with a long battle between us and Bolliger Kawasaki for the final place on the podium. In the whole 24hour race we were never separated by more than 2 minutes. It was a ripper, and it was great to come out on top and secure 3rd place. That podium felt as good as a win to me, and our whole team deserved that result.
At least Damo won the bottle opening race
Afterwards we showered up and went to another trophy presentation which saw every team who finished receive an award. It was a good gesture but with the wine flowing freely and the empty beer cans filling our table quickly, Warwick and I were half pissed by the time we got our trophies! After the presentation, we returned to the pits to drag our mechanics and team members up to the bar and dance floor area. It was our data recorder Craig’s birthday aswell, and we made it our mission to make him feel….. Well…. Appreciated ;-) Alister and a few of us threw the hat around and got everyone to chip in (3 euro’s each I think from memory) and with that we bought around 15 shots of mixed spirits, from bourbon to sambucca, tequila, vodka, absynth, you name it, he had it. We then poured them all together into a pint glass and got him to drink it unaware of exactly what it was. This crap mixed together looked like medicine, and the vapour alone coming off the stuff was making Craigo’s eye’s water, but he did what was asked on a countdown and took it like a man. That was about the last we saw of Craigo for the night……
Alister then showed us why he’s the king of the Scottish club scene with dance moves reminiscent of the Jackson 5, and the singing skills of Freddy Mercury. He was a pisser. I laughed so hard once that Jack Daniels came out my ears and nose simultaneously!
Next morning, Ray got the shit job of starting the drive back to England. Made it to the ferry just in time (all whilst I was snoring on Rays shoulder) before getting the rubber glove treatment at the border control. Me and Al always get it in England, being Aussie’s. It’s got me buggered when anyone in the EU can just walk into the place, but we get all the hassles. Most of us are only bloody English convicts anyway when you think about it!
Eventually made it to Rays, stopped there the night, then flew back to oz the next day.
Made it home safe and sound, but was back to work the next day to try and earn some money. If only I could ride full time…. Hmmmm.
Spent two weeks at home before heading back to Europe, this time to France for the final round of the year, the Bol’dor 24hour race.
DC on the gas
After Japan’s 2nd place and Germany’s 3rd place, we had jumped up in the championship to 3rd. Looking at the points table I figured that was about as far as I could go. Unless we won the Bol and YART didn’t finish, 2nd was pretty well out of reach, but with a bad performance in France we could’ve dropped to 5th so it was 3rd place we intended to defend. Our biggest threat for that prize was our Osch rival’s Kawasaki Bolliger. We had to beat or finish very close to them.
Me and Al were both psyched for the final round and eager to get out there and amongst it, so it was on the road again, Ray at the wheel of his Renault Van and our riding gear in the back.
Got to Nevers (the town near Magny Cours circuit) pretty early so we decided to head out to the track and unload our stuff out of the van. As usual we encountered a dickhead at the very first check point at the circuit and although we had personal passes, and our team had our car pass literally 500 metres away, we were forced to park up and wait for Warwick to bring the pass for the van itself.
Received the pass after kicking a soccer ball around for 20 mins and proceeded to the next check point. This time we were met with a real idiot. This bloke was Captain Dickhead.
Having just been given the all clear from the last jerk off, this bloke stopped us again and pointed out another problem we had. The pass we were using was a season pass, meaning the same one is used all year long. At the bottom of the pass is a section where the car reg (for the meeting) must be filled into. As different vehicles are used at different meetings, we of course wrote our rego in marker pen over the top of the reg the team had used at the previous race, but this was a problem for our mate at the gate. After muttering some crap in French he pointed to a spot off the road and said ‘you park here’ so we did. We then sat there for around 20 minutes as car after car after car rolled passed us into the circuit. Ray got out and went over to see what the hold up was but couldn’t get any sense out of the guy. All he kept saying was that ‘le pass is not good, you park here’. Ray came back to the van no better off than we had started so continued to wait in the car for another 10 minutes. By now we’d been at the circuit for 50minutes and I hadn’t even seen pit lane…… I was running out of patience.
Then a car with the same pass as ours (on French number plates) came past us and drove into the pits. By now I’d had enough and went myself to sort it out. I walked up to the bloke and asked what the problem was, and what we were waiting for? He looked me up and down and said ‘you park there’. I went off the deep end. After calling him every name under the sun I told him we were driving in anyway and if he didn’t like it to either send someone else over to sort the problem out or to eat my arse.
I got in the car and told Ray to just drive in. He didn’t take much convincing so he fired up the Renault and headed for the pits. We moved passed the idiot when Ray engaged 2nd gear, then out of nowhere this other moron yells ‘stop now’ and throws himself in front of the van like he was taking a bullet in the chest for the President. It’s merely speculation what happened from here of course readers…… perhaps the sun was in Ray’s eyes, maybe he didn’t react quick enough, perhaps he didn’t see the highlight orange vested gate marshall, but all I know is something bounced of the bonnet and tried surfing the door panels for 50 metres.
It was, with out doubt, the absolute highlight of my weekend. I laughed so hard I couldn’t breathe.
Needless to say, we got into the pits.
The next day Alex video recorded the grief we got at the gate again, just incase we needed the evidence later...... Click this link to check it out! http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=5364684284818357890&hl=en-AU
Tense times in qualifying
Our weekend at Magny Cours was a tough one. Without testing at the circuit like most teams did in an official test a few weeks earlier, we found ourselves on the back foot from the get go.
When the rain came down for qualifying I was actually excited. I’m usually very strong in the wet and thought even if we found ourselves off the pace a bit in the dry, the wet stuff should even things out a bit. I was wrong, it was worse. I managed to do the quickest lap for the team again in qualifying but it was only good enough for 22nd spot on the grid. With rain forecast for most of the race, we were in deep shit.
We talked tactics race morning and figured this was going to be a race of survival, so we had to stay in the game whilst the others fell by the way side. It’s about all we could do anyway, as we were in no position to attack with our pace.
Damo at the start of the Bol'Dor
Luckily enough for us, about 21 of the 24 hours were dry and our plan came to fruition with other teams dropping out one by one. Most importantly Bolliger Kawasaki had crashed and were out of the race, so our 3rd in the championship looked pretty safe anyway, but we had to push on to the finish. Apart from one small crash Christer had in the early hours of the morning, we had a pretty incident free race and got the bike home in 6th place. It was enough for 3rd in the championship. We were happy.
The race for me was no doubt the hardest physically I’ve ever done. The demands Magny Cours puts on your body with the heavy braking and changes of directions is real intense and I felt it.
Eileen, our team physio, had helped me all year long but no more than at this meeting. I could not have finished the race at the same speed with out her, that’s a fact. As always Warwick’s girlfriend Kris was great at strapping my hands with a technique she’s tailored for me personally (it involves using sanitary pads on my palms!) and I also had an extra little helper Sam who was great. Sam came to Assen, LeMans and Osch as a student chef in our team, but although she wasn’t needed in the kitchen for France she came anyway, but it didn’t take long for me to put her to work. Whether it was drying my helmets, getting me food, mixing my drinks, Sam did it without question and it helped me heaps.
If any of you read this girls, thank you.
The best seat at the Bol'Dor
Presentation followed that night and we received the trophy for 3rd in the championship. It was a great feeling standing there next to Warwick, Christer and my boss Russell knowing we’d just finished 3rd in the World Championships.
The after party was one you’ll be surprised to hear wasn’t as wild as anyone thought. I think this time everyone (if they felt like I did) was just so tired that all we wanted to do was hit the sack. So after dinner and a Jack Daniels and Coke, that’s what I did.
Said some goodbyes to the remaining crew at the track in the morning and headed for home.
This brings you pretty well up to date.
I’ll be here in Oz now for at least the next couple of months whilst I make plans for my 2007 campaign. I’ve got loads of things happening personally and professionally at the moment, but all prospects are looking good for the future. I hope to bring you all some positive news in the next few weeks.
So till then, take it easy and don’t forget to stay in touch with all the latest news on my website www.damiancudlin.com
All the best,
Damo.
