Sorry I haven’t been online for a while. It’s hectic here. Well, we’ve had the first race and it was a bit of a sickener. I was 10secs in the lead. Controlling the race and then the bike made a noise like a Dalek and stopped. Nothing more I can do about it. But, again, I’m looking at the positives. I brioke the lap record from a standing start. I was leading the race and we had an absolute lightning pit-stop – night and day compared to last year. But sh*t happens.
I got a lift back from Sulby in a helicopter, then a lift to the pits from a young woman called Kate. On the radio was Fast Car by Tracy Chapman who I like.
I’m going on out on the 600 for two laps of practice and then I’ll see my girlfriend and some friends tonight.
I’ve been doing a lot with Dainese, who make my leathers. The leathers I’m wearing here have got telemetry in them because Dainese want to develop their D-Air rider airbag system to offer to road racers. The datalogger was in Rossi’s leathers at his last race. Allessandro is the engineer who is looking after the telemtry and he’s mint. He likes all the same music as me, he likes Tarantino films and he even likes Transit vans.
The big boss of Dainese, Mr Lino Dainese is here, along with a few of the fellas I know. Dainese are sponsoring the event. They’ve never been to the TT before and they’re blown away by it. They’ve also brought some Dainese legends over and I was out with Carl Fogarty, Marco Lucchinelli and Giacomo Agostini the other night. How cool is that?
Finally, for now. If you’re over at the Island or coming this week make sure you call by the Red Torpedo stand behind the Grandstand. They’ve got loads of Gear Martin gear for sale and cool free postcards (until they run out).