this season's start has not been an easy one so far. Planned was to have a training session last Wednesday but we had to postpone it. For this reason it was only until Thursday when washing the bike I noticed there was a lot of coolant mixed with the engine oil. I removed the clutch cover in the hope we could manage with a minor repair.
No luck and Friday evening the only solution was to remove the engine and take it apart completely. We checked and rechecked every piece of the engine but there was no clear defect. We cleaned every part and put it all back together. It was almost midnight when we left the workshop.
Saturday morning I checked the engine by connecting it to the waterworks to put it under pressure. Water was flowing straight trough. A very nice situation when we had to get the ferry to Tallinn at 17:30. As a last resort I took a clutch cover from the second engine, still in parts, and furnished this with the necessary seals and bearing stuff. After exchanging the clutch covers I reconnected the engine to the waterworks and tested it. Now it stayed okay. The clock was 13:00 already!
Quickly the engine back in the bike and all the equipment in the van.
We were in good time for the ferry, there was even time to pick up a hamburger. Mikael was not feeling well, sore throat and a cold. We stayed for the evening in the Dzingel hotel with the team of Aronen/Mantila & co.
Kose was only a short ride from Tallinn. The track is very hard with a lot of stones in all sizes you don't want. We took it easy during the free training because I wasn't sure about the engine. After the training sessions and first heat I exchanged the engine oil to get it clean again (residue of water). In the time training we crashed in a corner and I was on the ground checking to where the sidecar would go but it was Mikael flying on top of me in an American Wrestling style. "Did it hurt" he asked me, I replied with "well how many kilos do you weigh?".
Not a good time and second row with 18 entries. At the Kose track he first corner is followed by large whoop-de-doos. Not very inviting for pushing so we just "followed" the leaders. We passed some teams and also got passed but we noticed many teams had quickly problems to keep up. The track was very demanding and rough. But then we had a repetition of the week before, again the (new) rear tyre got flat. But with about 5 laps still to go we had no possibility to wait it out in the paddocks (75% of the amount of the winner's laps to be classified).
The second heat was for the first part a copy of heat 1. After 4-5 laps everything was settled and we concentrated at keeping the tyres away from the biggest stones and to arrive at the finish line for our first result in Estonia, 11th place. In spite of Mikael's illness he stood bravely and managed to complete the 25 minutes and 2 laps. Aronen/Mantila took 5th overall with 2 fourth places. Both teams took the ferry of 21:00 back to Helsinki.
Regards, Stephan
http://www.mylaps.com/results sidecar=kv
Trip Dzingel, Tallinn - Kose
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