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Reading: G2 Motorsports final summary

G2 Leaves Reading Vowing to Improve The really good Maple Grove Raceway air that the Pro Stock Motorcycles had to breathe this weekend favored the volumetric efficiency of inline four cylinder motors, not the big V-twins run by G2 Motorsports ...

Published: Oct 4, 2006, 9:40 PM

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G2 Leaves Reading Vowing to Improve

The really good Maple Grove Raceway air that the Pro Stock Motorcycles had to breathe this weekend favored the volumetric efficiency of inline four cylinder motors, not the big V-twins run by G2 Motorsports and others. "That was the number one thing this weekend," said George Bryce, the G2 tuner/crew chief. "But we never really found the screws to turn, or we didn't turn them the right way. We thought we were going the right way when Matt ran 6.97."

And things were looking pretty good for G2 after two rounds of qualifying. Matt Smith's 6.975 at 190.78 mph in the second round of qualifying was his second straight 6 second pass on the Torco Race Fuels/Skull Gear Buell. "Randal Welch was my new chief mechanic for the weekend," Matt said about the young, 20 year-old Welch. "It was his first time ever working on the bike and he did an awesome job. His worst pass was a 7.04, and his first two passes were 6 second runs. There aren't many people that can say that." Indeed, probably nobody.

"But then we went the wrong way," said Bryce, as Matt slowed to a 7.049 at 182.95 in the third round. "Then it rained and we never caught up. My partner George Smith was on the phone with the S&S Cycle guys all weekend providing feedback and discussing the current projects to improve engine performance."

"We tried something on the third qualifying pass and it didn't work," said Matt. "We were gonna go back to what worked and put a new tire on, and then it rained."

Meanwhile, teammate Chip Ellis had settled into a 7.04 groove on the DRAG Specialties/S&S Buell. "My bike ran 7.04 every time I went down the racetrack except for my first run when my kill switch broke," said Ellis. "But if it hadn't broke, it woulda been a 7.04 too. I went three passes within six thousandths of each other. And that was with two different engines and a couple different tune-ups in it." Chip's 7.042 in round 1 of eliminations wasn't good enough to get past eventual race winner Karen Stoffer.

"Chip's 7.04 first round was good enough to win the race, it just wasn't good enough to go past first round," said Bryce. "In the semis and the finals, I don't think anybody went better than that, maybe a 7.03." True enough, Angelle Sampey's redlight 7.037 in the semis was by far the best ET of the last three passes.

"I started eliminations with a new tire," said Matt, and starting a race with a new tire is something you hope to avoid. "My bike about crossed the centerline at the 60 foot mark. It didn't go straight at all and it still went a 7.03. It probably would have went a 6.97, I was that far out of the groove. There's no doubt we would have been fastest bike in the first round."

The new tire wasn't Matt's primary problem on the run. The redlight at the Christmas tree was. "I don't know why it popped up there, no clue," said Matt. "I didn't do anything any different. It isn't anybody's fault but my own, but I'm a little puzzled by it. But I feel like my bike was there."

All the V-twins but one (which was racing another V-twin) lost in round 1 at Reading. "When I went to the starting line for the second round, I said 'Me and my friends came here to see some thundering V-twins. Where are they? Maybe we should add some weight to the Suzukis to make it more fair,'" said Bryce. "Just as Denver has been labeled the V-twins' playground, it looks like Maple Grove may be the four cylinder playground.

"But we didn't tear anything up, and we found that there's some more things for us to find out about different tuning conditions," Bryce summed up. "We've found out how to go really fast at a place like Denver, but we haven't learned how to tune to really good conditions like in Maple Grove. But we will figure it out and then we'll add that to our arsenal."

-credit: G2 Motorsports

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