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Yes, one of our community went to Cadwell Park on a track day and took his Guzzi along for a blast, here's Phil's story as told by Phil himself:



My first track day at Cadwell Park.

This famous circuit, in the Lincolnshire Wolds, has been described as a ‘mini Nurburgring’, and variously assessed as ‘challenging’, ‘tricky’, and ‘downright dangerous’.

It is possibly the most picturesque circuit in Great Britain, with a wide range of viewing opportunities over a huge range of bends and elevation changes.

What on earth compelled me to choose this circuit for my track day debut on My Moto Guzzi Sport i 1100? ... I am not entirely sure.

After all, I am a dedicated coward, although a keen road rider who is not averse to a bit of speed in the right place. I can only suggest that it is the proximity of the track to my home in Newark, Notts. (about 40 miles), and the fact that MotorSport Vision were offering a Novices evening track ‘day’ for the princely sum of £49 (about $100 US).

Not having a van or trailer with which to transport ‘Baby’ to the track, we resorted to the simple expedient of me riding to the track, and Nikki (SWMBO) driving our estate car ‘support vehicle’ with the boot crammed with everything I thought I might need, including about six gallons of fuel as we had been warned that it was pricey on site, a shed load of tools and the odd spare part, and our compressor, charged with air so I could alter tyre pressures to my hearts delight if I should want to.

Unsurprisingly, I arrived first, and was able to get parked up in a space in the pits and a nice lady told me that registration for the evening session wouldn’t start for about an hour and a half. I made my way to the clubhouse that overlooks The Mountain through to Hall Bends and started to watch the experienced track day guys giving their bikes a seriously hard time, with plenty of wheels getting airborne over the infamous lip of The Mountain.

I sent Nikki a text message to let her know where to find me and enjoyed the sights for the next twenty minutes till she arrived. We managed to grab a bite to eat before registration time which helped to settle my nerves a bit, up to now my stomach had been doing summersaults at the thought of going out on the track. Registration was a bit of a mêlée, and the staff were very apologetic about being short handed.

The British Superbike meeting had been held at Cadwell the day before, and I think that lots of people were tied up in the clean up operation. We had to fill out a registration form and then present it with our road driving licence before getting our identification arm bands. Next on the itinerary was a noise check, and as the queue for registration was so slow, I went and grabbed the bike and took it down to the noise check guys who were twiddling their thumbs at this stage.

The noise limit for the day was 115dB and the Sporti came in at well under that at 95dB. As I understand it, with the dB scale being logarithmic, each 10dB difference represents a doubling of sound pressure levels. Having got the required sticker on the bike I slipped back to registration to find a much shorter queue and signed up and got my most attractive pink arm band that designated me as a real novice, novice as opposed to someone who could have done up to a couple of track days before (any more than that and you are an intermediate and not allowed to take part in a novice day).

Doing it this way meant that they were able to split off the real neophytes from the rest of the field. After registration, we had the rider briefing where they went through procedures for crashes/breakdowns etc. and the use of the coloured flags. They also ‘suggested’ that we limit our overtaking to areas of straights rather than the bends, with the clear implication that if they saw anyone diving up the inside then they were more than likely to get black flagged.
At this stage, the decision to bring plenty of fuel was found to be a ‘good plan’ as it turns out they don’t have enough staff to man the circuit pump, so anyone needing petrol will have to go off circuit to get it. At the end of the briefing, we got a gold arm band to go with our pink or white one to prove that we had stayed awake through the briefing.

With registration over, the white arm band group (experienced novices) were pretty much out on the track straight away, giving us starters about twenty minutes to allow our nerves to get the better of us again. I took the opportunity to gaffer tape over the headlight, which, being glass; was required. I also taped up the mirrors, as we had been told in the briefing that they were a distraction best avoided, and that it was the responsibility of the rider overtaking, to make sure that they carried out the move safely.

I also set up a video camera on the bike, recording to a hard drive. This was a dismal failure as the camera developed an intermittent fault about thirty seconds after I covered it up and put the seat back on. Over the ‘Tannoy’ came the call for ‘Pink group to the assembly area’, and we were almost ready to start. We were corralled into the assembly area for about five minutes while they cleared the track of the last few stragglers from the previous groups.

Starting and stopping the bike gave me the chance to demonstrate my nerves as I kept on setting off my alarm. This first session was to be ‘Ducks and Drakes’ with the forty odd riders being sent out in groups of ten, with an instructor leading us, and about fifteen seconds between groups. There was to be no overtaking and it was to give us the chance to get an idea of where the circuit went, where the marshal posts were, braking, turn in and apex points, and to get the feel of building some heat into our tyres.

I guess that we were on track for about six laps in this initial twenty minute slot, and I was pleased that I was at least able to keep up with the instructor and half dozen or so riders in front of me. It certainly gave me an idea about some of the areas that came into my ‘problem’ category, with both ‘The Mountain’, ‘Hairpin’ and ‘Barn’ certainly qualifying. Those twenty minutes passed in a flash Back to the pits and I decided to give the bike a once over, see how tyre pressures had changed with the heat and check what the recorder had caught (needless to say, the recorder had got nothing due to the aforementioned failure of the camera). Otherwise all on the bike seemed to be where it should be, and as tight as it still needed to be.

It seemed no time at all before we were being summoned back to the assembly area for our first ‘proper’ session. This session we were again sent off in groups of about ten riders, but this time there was to be no instructor leading the way, and we were free to go as mad as our cojones would allow us. I stuck pretty well with the guys just in front of me, including a big yellow BMW twin. I was taking it pretty easy in some of the bends, but doing my best to make use of the cones set out to mark turn in and apex/clipping point.

Using these really worked, and the times when the guys in front missed the markers it allowed me to close up on them quite a bit. The two long straights on the circuit probably showed up the Sporti’s limitations most acutely, and after about four laps or so, I was comprehensively stomped by a good few riders who came flying past me, obviously with bags more top end than I could hope to have. But I was pleased to find that they weren’t able to stretch out any more distance through the bendy bits. I began to find that I was able to hold onto quite a bit of speed through the flowing uphill left hand sweep of ‘Coppice’.

Baby felt really planted and it was my nerve that was the limiting factor, rather than her abilities. This time round we probably got in another lap or two above the distance covered with the instructor, but again the time flew by.


When I got back to the pits this time, I had a look at my tyres that were really nice and warm, with wear showing out to the limits of where they were worn before, but with some quite noticeable bits of rubber building up on the edges of the rain sipes. I was feeling like I had the start of a mild headache and was feeling ever so slightly nauseous, so I got a load of fruit juice and a couple of pain killers down my neck figuring that I was probably a little dehydrated.

Again, all too soon it was time to get back to the assembly area for what I reckoned would be our final session. Yet again I managed to get out in the first of the four groups sent out and my confidence was certainly growing. At least twice, coming over ‘The Mountain’ I felt my front wheel get airborne, and a couple of times, hammering down the start/finish straight, I bounced off the rev limiter. Coppice now was becoming something of an old friend, and despite getting overhauled by the UJM’s on the straights as per the previous session, I was able to take real advantage of the Sporti’s planted feel, and simply drove around the outside of a couple of riders through the bend.

I managed to outbrake myself a two or three times, with the track getting the best of me up at the ‘Hairpin’ and dropping down the monster drop into ‘Mansfield’. I almost overshot the little chicane that they had put into the short straight before ‘The Mountain’, and only just made it round. Anyone who was on my tail at that point must have been really cursing me, as there was no room to spare through the chicane at all. My biggest problem on this session was that I kept on getting my visor steaming up a little, and trying to find the little doo-dad on the side of the helmet to hold the visor cracked, while travelling at speed, was to say the least, tricky.

The pictures that Nikki managed to get of me were pretty much all shot from the same place, giving me some pictures on the straight after the mountain, and through ‘Hall Bends’. ‘Hall’ again was a good confidence builder with a nice swooping right-left combination. Suffice to say that my knee slides didn’t come any where near coming into play, probably caused by my lack of athleticism and hence no hanging off the side of the bike. That said, there is evidence of the tyre having been in contact with the road all the way over to the shoulder (just about). When this session came to an end, and I had driven back to where the car was parked, I was feeling quite frankly awful. The head was getting worse and I was almost ready to chuck my lunch. I came to the simple conclusion that with all the throwing myself around, I had simply succeeded in making myself travel sick!


They were sending the ‘white’ group out for another session, so I guessed that to keep all things even, the pinks would probably get another go too, but when I took into consideration the way that I was feeling, and the fact that as it was going to be close to 7.00pm by the time we would be going out (combined with the dark clouds overhead) and getting a bit on the dark side, especially through the tortuous woodland area, I decided to quit while I was ahead. I took a breather, topped off my fuel for the the journey home and wrapped up warm for the journey.

I had given Nikki a stopwatch to get some of my lap times, but once she got the camera in her hand, it had slipped her mind to time me. The alternative timing of the video camera was a dead loss, so I was a bit peeved.

The BSB riders the day before had been lapping in about 1 minute 30 seconds, and the fastest track day riders earlier were doing about 2.05. The intermediates were a bit slower, with one of the slower riders, who it has to be conceded had something of an, ahem…… weight penalty, was turning in 2 min 45 secs.

It was only after I got home that I had the brainwave of checking the photo’s that Nikki had got of me. Sure enough, she had managed to capture two or three consecutive laps, with me in exactly the same spot. Load the pictures onto the PC, and check the Exif data embedded with the pictures, and the best lap time I could figure out was 2 mins 22 secs. The ride home though the growing gloom was fun. I swear that my riding was smoother and more confident despite the ever thickening layer of bugs that was accumulating on my visor. Did I enjoy myself? No question about that, an overwhelming yes! Was I scared? Once or twice when I got my braking points screwed up. Would I do it again? You just try stopping me!

We are tremendously thankful to Phil for taking the time to submit his excellent story...we thought "Baby" would be excellent fun round a track...now we know! Do you want to publish your story? Simply e-mail joe@guzzista.com with your pics...oh, and for some tips, download this: GO Want to find Cadwell Park? Below is an image from Google Earth...type it in the search field or note the co-ordinates at the base of the image.