Thursday's practice day is over at Mid-Ohio and it looks like the track has been pretty well received.  Most of the riders I spoke with who rode today seem to like the new surface.  I did not speak with Larry Pegram, but roadracingworld.com reported that he did not like it that much.  The weather was pretty good, compared to a HOT yesterday, but these massive thunderstorms came ripping through later in the afternoon sending everyone home.

Before the thunderstorm I got a little more insight into the way a Superbike team operates.  I was lucky enough to sit in on a meeting that Kawasaki factory rider Tommy Hayden's team had discussing what was going to happen tomorrow, the first day of the national.  Joey Lombardo is the crew chief; he handed out a brief description and schedule of things that need to be accomplished tomorrow.  Tommy has to try this part, and he has to ride each bike so they can decided which bike will be used for the weekend, will it be H1 or H2?  There are tires to be tested... Joey went through with each team member what they need to do and when.  Below are some pictures I took with Rosco, JJ, Joey, Theo (Tommy's team) and Scott mucking up the shot!  Scott works with Roger mostly, but they all work as a solid team.  It was cool to listen to how the communication works for a team at such a high level.

After the day was over I went to grab some dinner with Jake Zemke and his father Paul.  We ran into a group from the Parts Unlimited Ducati Team including Neil Hodgson.   I seem to always get Neil a Happy Birthday song and cake, and today was no different (even though he asked me about it and I thought I was caught!).  They came out singing and put a hat on his head!  I had to snap a shot of the Brit with his new look... that is a roll in his mouth not chew!



Well the weekend really starts tomorrow, so we will see how things go.  I did get to ride bicycles with Mat Mladin for an hour yesterday, and we had an interesting conversation.  I will keep it to myself, but lets just say that Mat is ready to race!

Talk to ya tomorrow.  L8R Greg