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Video taken by: MrRob600rr

This was a video that a fellow track day rider took, unbeknownst to me, while I was adjusting to my new rearsets. My whole intention on this day was to find the ideal peg position for these new rear sets, and to make GP shift a part of muscle memory, rather than something I had to think about.

One of the first things that I noticed with the rear sets was that I had a lot more weight over the front end of the bike. This made the bike was to steer a lot quicker. I should also mention that I had never ridden at Cresson on slicks before. Slicks have a much different profile than even DOT race tires. They're much more aggressive. One of the first things I noticed then I got these tires initially was that the bike would literally want to fall over. It would 'flop' into the corners much easier than ever before. I thought I had adjusted to this already at previous track days. However, it was quite apparent that I had even more adjusting to do given the new set up at Cresson. Having not ridden on these tires before at this track, I was having to adjust to different turn in points than I was used to in the past, having to hold the bike differently in the corners due to it wanting to 'fall' over, and having the bike steer quicker due to more weight on the front end. All of these things added up to me decided to just take a step back and slow down. I decided to just focus on not missing shifts, my foot position on the new pegs and peg pressure, relearning my turn in points, and learning how much effort I need to put into counter steering, tank pressure with my knees, how much to hang off the bike in each corner due to more lean angle, brake points, turn in points, clip points, etc.

There's a lot of folks out there who wouldn't put that much thought into it, and who would probably get done reading all of that and think I'm over thinking, and over reacting to what could be considered minor changes. My response to that is that it's what's made the difference for me. I'm analytical by nature. At the end of any track day I look back at what I've just done, what I learned, if I walked away feeling like I've improved on what I set out to improve on and if I feel like I gave it my all.

Unlike some other folks out there, I'm not out there to just blow off steam, though, that's a rather large chunk of the reason that I'm out there! I'm out there to try and improve upon my skills, and I take it pretty seriously, all the while, I'll have a huge grin on my face.