Ducati Sporting Club UK - Domski

As I'm not racing at Cadwell next month, I thought I may as well have a go at summing up my 2005 season.

...hit your BACK button now...

Right then, for those of you who have stayed behind, here's a sorry tale of bad luck, lots of excuses and a LOT of bad riding

:lol:

First of all came the trackdays...

I went off to Silverstone with Ali and Phil and a 748 to get some track time (as the DD bike was still being built). On the second lap of the first session, whilst still pottering around behind the instructor the gearbox selector thingy broke. Fortunately for me, Phil & Ali let me use their bikes for the rest of the day - thanks chaps :D

Then to Cadwell Park for the first race, the one I was going to win - by miles :lol::lol::lol:

Oh dear!

I still hadn't ridden the DD bike by this point, no-one had, so it was a case of here's your bike, just go race it.

Out for qualifying and the gear linkage fell apart coming out of Barn to complete my second lap, so I had to start 24th!!!!!!!!

Then TP dived under my front wheel off the line (he must have been desperate coz he was 8th on the grid!) and I ended up being dead last (30th) into the hairpin.

As I completed lap 9 I went alongside and eventually past AntonyE for 11th spot and promptly wiped out Mike Atack on the multistroodle - breaking my radius in the process.

:(

I had to miss the 2 trackdays I had sneakily booked for Castle Combe and Louigi had fitted a 620 engine out of a crashed bike in to our chassis, but had to run it on carbs (all we had at the time).

Off to Castle Combe for the race, just 5 weeks after Cadwell and my arm was a tad sore still, but you gotta race haven't you.

The bike was even slower this time, down to around 40bhp as we later discovered. I qualifed in 15th, finished the first race in 14th after almost going over the handlebars again and then missed the start of race 2, so started off the back of the grid with no warm up lap and finished 20th.

:sniff:

Honestly, you have to ask yourself what the hell you do it for sometimes ;)

Snetterton was next, and we now had injection running on the 620 engine, plus a powercommander and a dyno figure of... 52bhp with open air inlets.

Just before Snett though, I had booked a place at Mallory for an afternoon to test the new engine.

Only trouble was, my van broke down at Birmingham on the way to Mallory so that messed the plans up. RAC'd it back to Louigi's.

Louigi lent me his Merc Vito as the part I needed for my van wouldn't arrive until the Friday - the day we left for Snett.

The following day (Thurs) I went in to Exeter to meet my dad to borrow some cash - coz I was eating the furniture by this point, and on the way home I wrote off Louigi's van after a Dutch chappie decided to turn right as I overtook him.

Can you imagine that phone call to Louigi? "Erm, I just wrote off your van"

So, to cut a long story short, £180 recovery of Louigi's van, £130 to hire another van, so I could get the bit to fix my van which was 60 miles up the road at Louigi's, blah blah blah we arrived at Snett eventually.

...but the DD bike sounded good with no airbox or filters.

Qually went better, I bagged 5th place on the grid or "Best of the Rest" (Behind Geoff, DLS & Dave R) and after 2 starts I finished 5th on aggregate in the 30 min race, but then got disqualified - cue a big sigh and another "Why do I put myself through all this?" moment.

Jeez I wish I hadn't started this, it's depressing innit :D

Donington then, and I was well up for this. I'd been there 10 days before and banged in a 1:24.7 which was pretty good I thought. Certainly as quick as Clint on the day.

We also now had 1 extra bhp and 25% more torque between the trackday and the race day - plus I found out that Louigi had put the airfilters on for the trackday so I was 2bhp down on the TD. My fortunes were gunna change... Here comes my first trophy...

It rained didn't it :( The last time I rode a motorcycle in the rain was in 1999, and I fell off!! I don't do the rain, I hate the rain, I am crap in the bloody rain :flame:

Needless to say, I qualified 16th and finished 10th and 15th.

So far my only good result was a 5th which I got DSQ from, I broke my arm at Cadwell and written off my sponsors van.

My points scoring finishes were with 40bhp and in the rain.

15th, 20th, 10th & 15th :lol::lol::lol::lol:

My confidence is destroyed, I'm under the impression that the bike is fine so it has to be me. How does a British Championship challenger become a complete loser in 5 years? Surely you don't just lose the ability to race quickly.

I dunno, Brands was crap too, I got a flyer of a start in the first race, only for Rob Hoyles to almost flip the Ducati UK bike off the line, so I shut the throttle and got mugged again.

Race 2, I got away cleanly and finished 11th. Pants.

I'm just gunna go off an shoot myself, but I'll probably miss.

So that's it. I'm fried. I'll be back next season on a Louigi Moto bike - although I don't know why Rich is willing to help me out still. Maybe I'm entertaining when I sulk?

Good luck to all you crazy people at Cadwell. Look after Kyle on the Louigi bike, he's a top geezer and knowing my luck he'll win and make me look even stoopider.

The end!