Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/847300
FEATURE 2017 PIKES PEAK INTERNATIONAL HILL CLIMB P126 The right time to race? This year was a rushed affair com- pared to the efforts of 2016. We didn't even see the new bikes in the country until mid-April, stripping them down and converting them to racers with the scent of sea salt still in the plastics after the ocean trip from Austria. One test day and a couple of weeks sorting suspension specs with WP later, the bikes were crated up and driven to Colorado by Fillmore himself, while I stayed in California and watched my wife give birth to my first-born son, Harvey. To say this was a rather hec- tic time to start racing America's Mountain would be somewhat of an understatement. Pikes Peak feels a bit like drag racing in that there's a lot of stand- ing around for not much riding. Spread over two weeks, it's months and months of preparation, very early mornings and finish times that would normally just have you head- ing out on the warm-up lap at your local track. The official tire test went well with first and second place on the second day in, for me, the correct order. But taking the fastest time in a tire test is a bit like winning a dat- ing competition with a mannequin—it means nothing, but it's still kind of nice. Fillmore was sick as a dog; the poor bastard had picked up a viral infection at the KTM dealer meeting and looked like Lurch from the Addams Family by the end of the test, a factor that no doubt hin- dered his speed. The good news was everything went as it should at the test. No crashes, not even near misses, meant we were in great shape. I spent the two days flicking between Pirelli and Metzeler tires, a theme that would be reoccurring over the race week. I set my fastest time on the DOT Metzelers, but I still felt more confident on the Pirellis. By race day I'd finally made a choice and stuck with the yellow-branded Pirellis SC1 slicks—which in the end was the right decision. Practice week was over in a blur of 1 a.m. wake up calls and shitty 7-Eleven coffees, and it quickly be- came apparent that my recommen- dation to Fillmore that he should try this event was going to backfire badly. He was on a mission, learn- ing the course in his own way while making sure everyone knew who the man to beat was. Fillmore was fastest at Glen Cove to the Summit, Glen Cove to Devil's Playground, and Devil's Playground to the Summit. By the end of prac- tice week, we'd qualified Fillmore