Technically, I'm not a back marker since the leaders of my class (open vintage) did not pass me, but I did finish at the back of my class. In my second year racing vintage motorcycles, I'm one of the slower riders in my class, but my lap times are improving every race.

Usually I have great starts and plan on beating some of the race leaders into turn one. I was on the second row of vintage bikes and positioned myself so I would have a clean shot down the track, but yesterday I had the world's worst start. Just as the flag started to move, I grabbed a handful of throttle and popped the clutch, only to hear my 750 Norton rev toward the 7000 rpm red line with no forward motion. Somehow I found neutral, and in a hurry, I pulled the clutch in and kicked at the shift lever and popped the clutch again. Again my Norton revved toward the red line with no forward motion. I could see the pack of racers, who know where their first gear is, racing down the track and thought, "Will I still be here when they come around the two-mile circuit?" I tried to find first again, with the same results, so I let the bike's RPMs fall to a couple thousand, firmly pressed the shift lever into first, let the clutch out slowly, felt the bike move forward, and smiled broadly that I was smart enough to find first, and cracked open the throttle.

Yesterday, all three vintage classes started on the same grid at the same time. There were at least 12 bikes in the smaller classes that don't have a chance of beating my bike to turn one. Yesterday I was behind all the 250cc and 500cc bikes going into turn two. I started to catch up to a pack of 160cc Hondas and the slower of the 350cc bikes going into turn three. Turn three is a down hill turn to the right and I feel I take it fairly fast. I managed to power past a few of the 160s, grabbed my front brake, down shifted from fourth to second and headed into turn three at a good speed. What the hell, a green (good color, my bike is also green) 160 come sailing past me like I was standing still. OK he was lucky--I would get him back before turn four. No, I got passed by another one. Don't they have any respect for the elderly?!

To make a long story short, all my efforts to get out of this school of smaller bikes (that is exactly what it felt like, being the whale in a school of really fast fish) through the back section of SIR was to no avail. Looking back, I wish I would have realized that I was going to be stuck (my feeling at the time) there and had just enjoyed watching them crank through the turns never, letting off the throttle. Instead, all I could think about was trying to catch up to my class.

Finally, the straight away came up and I was able to leave my smaller friends for good. I hope I wasn't too much in their way on that first lap. I managed to overtake the faster bikes of the 500cc class by the last lap, and even take some of my own class.

My wife takes my lap times, and my first lap was 2 minutes 15 seconds; my second lap was 2 minutes 4 seconds. The fast vintage riders run in the low 1 minute 50 seconds. I did turn my fastest lap ever at SIR (2 minutes 2 seconds) on my last lap, as I was trying to overtake a Triumph triple who was running by himself and didn't know I was behind him. I didn't get him, but I had tons of fun trying and even more fun when I learned what my lap times were. Prior to this race my fastest lap time was 2 minutes 6 seconds. A lot of the fun of racing for me is competing with myself, and when I see improvement, it feels good.

If I could shed 60 pounds, I think it would be fantastic to race a 160cc or 350cc Honda. Please don't let any of my Norton friends read this.

Tim Fowler leading me through turn 4 at SIR.

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