After enjoying the Morini Cadwell track day so much I finally had the opportunity to do another last week. The weather report promised a day of unbroken sunshine (well sort of), I was off shift and the Nordwest was freshly MOT'd and ready to go. I called Castle Combe circuit with just a day to go, luckily there were still places available so I booked myself in.
The next morning I was off at 07.00, it's about 50 miles from Weston to the track so I was freezing by he time I got there. After a quick coffee it was off to the noise test, the two greying gents on duty had been waiting to see what this Gilera 600 was. 'So this the Gilera' one exclaimed, 'Not what I had expected'. After giving the Nordy a good look over we carried out the noise check, 'Yes! It registered' he said jokingly. My Nordwest is totally standard and still has the original exhaust, I think he was expecting it to be louder.
I'd read that Castle Combe is a bumpy circuit and as the Nordwest's suspension is not the best while riding on the road I wasn't sure how it'd be on track. I must say though that I found it excellent during the four sessions, no complaints at all.
The Nordwest actually acquitted itself very well throughout the morning, it was the only single cylinder and also the smallest engine bike there. Of the six bikes in my group two were track prepared 1000's, one a ZXR and the other a GSXR, they just left the Nordy for dead but it did manage to keep the others behind, and they included another GSXR1000, a ZXR750 and a Yamaha 600. I'd said to myself before hand that I wasn't going to rev the engine past the red line on the straights but once out there I lost my discipline and the counter was buried deep into red on each lap but no blow ups!!
It was a great value for money experience, Castle Combe call this a 'Taster Session' and it cost's £40. I was expecting all participant's to be like me, new to tack days but the majority of riders on the day had done loads. The guy with the ZX10 was obviously track hardened and he said he though that these taster session at Castle Combe are the best value track days in the UK.
The only down side is that in my opinion the track is no where near twisty enough, can't wait to get the Nordwest to Cadwell next year!
