Wednesday, August 17, 2011

I entered three races with my 1970 H-D Sprint ERTT at Mosport: the primary class, P1350; the 'bump-up class, P2 lightweight; and the P1/P2 Masters race for riders over 50(?) years old on those period bikes. Sat. P1350 heat was combined with P1 Open, Pre-'65 500 and Pre-50. I had a great scrap with Doug Forbes and Peter Hurst on P1 Open bikes and Peter(?) Brubaker on a Pre'65 500. That's Hurst's 750 Norton I'm trying to go around in the lower photo. I was ahead of each of the three at one time or another, but ended up 3rd O.A. and 1st in class behind Forbes and Hurst. In Sun. final, they had a two wave start with P1350 gridded behind the bigger bikes, so I couldn't annoy those three as I had in the heat, but did win my class.
The P2 lwt heat was combined with p1500 and Dave Crussel on his Kawasaki Bighorn (P2 lwt) dogged Jody Pearce on a 500 Honda twin(P1500) and the two gradually pulled away from me. After finishing 3rd O.A. and 2nd in class, my carb fell off on the cool off lap. I was able to shove it on and ride back to the pits. I quickly safety wired it on and went out in the P1/P2 Masters race, which had no heat, just a 8 lap final. On the last lap, while running 3rd or 4th O.A., the wire broke and my carb fell off again. I stopped in turn #2 and shove it back on and bumped started the bike down the hill. Holding the carb on with my left hand, I rode back to the pits, thinking I could cross the finish line in the hot pit, but apparently it doesn't work that way at Mosport and I was listed as a DNF even though I did the 8 laps. Sunday, I carefully mounted the carb and used 0.041" safety wire rather than the 0.032" I had used Sat. and managed to get through the whole day without the carb falling off. In the P2 Lwt final, Tim Tilghman on Frank Gianinni's CB 350 Honda special, swapped back and forth with Crussel's Bighorn (after sandbagging in Sat. heat), with Crussel just beating him, with me a distant 3rd. The rain held off, another bonus for a well run event on one of the great tracks of North America.
Photos by Paul Pace

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