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Alabama the last AMA in 2003

After our VIR experience, a day I'll never forget.

Chris and I flew to Virginia and then drove to Alabama, to what is getting known as the most beautiful race track in North America and maybe the world. It's spectacular, it should be a golf course or resort.

We were joined this time by Bill, Ari, and Jim, also helping out with suspension was the master, Max from Traxxion Dynamics.

I want to thank the AMA for being so understanding about the VIR incident. When we arrived at Barber for the last round, I wasn't sure what to expect.

What I was greeted with, was the most professional group of people I could have imagined.
There was no mention of VIR and the staff carried on like nothing had happened.

I felt they realized we were very sensitive to the event and they never made us feel any worse than we did.
Even during our "tear down" when they could have been horrible, they treated us with the utmost respect.

Everyone was as nice a the AMA staff and kept reminding we about the Virginia incident, just joking, they said.
The best one I heard was that the AMA had me on camera and if I touched a tool, a mechanic from Honda would have to come to see what I was doing. This wouldn't seem so funny, except every time I was near the bike, someone from Honda would show up out of the blue.

Chris rode well all weekend and was in the top 13 during qualifying, ( 1:30.28) as a matter of fact he was 8th for most of the qualifying, until the teams put on their qualifying tires and pushed him back to 13th spot. His best qualifying to date.
Not bad considering that was his first time at Alabama. With his 13th spot, he was only 1 second from 9th place (I think that's a big deal).
Anyway, he rode extremely well and without incident.

The race always seems a little different.
On Sunday the weather was supposed to be perfect and then, the rain started, looked good for us.
The tire choice was up in the air again, we gambled with rains and that was the wrong choice. To bad.
He was running in 12th place till his tires faded and finished in 19th.
The AMA decided to tear down our bike based on Chris's results during qualifing, they felt he was riding extremely fast for a privateer and they told us the tear down was to be viewed as an "Honour". Apparently, they only tear down promising talent, the tear down was succesfull, we were found to be legal.
I have to thank Jamie from Bruce Transport for doing the tear down, the AMA forces you to have your own mechanic do the work.

Overall a great first AMA season 15th overall ahead of two Honda Factory support teams.