Racing in SL

G1-GP Season 3 Opener

2009-08-06T11:11:00.006-04:00

It was a bit of hard and wild racing at the Gilles Villenueve circuit in Montreal Canada for the G1-GP season 3 LMP 900 round 1 race..... A 1st lap crunch in turn 2 , started it off, involving 3 cars and ultimately retiring Nella Boccara. 3 drivers barely avoided the wreck and continued on after the leaders.

Up in the front Remon Franizzi ran away a little bit with Jafo Tendaze in hot pursuit ... Remon ran a near flawless race ultimately getting the win . Jafo had it a bit worse , unfortunately was using a car setup nearly verbatim from myself and suffered late race Brake failure and retirement , just as i did hehe .

There were several notable duels during the race, Suku Ming vs Suzy Cuddihy for 3rd.... Myself and Katier Reitveld had a fun running battle for a lap or 2 , several good passes back and forth by both of us . Sulla Looming stayed steady and fast , with Jafo putting on heavy pressure near the end of race before his brakes failed . Sulla got 2nd, Suzy Cuddihy 3rd, Suku Ming 4th and Jafo ended up 5th in official scoring .

6 cars of 11 retired from this one in quite a bash em up ...Canada was one of the harder races on the schedule , but i dont think anyone quite expected that many cars to go down ... well thats racing , Drivers will cheer triumph or wince in defeat for a moment or 2 and focus on the next round , which is the first of 3 UK races this season at Silverstone raceway .

G1-GP -- Season 2 finale

2009-07-16T13:29:00.011-04:00

The G1-GP season 2 has finally come to a close with triumph and heartbreak at the Round 10 russian roullette match at Buffalo Back park figure 8. The season had come down to a final showdown between Suku Ming and Sulla Looming , with Suku leading in the standings by just 1 point . Having led after 9 rounds , it was Suku's choice for the final race, and Suku made the controversial choice of Legends on the dirt figure 8 at Buffalo Back .

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With a car crunching crossover at mid track, it was up in the air wether anyone would finish the race. Jafo Tendaze landed his 4th pole with the Legends cars , pole ace Sulla Looming was suprisingly unable to do better than 6th on grid , despite being significantly faster during practice sessions.

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But one thing about Sulla , when she lacks in qualifying she is determined to make up in starts and this was no exception , jumping quickly from 6th to 2nd by turn 1 . Jafo led around for 5 laps before Sulla cornered hard and fast making a nice pass on him. Suku was determined to keep pace, having stayed in close 3rd to this point.

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But soon Jafo's times started lagging , holding Suku up some , meanwhile Sulla steadily pulled away , leading around for the next 11 laps . By this time in race, nearly half a lap back , Myself, Rattra and Yuriko had been dueling it out for positions 4th - 6th lap after lap ...then came the fatefull lap 17 . Rattra was in 4th and around the turn and off to the crossover first, me close behind and Yuriko close behind me .

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Out of my peripheral i saw Sulla approaching the crossover from the opposite direction, from my perspective at current speeds there looked to be a collision, Rattra and Yuriko didnt hesitate and made it thru safely , i didnt try to make it thru instead stood on the brakes hard, while Sulla had been slowing herself to avoid the crossover traffic...and then crunch ..i T-boned Sulla, we were both out of shape and stunned i think, both got going again. But Sulla's chassis had taken a bit of damage and her handling was kaput forcing her to retire.

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I only had a little bit of handling loss and was able to finish in 5th ...Suku held on strong for the remaining 14 laps , winning the race and the Season 2 championship. Jafo had fallen back due to difficulties and finished 4th , but Rattra and Yuriko had held on and battled tooth and nail for the rest of the race and 2nd place . Yuriko had 2nd going into final straight , but Rattra had the jump on her and pulled away in the last meters for a exciting finish and 2nd place.

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Thus season 2 comes to a end , after Legends on some good oval fights, Rally cars thru the mountains that made for some exciting races to drive, and F3's thru some classic close quarter street tracks, and a dirt figure 8 to finish it all...it was a unusual season to say the least , i had alot of fun and i hope everyone else did too .

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But thats not all , not nearly all...we are now gearing up for our first top series season with LMP 900 prototypes ..and at the same time will be running a 18 race Late model stock season that should be alot of fun also ..stay tuned more to come ... Including ...finally...the final 2 race highlight reel for season 1

Recruiting for G1-GP season 3

2009-06-30T14:11:00.009-04:00

As the 2nd successful season of Second Life drivers racing on Rfactor is drawing to a close... I am doing some limited recruiting to expand our ranks for upcoming season 3 . Season 3 test races will begin approx mid July and the season will officialy kickoff approx early August . Here are some of the requirements to join us... for what has been some really fun racing ....

1.. need to be a friend or aquaintance of mine within SL , pre-race and post race happen within the confines of SL , so having a SL background is a must .

2. Need Rfactor program , costs anywhere from 20 to $30 US , depending on how you get it , ebay or amazon, or as a Download ect...

3. Need some level of controller above just a keyboard, Gamepad is cheapest , and has been used as a effective controller by several of the current racers, wheel is ideal but not a requirement...in fact if you can handle just driving with keyboard , your more than welcome too.

4. Some patience with the process, the technical nature of Rfactor does make you jump thru a few hoops in getting setup , Downloading and installing mods and stuff, this is something that becomes "old hat" after doing it a bit . We have a alot of people willing to help you also .

5. Official League times are Open practice monday and tuesdays at 6pm SLT to approx 8 or 9pm or so .. this isnt mandatory, just a good way to exchange setups , to make sure no one is having probs connecting to server , some race traffic practice and to compare times with other racers.
Races are held Wednesdays at 5pm SLT ....and are run in following format ....
----5pm SLT Driver meeting at G1-GP Clubhouse....at 5:10 Server will go up for Race practice
----Race practice lasts between 30 to 45 minutes depending on track and my own judgment of how much practice some people may need.
----Qualify session , usual format is 10 laps in a 20 minute session
---- Race....Races vary in length , but for season 3 , will last from 30 to 40 minutes .
----Post-Race wrap up and podium ceremony back at the G1-GP clubhouse, entire event lasts approx 2 hours.

Season 3 will be run using a mod , the cars will be LMP 900s (LeMans prototypes) , run in a series of 10 real world road courses. Some of the tracks are included with Rfactor , some need to be downloaded and installed ...all info for that will be supplied by me and everyone currently in the league are a great help to new racers if theres any help needed. I will be releasing the season 3 schedule shortly .

The following is a short demo video of the cars and game , showing off the sights and sounds that will be part of season 3 ... Contact me in SL if you are interested , thanks .....

We are only accepting a limited amount of new drivers ..so if interested send me a IM asap

On the top step: Zaria and Katier

2009-06-27T02:08:00.019-04:00

To catch up a little.... im gonna cover both the last FormulaSL race (round 10 at Amber Raceway) and the last G1-GP race (Round 8 at Lienz Hillclimb) with this post .

For a period spanning 44 rounds of FormulaSL and MotoSL , Archer racing had been in 1st place, but that came to a end with FormulaSL Round 9 at Bekstone raceway, Annie Gufler and AM Pro racing became the first team to topple Archer from the top spot since its creation back in season 1 of FormulaSL . Not a team to stay down when down, Archer put in the effort needed to regain the top spot.

Annie had her worst finish of the season at Amber raceway finishing 8th , Jafo finished 2nd and Yuriko 3rd. Needing to gain 4 points on Am Pro to regain the Team points lead, Archer gained 29 points on them. But the story of Round 10 was InDrive's Zaria Falconer who gave herself and her team their first RaceSL victory. Jafo and Yuriko both led the race at various times , but in the end Zaria grabbed the lead after the field took its 2nd pitstop and led the last 7 laps for the victory, her teamie Caz Freschi finished 4th .

Big grats to Zaria and her team on the victory, and big grats to my own team on their superb performance in regaining the Team lead. Round 11 of FSL season 3 will be at Racer's island Midnight track.

Round 8 of G1-GP season 2 ....Lienz hillclimb. The 3rd and final rally race of season 2 , promised to be prolly the most difficult , with average times of 3 minutes and 50 seconds a lap, the Lienz hillclimb mixed a combination of offroad dirt and paved racetrack .

Like previous Lienz Rally races, this one consisted of 2 seperate races, with the final results being compiled from the results of both races. Jafo Tendaze impressed all with his 3rd pole position of the season . But this was still not enough to stop a hard charging Sulla Looming from jumping as fast as possible to the front of the pack.

In the first race this was aided by most of the field overshooting turn 1 onto the dirt portion of the race track, Sulla raced ahead into the lead with myself at first following closely . But my luck soon ran out later on the 1st lap , i overshot a turn a little and was going to fast and too wide into one of the faster portions of the paved track, striking a portion of guardrail head on .

This put the kaibosh on the rest of my race, Sulla won it , with Katier close behind in 2nd and Jafo finishing 3rd.

Up next was the 2nd round with Jafo again on pole , again Sulla proved quick at the start... racing into lead, but it was Sulla's turn to run out of luck, running in 3rd i sorta saw what happened , but all i know is i saw Sulla careen far to the left into the woods and ..kapowww hit a tree which sent her flying back onto the dirt track sideways blocking the path of Katier who was at that point running 2nd .

I barely nudged my way past the mess and into the lead where i stayed for the rest of the race. Behind me Jafo and Katier were racing the real race , both of them battling back and forth with the possibility of whichever of them finished 2nd would get the overall win . But in the end Katier prevailed and thus captured her 1st G1-GP victory . Jafo was 2nd overall, with Sulla 3rd, Rattra Raymaker 4th and myself 5th .

Next Round for G1-GP season 2 is F3s at the venerable Monaco city street track , with 4 persons still very much in the run for the championship. Suku Ming currently leads..Sulla and Myself in 2nd and 3rd tied in points, and Caz freschi , unfortunately having missed the hillclimb..still not very far behind in 4th .

Some quick facts after 8 races, 5 different winners , 9 different people having been on the podium, only 1 polesitter of 8 has taken a victory.

Farewell Mooz , FSL round 9

2009-06-17T00:08:00.011-04:00

It was just over 2 years ago i strolled into Mooz looking for the MotoSL 2 season. I found out i was a few weeks too late , instead i found RaceSL, a close knit group of fellow racers , 5 seasons of Formula and Superbikes. But alas a struggling economy and a struggling technology takes another victim with the 3rd major RaceSL track, the home track , lost in 2009.
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The first being Snowpeach, home track of Museum of Robots owned by Count and Bibi Bayliss, long time supporters and contributers. This was one of my fav tracks on the circuit. Next was RD Motorsports sim, owned by Raver Bellow and home of the Canyon track and Raver's own Wide track. FormulaSL season 3 , round 9 is the final race at Mooz , on a new track located high in the sky, designed and built by Bikey Bekkers.
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Zaria Falconer and Caz Freschi of Kokopelli's InDrive team did great, battling each other back and forth for 2nd and 3rd, Zaria prevailing in the end .
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Caz actualy qualified into the B group, but ran that race solidly getting the advance. HotWire driver Suzy Cuddihy looked like she would get 2nd , but it wasnt to be . Frutopian Mango Birdbrain getting up for 2nd and the pass to Group A instead.
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Ashe Revnik and Abacus Mimistrobell got 1st and 2nd in the C race, with Molly Fitzgerald just missing out after tangling with non-yielding traffic while in the lead. Molly got back to 2nd , fell to 3rd last lap .
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Abacus handily won the D group race. Although gone , the history of mooz lives on, as does the track, with Les Whites handy track rezzers, Mooz can be put down anywhere a friendly low lag sim will let him....the same with Snowpeach, Canyon and the Wide Track, so the hope is that all that is lost is a bit of a inflated monthly bill and ....a sim , although classified and class 5, seemed to often be sick and not quite performing up to its advertised potential .
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Round 10 moves us to host Amber Raceway , a multi-tiered track , with a club, drag strip, airplane pylon racing , a resort and alot of fun things to do.

G1-GP Update

2009-06-01T14:27:00.009-04:00

Finaly doing a overdue update on the how the G1-GP season 2 is coming along since i havent posted since Round 1.....we are up to Round 5 with Round 6 just around the corner .

Round 2 at Lienze GP short... the first rally race of the season was well anticipated cause this is a small fun track. Consensus was that it would be crashed filled with alot of people finishing the race crashed out ...but actualy quite the opposite everyone did quite well and finished the race in its entirety.

Sulla Looming proved unstoppable here , winning both races that comprise the event . Caz Freschi gave Sulla a run for her money in the 2nd race, but once Sulla got by she was gone . Caz finished 2nd overall, myself 3rd, and Yum Divesadero scored a G1-GP career high finish of 4th .

Round 3 at Miami Bayfront ...for round 3 we switch to F3s at the small tight Miami track . I had hopes for a pole position after driving well during the weeks practice rounds, but things dont always worked out , Remon Franizzi grabbed pole , and i was all way down in 5th .

Caz Freschi didnt disappoint his fans in the crowd that were waving signs that read "Green means go !" , "Pit Limiters, not just for the pits!" , "Chill out!!" and "Milk does the body good" , as the greens flashed , Caz was waiting for a 2nd opinion on the matter....meanwhile much to the chagrin of everyone behind him, Remon, Sulla and myself on other side of grid, got good starts and raced ahead to turn 1 .

Remon led around for a good half the race, Sulla in 2nd till she spun and smacked the wall and pitted for repairs, into 2nd i went and after Remon . After a nice pass if i do say so myself , i was in the lead and never looked back grabbing my first win of season . Remon got 2nd, Jafo Tendaze 3rd , Caz eventualy joined in the fun after his mis-start and got up for 4th, Katier Reitveld rounded out top 5.

Round 4 at Joesville ....Round 4 brought us back to the Legends cars at the 1/2 mile oval at Joesville. Jafo nailed his 2nd pole position of the season on the ovals . But it was Suku Ming who got the the best start and led the pack around for all 50 laps for her 2nd victory of season , Jafo hot on Suku's heels for 2nd and myself 3rd. Nella Bocarra and Sulla Looming both had incidents resulting in big crashes .

Round 5 at Lienz GP....the 2nd rally round of the season , brought us to maybe arguably the hardest track of the season , the 3 minute a lap Lienz GP , and prolly the most mayhem of the season . There was no shortage of wrecks and questionable driving in this one . Favorite Sulla Looming crashed out on the 1 lap qualify round setting her back in the pack for both races.
While i was out front with my first pole of season and i made the best of it running out front as hard as i could .

It wasnt enough in the first race though , leading the whole thing i spun once in the final lap , allowing Sulla who had worked her way up to 2nd early on to pass and take the win . Race 2 was much the same me out front , Sulla worked her way up to 2nd , but lost concentration and crashed out early . Highlights of this race was a nice racing battle between Suku and Rattra Raymaker for 2nd place.

Suku did a great job holding off Rattra for awhile , but eventualy he was able to get by, but just long enough to get spun by lapped traffic allowing Suku by again where she finished 2nd in the race. Fortunately for Rattra his points in both races was good enough to get him 2nd overall. Suku finishing a impressive 3rd overall , Remon 4th and Katier 5th .

Next round is this wednesday , back to F3's this time at Long beach .
G1-GP stats can be found at http://g1gpracing.blogspot.com/

FormulaSL - Round 7

2009-05-25T01:26:00.026-04:00

Round 7 found a little smaller field of 23 drivers attending , cause of the holliday weekend , this time at the PSU 1 track at Motorato Ware's Hotwire racetrack sim . Just check archives if you wanna know how i feel about my luck at this track hehe.

Annie Gufler took her 6th Pole and 6th win of the season , but this time just ahead of Jafo Tendaze looking for his first win of the season . Jafo was hunting Annie for the last 8 laps of the race, closing the gap in the last 3 , but Annie held on for the win . Jafo 2nd , and Laney Recreant with her 2nd podium of season coming in 3rd after advancing from the B group race and putting on a very nice performance in the A group race.

I got a rare glimpse at the front and led for a few laps before my old friend PSU 1 badluck paid me a visit , and i finished 4th overall . Silk Bamboo shared in some of my luck , there was plenty to go around , with a early lead at start of race, Silk looked strong to finish 3rd, but ran into troubles ending up in 5th .

One car i thought would finish higher was Racers Island's own Brave Ashbourne , i heard his engine buzzing close in my ear a few times over several laps , i think Brave was held up sometimes by my shaky driving at that point in race, but he drove much like a racer in RL would without charging thru at first chance no matter what , unfortunately Brave ran into some troubles and fell back before getting by me , finishing in 6th.

Caz Freschi and Yuriko Nishi rounded out the field also having races with heaping helpings of bad luck and technical difficulties. Annie Gufler now leads the points championship by a large margin , with Yuriko in 2nd and Jafo 3rd .

Other highlights of day started in D race , where Amber Raceway veteran Kelly Grumiaux had a good race, driving steady in 2nd place, looking like she would get the advance with Rattra Raymaker who led the whole race, but Kelly ran into trouble, and her own team mate Tracy Torok got by and finsihed 2nd .

C race might have been most chaotic of the day , with alot of collisions alot of off roading and mayhem . The story early in the race was Race island's Nella Bocarra, on a mission to score some points was in 2nd and even led for a bit in early laps of race before falling back , unfortunately finishing 8th after more troubles.

Around laps 5 and 6 the field settled down some , with returning veteran Yamaha Harley holding onto a steady lead, untill he pitted, Yamaha seemed to be in the pits forever before finally exiting in 5th place, Yamaha ended up finishing 3rd and a very good performance despite being rusty .

After the pits DYG driver Darko Revnik took over and led the rest of the 20 lap race, winning his first FSL group race, grats to DYG team they certainly have put in the practice in effort to improve steadily during this season.

The other story of C race was Shoshin racing's Ford Roffo, who has been qualifying well lately but unable to bring home the bacon in the main races, this time was different, Ford hovered around the top 4 all race , driving steady enough to grab 2nd and a pass to the B race.

B race was punctuated mostly by Caz Freschi running a tight race, leading nearly the entire thing , Motorato Ware gave chase early in the race, but contact with traffic put her in trouble around lap 10 . In the end Caz ran into enough problems to get 2nd behind Laney Recreant who filled the void when Moto fell back .

Final results were Laney 1st, Caz 2nd , Moto 3rd , Molly Fitzgerald 4th , and Indrive's Zaria Falconer 5th . Just 1 week till round #8 ...on the oval at Greg Drayman's Kokopelli Raceway . The FSL cars on the oval is always mayhem , and im sure this one wont disappoint.

Formula SL , Round 6

2009-05-11T00:20:00.056-04:00

The 6th round of the current FSL season brings us to the RD Motosports sim and the Wide track. Last raced on during MotoSL season 4. Its a fast wide open track , with the Formula cars this means danger, spins and crashes. Another full field for this one, as 27 show up for the challenge.

Annie Gufler showed a fast hand today , grabbing her 4th pole and eventualy 5th win of the season. Yuriko Nishi also using a supercharged setup finished on the lead lap after some trouble about mid race where she fell as low as

Yuriko started out well chasing Annie close and eventualy taking the lead on lap 7, but Annie regained the lead again lap 10 and ran away with this one , Yuriko was able to finish on the lead lap , currently in drivers points Yuriko is 2nd by 25 points , with overtaking Annie, atleast possible on paper still.

Remon Franizzi was also running a turbo charged package, but he was tested by a 8th place qualify and had to race the 35 lap B race before the 50 lap A race. He dominated the B race untill a tangle with traffic allowed Moto Ware to charge ahead on lap 19 and lead around for 6 laps before she had her own problems in traffic, Remon got by and took the win in the B race.

As far back as last place during the 50 lap A race, Remon stayed steady and patient and , breaking thru to 2nd place on lap 33 and finished strong in 3rd.

Myself qualified 3rd , and for most part had my usual fall back then tunnel vision racing with hopes of being able to move thru field some and finish as well as possible, i was somehow able to grab 4th overall on the day . I was as far back as 7th for a bit and got as high as 3rd, some handling troubles in the closing laps allowed a very close finish between myself , Caz Freschi and Moto.

Caz Freschi for the InDrive team has certainly made his home up in the A group race, and once again proved why with a good start , he chased Annie and Yuriko from 3rd. Staying strong Caz moved up to 2nd after Annie had troubles in early part of race, after the 1st pit stop Caz was still in 2nd , with Yuriko falling back to 3rd. But after the pit Caz' fortunes changed, he held onto 2nd for a bit , then falling back and finishing strong in 5th overall.

Motorato Ware had a long day this round, having to race 3 races totaling 110 laps. Qualifying 13th , Moto started the racing day behind the wheel in the C group , 25 laps , of which Moto led for all but 1 lap, at the very end Ashe Revnik of the strong rookie Midnight Lotus team passed her , but Moto got lead back and beat Ashe by less than 1 second.

Onto the B race, 35 laps , Moto had a bit more trouble this go , and was caught up in hard charging traffic early on , but bided her time , moving from 7th to 4th after one pile up and 4th to 2nd after another. Leading laps 19 thru 25 , Moto crashed out and fell back to 4th again , then 5th for the next , needing to get atleast 2nd to advance to the A group race, Moto stayed steady late in the race, moving to 4th then 3rd, a final lap spin by the other skilled Midnight Lotus rookie, Laney Recreant, gave Moto the slight chance she needed to get by and grab 2nd . Moto got 6th overall in the A race, again having problems early, but staying steady and moving up for a strong finish, less than a second out of 4th place.

Jafo Tendaze had a bit shakier day than im sure he would have liked to have, qualifying 6th , just making it in the A race. Jafo started strong running steady in 4th chasing the lead group of 3 closely . Jafo also had problems after 1st pit , falling back to 7th . Jafo got back to 4th after i needed a 3rd pitstop , but had some misfortunes in the final laps landing him 7th overall .

There were several other strong performances on the day , most notable being Ashe Revnik , who qualified way back in 20th and also like Moto raced in 3 races, for a total of 75 laps .
Ashe won the D race handly, start to finsih , with a closer race for 2nd being won by Racer Island's Brave Ashebourne. Ace Crabe in 3rd, Nella Bocarra 4th.

Ashe had to over come more adversity in the C race, where he fell back to 4th early on , but kept his eye on the prize, working his way to 2nd on lap 8, and was able to lead for a lap after Moto spun, Moto won but Ashe got 2nd and the advance to B group.

Saori Otsuka of Racer's Island, once again showed her skills in the C race, chasing Moto in 2nd for the first 7 laps of the race, but crashed big lap 8 falling back to 7th and eventualy finishing in 6th . Brave Ashebourne got up for 3rd, just beating Ramrods chief Ram Pharoah at the line , Ram 4th, Molly Fitzgerald finishing 5th just ahead of a late charging Saori.

Ashe did well in the B race , never further back then 3rd most of the race, was in 2nd a few laps , and even in the lead for a lap , but had a hard last part of race , eventualy finishing 4th , putting a commendable end to one of the better driving performances of the day.

The racers are off for a week but will return to race at the venerable PSU 1 track , thought lost at one time , but ressurected by Motorato Ware at her Hotspot sim. For me personally the word redemption first pops to mind, but mostly having bad luck at PSU 1 , makes me think again. It will be another good one .

A very nice video of this race and several other races this season, can be found at......
http://www.slodcast.com/

FormulaSL Round #5 in the Desert

2009-05-06T01:22:00.015-04:00

This week we raced at Les White's brand new Desert track , a fast curvy track with fast times and lots of action. 28 drivers came out to brave the heat , with the Italian team in particuliar having a nice size cheering section, once everyone was descripted and ready, Race Director Yum Divesadero got the proceedings underway.

Annie Gufler grabber her 4th pole position , her AM Pro pit crew is honed to a knifes edge with the drivers championship already in sight , a 1 stop strategy scored her a 4th win of the season.
Racers Island Remon Franizzi finished 2nd after qualifying 3rd. Myself 3rd, after qualifying 6th,
Caz 4th, Jafo 5th, Yuriko 6th, Laney Recreant 7th and INDrive's Zaria Falconer 8th.

The A race was a bit of a wild one , lots of spinning and lead changes with Remon Franizzi and Caz freschi taking over the lead from Annie for several laps . At one point on lap 17, the top 5 cars were all very close to one another, at one point 5th place being 2.3 seconds behind the leader. Both Remon and Caz held the lead at this late point in the race, but in the end it was Annie's 1 stop strategy that go her the win, a very good race by everyone.

Yuriko qualified 7th overall and dominated the B race, leading wire to wire to advance, Zaria Falconer was strong in 2nd the whole way too . A closer battle for 3rd between Brave Ashbourne, Ashe Revnik and Ram Pharoah, with Brave getting 3rd in the end . Ram 4th and Molly Fitzgerald 5th .

The C race was all Ashe Revnik's... leading the whole race , with Ram grabbing 2nd for the advance . This race was another good one for places 3rd and down , with alot of good driving and passing, AM Pro boss Abacus Mimistrobell got 3rd and Racers Island's own Nella Bocarra 4th .

The D race looked like it was gonna Suzy Cuddihy and Rattra Raymaker easy for the advance to C, but Rattra fell back some and it was a race for 2nd , between Rattra , Abacus and Ace Crabe.
Ace fell out , but Abacus just barely beat Rattra to the line for the advance and the closest finish of the day .

Round 6th is in 1 week at Raver Bellow's own "Wide Track" in the RD Motorsports sim, we raced there last Bike season, but this is first visit in the cars , should be a fast close race.

G1-GP Season 2 opener

2009-04-30T23:17:00.014-04:00

Wednesday night was the season opener of G1-GP season 2 , the Triathalon....the first race being Legends cars at the Stockton 1/4 mile oval. 11 drivers showed for the tiny oval brawl, 3 more than last seasons opener.

Jafo Tendaze put down the fastest lap in the 2 lap qualify to secure his first pole position . The race began and Jafo looked like he was in good position to take his first G1-GP win, in front and running steady...First lap was my one and only highlight of race, when i passed Sulla Looming who had drifted high in a turn , puting me in 3rd place behind Jafo and Suku Ming.

But the fortunes of racing can often change quickly and they did lap 5 when Nella Bocarra got a little loose coming into a turn and spun out . Jafo barely missed her swerving high, then coming back down into infield , and just barely not getting stuck nose first into wall (Legends cars have no reverse).

I wasnt so lucky , no time and no room to manuever i hit Nella and was then struck by Katier Reitveld , taking us both out of the race. This left veteran driver Suku Ming in the lead and in command for the next 42 laps . But the race was not over , Sulla Looming slowly gained on Suku lap after lap , finaly getting within striking distance in the closing laps (lap 47 of 50) , almost getting by , but Suku was steady as a rock , while Sulla swerved a little losing ground lap 48.

Suku held on for her first G1-GP win ...the following video shows the highlights ive detailed above . Good racing by all, next race is Rally cars on the short Gp track at Lienz.

Full WMV file can be download at .........

http://rapidshare.com/files/227750228/Round1-season2.wmv.html

Season 1 Highlights- Part 2

2009-04-29T02:25:00.012-04:00

Here finaly part 2 of the G1-GP season 1 highlights..still not done though as this covers only rounds 5 and 6, next up will be part 3 with rounds 7 and 8.

After a 4 week pre-season , opening day for Season 2 has finally arrived , with Round 1 being Legends cars at the Stockton 1/4 mile oval. This should be a interesting race, as this track is only half the size of several of the oval raceways in Second Life.

Top drivers of the pre-season were Rattra Raymaker, Sulla Looming and Suzy Cuddihy. With new driver Remon Franizzi making his mark, and proving he will be one to watch.

Full sized WMV of the video can be downloaded at ......

http://rapidshare.com/files/227005842/Season1-Highlights2.wmv.html

ps note-- Yes the Nuerburg race was that dark by then end ...pitch black

FormulaSL Season 3 - Racer's Island

2009-04-20T11:03:00.015-04:00

Laney Recreant wins big , 2008 FSL Round #4

This was, as many know, one of the more controversial races for RaceSL in awhile. I could go into length here why , but i dont want to take away from Laney Recreant's accomplishment because she certainly had nothing to do with controversey , and everything to do with the high level of skill, poise and class that RaceSL strives for .

Qualifying 5th, Laney raced the early portion of the race in 6th , slowly working her way up to 2nd place around time of the first pitstop and then taking the lead over from Remon Franizzi on lap 17 and never looked back , winning handily . Annie Gufler 2nd, and Yuriko Nishi Nishi 3rd.

Group B was a close battle between Hotspot Racings Silk Bamboo and Ramrod Racing Just Catteneo . Silk led for the first 18 laps before a incident sent her back to 3rd, and then back to 2nd where she chased Just closely for 4 laps before retaking the lead and the win . Just 2nd , myself 3rd. Molly Fitzgerald 4th .

The C race was another exciting one to watch , with 3 leaders swapping off during it , Zaria Falconer of Indrive led early on , then Motorato Ware for a couple laps before the pits . Molly Fitzgerald took over for a bit after the pit stops , before Moto took over for the remaining 8 laps and the winning , Molly 2nd , and Zaria 3rd after bouncing back from being last at one point.

Race D was a big one for Alice Racing vet Darko Revnik who , deservedly led from wire to wire, Darko has been putting in the time and effort in practice and it paid off here with a very nice drive and the advance up to C race. Racers island own Strife Leominster took 2nd and the advance with Am Pro veteran TFFox Tammas getting 3rd.

Next race will be in 2 weeks at the new beautiful desert track . Big thanks to Racers Island to hosting round 4 at their nice new Formula track, despite the controversey , a good time was had by most .

G1-GP Season 2 preview....

2009-04-15T13:38:00.011-04:00

The G1-GP Rfactor league is steadily working up to the start of a new season. This time the racers are gonna have to race a variety of cars on a variety of tracks to test everyones strengths and weaknesses in a more diverse season .

There will be 3 races each of 3 different classes this time ... Legend coupes and sedans on small ovals and small road tracks..... Rally cars on mountain and offroad rally tracks and Formula 3 cars in dangerous downtown type city tracks .

Here is a little video showing some highlights from the test races weve run so far for all 3 classes....The season is slated to start Wednesday April 29th .

Also available to download the better quality WMV at ....

http://rapidshare.com/files/221730326/Test-Highlights.wmv.html

FormulaSL - Round3 at Snowpeach

2009-04-14T00:46:00.016-04:00

Annie Gufler takes 3rd straight in Round 3

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Another 40+ peeps crowded into the viewing room at a race track to partake in the current FormulaSL season, this time the venue is the venerable Snowpeach , owned by Count and Bibi Bayliss, long time contributors, supporters and participants in RaceSL.

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32 racers entered the que to qualify for the 26 spots in the 4 races. Yuriko Nishi got her first FormulaSL pole position, in her bid to catch the runaway AM PRO driver Annie Gufler.

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As always after qualify then a short break its time to run the races..first of the day is Group D , with Alice Racing veteran Darko Revnik on pole. Darko didnt have too good a start recieving some heavy contact and finished in 7th . This race belonged to Ram Pharoah , who got in the lead lap 4 and didnt look back . 2nd was Strife Leominster, 3rd was Nella Boccara. Saori Otsuka put on a very good performance in this race, Leading for 3 laps then chasing Ram for a bit , but falling behind out of 2nd finishing in 5th .

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Group C ...may have been one of most back and forth battles weve seen in awhile..Stang Voom , Suzy Cuddihy and Remon Franizzi battled up front for most of this 20 lap race. Stang led for the first 2 , then fell way back for a bit after a early pitstop ,while Remon took over for 5 laps untill it was time for pits.

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Stang led again untill spinning out , Suzy Cuddihy took over and was looking like she was cruising to a win, when she had a incident with traffic, a close battling Stang and Remon got by her, and battled each other in finals laps..Remon was just 1.6 seconds behind at lap 19, but Stang held on for the win, finish order of Stang, Remon, Suzy, Ram and Strife Leominster in top 5 .

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Group B was all about how good a driver can get with enough practice, and in this case im talking about Shoshin ace Molly Fitzgerald . Her B race from pole this round was exciting and skill filled, dodging traffic, pitting well, and a back and forth battle with zT top cheese Stang Voom.

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Molly led 15 laps and Stang led 10, but in the last part of the race it was all Molly and the battle was between Stang and InDrive Racing driver Caz Freschi . Caz was by into 2nd for laps 21 to 23 , but spun allowing Stang by for 2nd and the the advance.

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Group A ...well lets see...Yuriko got pole ...then ...well my memory is a little blurry i just drove and finished where i did , id put a more detailed recap here...but im not sure anyone knows exactly what happened..mayhem .

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The story of the A race was prolly Silk Bamboos awesome early chase of Annie after getting by the early mayhem . 11 laps Silk kept good pace with her , kept her in sight . Eventualy falling behind , but never out of 2nd , finishing 2nd , i finished 3rd , Jafo 4th , Yuriko 5th . Annie led the entire race eventualy lapping everyone atleast 2 times ..most of the field got lapped 3 times or more.

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Impressive stats for season leader Annie Gufler ...after 3 races and 21 opponent finishes...only 1 time did someone finish on lead lap, Yuriko in Round 2. Currently Annie is 1st, Yuriko 2nd, Jafo 3rd...Archer hangs onto the team lead , with Am Pro close behind , InDrive in 3rd. Next saturday is round 4 at Racers island .

Part 1 G1-GP Season 1 highlights

2009-04-05T02:00:00.007-04:00

Heres part 1 of 2 , covering the first 4 races of season , i will release 2nd one soon covering races 5 to 8.

There is also a higher quality version available here for

download http://rapidshare.com/files/217568990/Part1.wmv.html

Round 2 FormulaSL 3 2009

2009-03-31T14:01:00.025-04:00

RD Motorsports played host to the 2nd round of this season of FormulaSL , the skies we clear and blue, hardly a lag cloud in the sky (can never escape SL lag, but it was nice anyways ). Another 40 + drivers and spectators crowded into the viewing box. 29 drivers entering the que for the event.

Annie Gufler got her 2nd straight pole and 2nd straight win . With Yuriko Nishi hot behind her, puttign in a great performance for 2nd , KRP ace driver Caz Freschi getting his first taste of the podium for the season. Jafo Tendaze had a rough race finishing 4th , Ram Pharoah rounding out top 5.

Stang Voom and Ram Pharoah got the pass to the A group by finishing 1st and 2nd in a good B race, filled with lots of close racing , and lead changes. Ram led the entire race but Stang got by on the last lap for the win. RD Motorsports owner barely got 3rd with a very close finish with Suzy Cuddihy , only by .16 seconds.

Group B wasnt Stangs first race of the day . Stang ran strong in the Group C race, although Remon Franizzi put up a serious challenge late in race, Stang held on for the win. Ashe Revnik won a intense 3 way battle early in the race to get 2nd and the advance to B race. Racer's Island teamies Remon Franizzi and Brave Ashbourne finished a close 3rd and 4th .

Group D looked a bit like it did last week , with Indie driver Ford Roffo sitting on pole , but someone musta stuck a banana up this monkey's tail pipe cause well after green thats all he was still doing on pole , sitting . Perhaps the flashing green light that tells his simian mind to press the gas wasnt switched on in time ....did the phrase "stuck a booger" have any revelance or context here, we may never know.

The other 6 drivers werent concerned , instead they gunned it on go , with Remon Franizzi getting the all important early steady lead in this 10 lap race. 2nd was more of a battle and some good driving , with Tracy Torok, in 2nd the first couple laps then being passed by Alice vet driver Darko Revnik taking over for a few laps before getting into trouble finishing 5th , just behind a surging Nella Boccara.

Amber Raceway ace Tracy Torok got back by Darko lap 6 and held on for 2nd, Ace Crabe got 3rd. Round 3 from the claustorphobic Snowpeach in 2 weeks , with Annie in 1st place in points, Yuriko 2nd , Jafo Tendaze 3rd and Caz freschi 4th .

G1-GP Season Finale

2009-03-26T13:40:00.009-04:00

Wednesday was race 10 of 10 at Spa Franchorchamps , not sure anyone got away without any scrapes... it was a doozy, heres a highlight reel of a little of the action .

You may have to fiddle with slider to get it to play it all....
this file seems truncated ...a limited number of downloads of full wmv file is available from rapidshare at http://rapidshare.com/files/213847808/S1-R10-s_0001.wmv.html

The full version with no sound can be had at youtube at ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8YUvqWhc4s

FormulaSL - Season 3 opener

2009-03-24T10:38:00.016-04:00

Annie Gufler wins season opener at Mooz

It was a nice welcome back on saturday for everybody , and i mean everybody as 50 peeps crowded into Mooz to kick off the new season . This included 30 drivers eager to test their mettle in Second Lifes most prestigious racing series . One of the great things about RaceSL, and even more so this season ,it has collected some of the best participants of SL's other top notch racing leagues , including Racers Island fielding a team of 4, Amber Raceway , and for the first time our Italian friends from the Alice Racing league.

Any commentary on this race cannot avoid the fact that Annie Gufler of AM Pro dominated the days proceedings , grabbing pole position then skillfully running away with the 8 car Group A race, lapping the entire field .

But for my day personally it was certainly one of the greatest challenges in my own teams history and a day i am quite proud of my team mates. The qualify round only shined for Jafo Tendaze , 2 time RaceSL champion , who qualified 2nd behind Annie . Yuriko Nishi and myself suffered from nerves and or inclement weather to qualify 10th and 11th , putting us back in the middle of the field for the B group race.

The situation was not looking good , with veteran speedfreak Hotspot Racing Drivers Silk Bamboo and Suzy Cuddihy both qualifying into A group , along with AM Pro sticking 2 drivers into Group A with the brilliant qualifying run of Annie's vet teamate Fox Tommas. Already the obituary Archer Racing's record of 36 straight races in 1st place was going thru my head, as our backs were obviously up against the wall like at no other time in our year and a half history .

All there was left to do was to actualy race, all we could do was try our best to give the other teams a challenge. Either Yuriko or myself needed to come in 1st or 2nd in Group B race to advance on to A and attempt to defend our title . After that it was a bit of a blur to be honest , a nice start for me as i threaded the needle past cars in trouble to move into the lead, it felt good out there and i did what i had to do making as few mistakes as possible and winning the race, and as a nice added bonus Yuriko also ran a very good race coming in 2nd .

Although i do prefer to adjulate the accomplishments of my fellow competitors on this forum , i am quite proud that Archer was able to rise to the occaision , with Jafo coming in 2nd and Yuriko grabbing 3rd, securing us our 37th straight round in 1st place, but just 2 points ahead of the AM Pro team. With the whole of the season remaining i think this will be a continuing battle with the veteran AM Pro and Hotspot Racing teams , both not only worthy to knock us off the top but also deserving to do so .

Veteran Caz Freschi overcame some bad breaks during the race, included a few maulings by myself to put the new InDrive team of Greg Draymans Kokopelli racway and league into 4th place. But i think the most eyes were on the rookie Midnight Lotus team , led by dedicated RaceSL rookie Laney Recreant and a top performing Ashe Revnik, Midnight Lotus had a commendable day with Laney finishing 9th overall and Ashe finishing in the points in 13th after a great performance in the C race to advance up to the B race.

The skilled , and to be completely honest... often a crazy ... Racers Island team was led by veteran nutter Brave Ashbourne who ran a solid win in the C race , finishing 10th overall on the day , not far behind was Remon Franizzi in 12th .

The highlight of the Group D race was resident monkey and indie driver Ford Roffo who decisively led wire to wire. Ford then came in 5th in the Group C race. Another story of the day was Racers Island veteran Rattra Raymaker having computer problems and running the event on a backup computer, he did great coming in 2nd behind Ford in Group D and 4th in the C Group race.

Although SL wasnt too kind to us as far as lag , sometimes it was ok, sometimes it was just bad , the race was a great show of driving prowess and support, and the rest of the season is promising to be much the same, the next round is saturday the 28th at the Canyon raceway , with alot of drivers already looking to be in top form in early week testing .

Barcelona GP video

2009-03-22T13:42:00.006-04:00

Heres my first attempt at making a highlight reel for our Rfactor league ..hope it works hehe

FSL 3, Heavy metal, and lots of stuff

2009-03-20T23:59:00.008-04:00

Its been awhile since i posted here, but still been very busy in SL. Tommorow saturday march 21st is opening race of FormulaSL 3, word has it approx 36 drivers are signed up and ready to go. This of course includes Archer racing , Yuriko , Jafo and myself are prepared to brain each other in search of a season title, and the team as a whole hopes to capture its 4th RaceSL team championship.

Also in my time off , the G1-GP season has been progressing well, 3 races since my last post, a win for myself and 2 in a row for Sulla Looming, next wednesday is the season finale at Spa Franchorchamps , with several drivers points still very close. Im hoping at some point to be posting short highlight reels on Youtube, with links here on the blog.

Also a nice change for us , besides wheels , rubber, cars , bikes , motorsports....was a great Iron Maiden concert performed by Bad Ampitude at Renegades, a nice change of pace and a good time for everyone. My next post will be the race report for Round 1 at Mooz , good luck to all the teams and drivers this season , it should be a good one .

Nuerburg Grand Prix under the lights

2009-03-02T01:46:00.010-05:00

Last wednesday was round 7 of the G1-GP Rfactor league, this time it was off to Nuerburg Germany for the longest round of the season , just 23 laps, but at more than 1:50 minutes a lap , the whole race took 45 minutes to drive. Also this time I sped up how fast the game time passed, so we started the race in the daylight and ended in the pitch dark .

10 drivers again this round , the horn sounded and we were off . Katier Reitveld, who qualified 4th , saw a opening turn 1 and took a bold dive at it , a risky move that could potentialy take out other drivers, but she executed it nicely , battling and banging side by side with Sulla Looming around turn 1 for 1st place, Sulla came out ahead, i found myself in 4th behind Caz Freschi after braking badly at turn 1.

Sulla moved away out in front , she had up to a 14 second lead at one point . Meanwhile Caz, myself , Yuriko and Jafo chased after Katier who was in 2nd. Caz took a turn too quick and I moved by , then passing Katier a bit later for the lead after Sulla had made a early pit stop .

There was alot of contact this race, with drivers banging it out side by side in some turns . I think one of the highlights of the race was Suku Mings performance. Suku was placed high after the dangerous turn 1 , but got bumped and spun out accidentaly by Jafo in turn 2 , Suku fell to 10th after this incident , same back luck she had last race at Monaco on the first lap.

Most of the race Suku was in no better than 8th place, but thru effort and perserverance managed to finish 5th for her 5th top 5 finish of season . Sulla led the race easily till she made a early pit lap 5 . I moved into the lead untill i pitted , then Caz took over.

Jafo had a fast 1st pitstop and was in 2nd place coming out , with myself trailing in 3rd. Sulla was back in the pack , but had a excelent strategy going and was biding her time . Slowly but sure light fell on the track, from day time , to twilight , then finaly darkness.

Lap 17 I was leading with Caz close behind in 2nd , and Sulla about 20 seconds behind in 3rd.

It was time for my 2nd pit , i pulled in and it was a race...this was my fast pitstop, 5 laps to go, no tire change, just gas . I pulled into pit lane and to my garage and stopped, 12 seconds was the time needed to give me the fuel to finish the race, i watched my dashboard display where i could see the list of drivers and their positions , being in 3rd, Sulla's time behind me quickly counted down towards 0....

I could hear her coming down the front straight as my fuel was finishing , i peeled out and almost spun trying to get going , but was able to come out fairly close behind her, and the chase was on .

Caz was still way ahead in 1st place, but he still had to make his pitstop . He pitted that lap(18) and Sulla moved into 1st , with me close behind .

It came down to a face off in the dark , and it was still growing darker, being around 9 or 10pm game time , everything became harder and harder to see, soon all anyone could see was what their headlights touched ...no high beams either at 170 mph. Soon the dark took its first casualties, lap 20 , Katier , who had run off track accidentaly , re-entered the track right behind Yuriko , just as Yuriko was braking hard for a turn , they collided and were both out of the race from damage.

Sulla over ran a turn and went into grass allow in me to move by into first , and now i was being chased. Sulla hung on wonderfully in the increasing dark ,untill the end of lap 21 where it was my turn to over run a turn a bit, Sulla got by and hung on for the win , myself 2nd, Caz 3rd, Rattra finished 4th after Jafo crashed on the last lap when in 4th and Suku finished 5th.

Round 7 takes us to the California desert and the high speed Laguna Seca track .

G1-GP at Monaco

2009-02-22T22:27:00.012-05:00

This weeks race for the G1-GP series was one of the more anticipated of the season taking us to the almost mythicly tight streets of Monte Carlo. In preparation for the difficulty of this race, we had a 2 week break and a test race last week for this one .

I think the preparation paid off as many were in good form when it came down to qualify . Sulla

Looming got her 4th straight pole , myself 2nd and Caz Freschi 3rd , lining up a anticipated 20 lap dog fight , with all others more than willing to join .

But fate had it this wasnt to be... Both Sulla and Caz crashed on lap 1 , leaving me out front with Katier Reitveld in 2nd . Caz started off the incidents by solidly hitting the barrier tires on the left while exiting the tunnel chicane, unfortunately for Suku Ming she was also right there, hitting Caz and spinning around pointing the wrong way, like me at Mills , Suku was helpless to do more than watch the whole field pass her by while she got going again, falling from 4th to 10th .

Not long later up ahead Sulla entered a fast S turn too wide striking the outside wall and bouncing off to the perimeter guard railing , a spectacular crash .. where she even got some air this time. Both Caz and Sulla were forced to pit because of the damage .

Meanwhile up ahead, the field continued to race on . Jafo took over 2nd and Yuriko into 3rd after Katier spun out . They both hung on for a good portion of the race, in the mean time , both Sulla and Suku had been working their ways back up . Lap 16 , Sulla had caught back up to Yuriko and Jafo, Jafo pitted out of 2nd , and Yuriko wobbled coming out of turn 1 just a bit, but it was enough for Sulla to power her way by .

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Sulla hung on to get 2nd after falling to 10th place on lap 1 , Jafo had a solid race coming in 3rd, Suku also made a great come back after getting involved with the lap 1 incident , Katier also had a solid race getting 5th .

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We had a so far season high of 10 cars in this race, thanks to Suzy Cuddihy returning from a unplanned hiatus , wb Suzy... and thanks to our newest member YumYum Divesadero. Next week is Round #6 at Nuerburg , this next one will be the longest race of the season , and using game time speed up , will transition from daytime to nighttime during the course of the race.

MotoSL season 4 Awards

2009-02-17T13:41:00.009-05:00

This last saturday the RaceSL comunity met at the RaceSL hall of fame facility at Misp for the official conclusion of MotoSL season4 . Everyone present came up and collected their hardware for individual and team placings .

Annie Gufler became the 4th person in 4 seasons to collect top rider award , while Archer racing collected our 3rd straight Team championship. Im sure most people are tired of seeing us up there collecting another one , but im savoring it, with the rise of competition , and the putting together of some top partnerships , each one maybe the last for us .

Big thanks to Les for this season , and everyone that has supported the league . Count Bayliss and Raver Bellow. Seems like the whole of the community is buzzing about the upcoming FormulaSL season , everyone still working out details , signing with sponsors , building vehicles , forming teams . Its looking like its gonna be a good one , with Annie Gufler looking to match Jafo Tendaze's record of 1 MotoSL and 1 FSL championship, only person to win one of each so far.

G1-GP Update

2009-02-06T13:15:00.013-05:00

2 races have passed now in our Rfactor league season, so Im doing a little race report for these.. cause both were outstanding races , and it certainly can be seen each race that everyone is improving and the competition level is rising .

2 weeks ago was was race #3 at Silverstone . This one kept me on the edge of my seat for the whole 30 minute race. The first half of the race was Sulla , Caz and myself running away from the field , trading off leads . Sulla led at first for a good while , Caz who had made a very nice pass on myself taking over 2nd, passed Sulla after she spun out . I also got by Sulla and chased Caz untill the lap where we pitted, Caz spun and i was thru . After my pit Sulla was right on me , but i was able to pull away and hang on for my 3rd win. Caz got 2nd , and Sulla 3rd.

This week the race was at another fictional track... Mills Metropark built by the Rfactor team , they put alot of detail in their tracks , and made them challenging and fun. We will be racing a 3 of the fictional tracks this season , Toban, Mills and Orchard Lake .

Sulla landed her 3rd straight pole , Caz 2nd on grid , myself 3rd. This race was the debut of new driver Katier Reitveld , driving the Blue/White Thetford Lola Ex257 . Katier had a great 1st qualify round landing on 4th beside me .

Caz jumped the start , way soon hehe , he held up , but got a bad launch after lights went green, allowing myself and Sulla to get ahead. I think Caz was kicking himself over this as the racers accelerated thru the opening corners. Yuriko also got by Caz in turn 2, but came together with Katier and spun out . Caz moved into 3rd chasing Sulla and myself .

But the cost of a jump start is a drive thru pits penalty... a little break for Caz is that Mills pits is very short, this amounted to just a 10 second penalty , he came out from 3rd to 5th , right behind Rattra and Jafo .

Caz was able to get by them eventualy and back into 3rd. Meanwhile Sulla had spun out of the lead , allowing me to move up into 1st . I led untill after the pits when I ran over a rumble strip , my car is low to ground and i think for just a moment 3-4 of my wheels came off of ground and I had my only spin out of race .

But 1 spin was enough , Jafo and Caz drove by me , then next around corner was Sulla and Suku who passed as i was recovering , 1st to 5th . The last phase of the race was close between Jafo in lead, Caz and then Sulla 3rd . Sulla unfortunately was first out, in one of worst wrecks of season so far, took a hard spin at about 140 mph, and hit the wall front first at 100mph .

Jafo started to pull away a little from Caz in the closing laps , but Caz closed it in the last 2 laps . Turn 4 of the final lap , they both lost their cool a bit , both came in hot and braked hard....Jafo spun , and Caz hit him, but Caz was still pointing in the right direction and was able to slip ahead.

Caz grabbed his first win , Jafo his 2nd podium in 2nd place, Suku Ming who also ran a very good race finished 3rd . Next round of the season moves to the claustorphobic streets and alleys of Monaco , it what promises to be the hardest and possibly most trouble filled race of the season . Next week is just a practice race , leaving 2 weeks for this one so everyone is well prepared.

Caz Freschi on top step after his win at Mills Metropark

MotoSL Season finale at Mooz

2009-02-02T16:26:00.017-05:00

Jafo Tendaze wins Round 12, Mooz Long Layout
Annie Gufler wins Rider Championship

19 riders made the finale of what has been a highly competitive season, that has had its share of dominations , hard spills , bad luck, good luck and close well ridden races . Jafo T. finally snapped his own personal run of bad luck and made it to the top step for the first time in the 4 month season, with a pole position making it the best attempt at a long shot upset championship as could be possible.

But Annie Gufler finished a respectable race in 3rd place , securing her as the 4th MotoSL champion in 4 seasons. Grats Annie , Grats Jafo on a very nice win and 2nd place overall season 4 . I somehow managed put 2 wheels on the track and with luck ended up 2nd in the race, my best finish of the season . Yuriko finished 4th in the Group A race, just 1 off a Archer podium sweep .

The rest of the field consisted of the Racer's Island vets Brave Ashbourne and Remon Franizzi , who finished the race 6th and 5th . Racer's island came on strong and are looking to be one of the top teams in the upcoming FormulaSL season 3 .

Other teams also shined this season besides Am Pro , Racers Island and Archer , namely BikeSites.com team , with a win and handfull of well deserved podiums it was great to see vets Moto Ware, Silk Bamboo and Suzy Cuddihy come on strong when given half of a chance.

Another good team this season that never realised their potential was the SLodcast team of Ram Pharoah and Sulla Looming . Another team that if was able to make every race could stake its claim amongst top teams , and these blokes are playing from England too .

Molly Fitzgerald has come a long way since her biddity friend Doll Kabuki got her hooked on Les Whites bad medicine, look for Molly to show up more often in the Group A dance as the seasons continue to progress , one of hardest working riders out there.

Annie Gufler had a outstanding season , with a 6 race sweep mid season that guaranteed her a first RaceSL title . Next up is FormulaSL and im sure Annie is feeling that once you have a collection, might as well add to it , Annie will saddle up this next RaceSL season as the person to beat , and i guess we'll have to see what she has to say about that on the track.

Am Pro had a franchise season , coming in 2nd overall in teams , and winning the driver championship. They have a legitimate chance to put together a team for FormulaSL to take the championship for teams and Driver . If Abacus Mimistrobell would visit from Never never land more often, maybe he could contribute to Annie and TFFOX's hard work .

The 6th complete RaceSL season is now in the books , now we enter pre-season for the 7th . Les is hard at work on a new car and new innovations , the stir for the next FormulaSL started even before MotoSL4 came to a close, and is promising to be another successfull campaign by RaceSL .

MotoSL 4 --- Round 11

2009-01-26T17:01:00.024-05:00

Brave Ashbourne wins MotoSL PSU2 at Racers Island GP!!

This round of MotoSL has taken us to the beautiful Racers Island sim , where Eddie Mathieson runs several racings leagues on superb race tracks... stacked 7 high .
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The story of this round is unfortunately one i wasnt able to witness personally cause i was racing myself , but the Group A race started and stayed for awhile a 3 bike dogfight between Ram Pharoah, Brave Ashbourne and Moto Ware . Ram hung on untill lap 7 where he was overtaken by Brave , with Moto still in striking distance if either should fall .
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Ram retook the lead lap 10, but Brave again got ahead lap 11 and hung on despite Ram being right on his heels for the final laps . Big congrats to a hard working racer that deserves this win on his home turf .

Group B race was won by Ram Pharoah who had a steady hand today, he needed it with last races winner Silk Bamboo hoping for any kind of voodoo to help Ram fall, but he did not and prevailed , moving onto the Group A race.
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Another great story of the day was the Group C race , where long time racing vet Nella Boccara
jumped out after Holden Saunders faltered lap 4 . Nella proceded to lead the rest of the race and win .
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Group D was a 2 bike faceoff between Bikey Bekkers and Hakuna Albatross, Bikey prevailed and moved on to the Group C race. Next race is saturday January 31st at Mooz on the full layout. Its been a great season , in the closing races we are seeing new stars like Mooly Fitzgerald, Brave Ashbourne and Stang Voom staking their claims, and seasoned vets still riding solid.
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Annie Gufler has the season championship sewn up going into the final round , Annie will become the 4th MotoSL champion in 4 seasons , with the 2nd all time number of MotoSL wins in 1 season and overall . Season 1 champion Stillywack Stillman, still holds records of most win in single season and overall .
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Archer has also wrapped up the team championship, our first MotoSL team championship and 3rd overall in RaceSL . But this season has showed that there is several good teams ready to take it next season , including Bikersites.com, AM Pro, Racers Island and ZT Racing .
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Last wednesday was also race 2 of the G1-GP rfactor season , i managed to get another win, despite a late race kiss with the wall . Rattra scored his 2nd straight, 2nd place.. and Jafo came in 3rd.
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So far as the season is shaping up .. I think Sulla is so far in a class byherself , and once she can stay the course , she will start winning. Rattra , Yuriko and Suzy are the steady crew, placing high in the 2 races , payoff for their steady racing.
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Jafo and Suku are both talented enough that once they can keep all 4 pointing forward they will finish high. Caz is working hard to join any of the above categories, plus we will have new drivers Kiboe Munro and Eddie Mathieson joining us in upcomign races, making it a field of up to 10 ...Race 3, is 18 laps at Silverstone wednesday jan 28th .

Group1-GP season opener

2009-01-15T11:11:00.011-05:00

In early december i had the idea of combining Second Life with a seperate racing simulation, having a pool of talented drivers from second life compete in a racing series that would be carried out both inside SL and the Rfactor racing game.

Finaly after a series of 5 practice races , we had a field of talented drivers and a 10 race schedule using high powered American Le Mans style cars. Race #1 was finaly set for Gille Villeneuve track in Montreal Canada .

We were plagued with some technical difficulties , but finally after some delay , a field of 8 was lined up on the grid for the 1st race of the series, these included , myself, Suku Ming, Sulla Looming , Jafo Tendaze, Yuriko Nishi, Suzy Cuddihy, Caz Freschi and Rattra Raymaker, champions and top notch drivers each one .

Nerves ran a bit high as the cars went off for the 22 lap race, Suku sitting in 2nd spot had a slow start , allowing Sulla Looming , who is a early favorite to do well in the series, to get by . Unforntunately Sulla spun in turn 3 and a close following Suku t-boned her, Sulla then hit a wall losing her rear wing . Sulla made a effort to continue , but had the whole track to drive around while damaged to reach the pits , finaly spinning out and being damaged beyond repair and the first casualty of the night .

2nd casulaty was lap 5 when Jafo T locked up and struck a wall , he also retired from the race when his car was beyond repair .
Although i was able to lead all 22 laps cleanly, the race was filled with several close battles, including early on between Ratta and Yuriko in a battle for 2nd , Rattra was able to show patience, and got by after Yuriko spun out .

Late in the race Suku and Caz batttled it out for 5th place , with Suku finaly prevailing in the last lap . Rattra ran a strong race finishing 2nd, Suzy Cuddihy grabbed the last spot on the podium for 3rd. Yuriko 4th .

In 1 week is Round #2 at Toban raceway , a fictional Rfactor track that should be a very challenging race, with several hard and fast turns for the drivers to negotiate in the 20 lap race. Its still early on and with a championship points scale made for a close season , everyone still has a good chance to come out on top in the end . Thanks to everyone participating .

MotoSL Round 10 and other stuff

2009-01-12T14:14:00.033-05:00

Silk Bamboo wins Round 10 at RD Motorsports -Wide Track

22 riders came out saturday to watch BikerSites.com dominate the Group A and B races , ill save the formalities and cut right to it . AM PRO rider Annie Gufler grabbed her 3 podium of the season and had visions of a 7th straight win in her eyes...wether or not this would be a RaceSL record is up to debate due to incomplete MotoSL season 1 records , but still would be quite a feat .

Annie started out well when the lights went out as usual, and it looked perhaps like she would 7 'peat, but something was different this time out . Although Annie had a 4 or 5 bike length lead , a determined cluster of riders was hot on her heels . 5 laps Annie led , then suddenly the crowd rose as one as she went down , when the smoke cleared , Silk Bamboo had moved from 4th to 1st with Jafo Tendaze and the the rest of the crowd chasing her close .

But thats all anyone could do for the rest of the 20 lap race, chase her.. Jafo was close for 5 more laps before crashing , after that Silk was gone for her first win since MotoSL season 2 . After his fall on lap 10 Jafo and Stang Voom of Zero Tolerance battled it out for the 2nd spot .

Jafo held him off for 9 more laps , but they came together going into turn 2 of the last lap, Jafo got the worst of it, getting hung up on the fence, Stang completed the lap and finished 2nd and his first MotoSL podium . Jafo finished 3rd, Motorato Ware 4th ...giving the BikerSites.com team the best showing of the day by a wide margin , Yuriko Nishi 5th, and Annie Gufler 6th . I was not witness to what became of Stang Vooms racing Speedos after finishing 2nd, but my guess is tongs and industrial grade solvent were involved .

Motorato Ware dominated the Group B race getting the advance to Group A. Normaly i dont dwell on races i dont do so good , but this one was fun, i started 4th on the grid for the race and it developed into a close dogfight between myself and cross town rival Brave Ashbourne for 2nd place, for 9 of the 15 lap race we crossed the line only seperated by tenths of a second.

I was trailing for 6 of those... finaly getting by him lap 12, at one point, I have no idea what happened , but Brave looked like a pop fly way up in the air , he manged to land and continue , but his line was a bit off thru the next 3 turns , and we both went into the fence at the turn 3 hairpin , i got going quicker and managed to finish the race 2nd, poor Brave stalled or something at the finish line and was passed by up and coming Whites Bikes phenom Molly Fitzgerald who got 3rd, Brave 4th , Ram Pharoah 5th and Abacus Mimistrobel 6th .

the Group C race was another tear jerker for veteran BikerSites.com race Suzy Cuddihy, who steadily led the race for the first 7 laps before taking her only spill , allowing SlodCast chief Ram Pharoah by after he ran a flawless 2nd till then, Suzy got 2nd , AM PRO ride TFFOX Tommas 3rd.

Group D was a flawless run by Rattra Raymaker , with a impressive 2nd place by veteran YumYum Divisadero , who has been missed as a top competitor this season . All in all it was a great day of racing , mucho thanko to Les White, next race is in 2 weeks ...where, has not been set in stone , but perhaps we will be at the Racers Island sim this time .

After the MotoSL races saturday , I headed over to Kokopelli Raceway to participate in the Sportsman Late Model class race. 3 classes of cars run there on saturdays , the Spectator, Factory Stocks and Sportsman . It was good fun , a bit lengthy I will be honest , but my butt on the hard bleachers endured and I managed to win my race as pictured below .

The next post for this blog will be thursday or friday for a race summary of the Season opener of my own league , G1-GP Racing league. Hoping to have 8 or 9 top skill drivers competing for cash and a nice trophy at a virtual Canadian GP (Montreal). Below is a pic from our 5th and last practice race, featuring Sulla Looming spinning out in turn 1 of lap 1 , she recovered and came back to win in a race that was great fun ..stay tuned .

Happy Holidays

2008-12-29T23:57:00.015-05:00

Hope everyone had a nice Christmas and has a safe new year, posting the picture above of myself and Rayne at our house, Haven Manor, which will be celebrating its 1 year birthday since we moved in . We have a nice plot of land there and just added the woodland you can see over to the right, will post a pictorial on just the house and property soon .

Other things in news.... is Les Whites holiday Time trials we did on december 21st, a large group of racers traveled across SL track to track , trying different vehicles in 3 laps to see who got the fastest times, it was a great tour of SLs race tracks, including , Mooz, Racer's island, Kokopelli raceway, Silver Mountain (SMC), Otway raceway, Amber raceway , Misp..all in all it lasted 6 hours and was lots of fun for all, in the end Jafo Tendaze won the event by just 1 point over Ram Pharoah.

This last sunday the 28th , was test race #4 for the Rfactor league, a good showing of 6 drivers this time. Was a few technical problems , but all in all a good race, especialy the last 3 laps where i chased Ratta Raymaker very close, shown in pic below, Rattra prevailed. So far tenatively setting opening day for the season for wednesday January 14th .

I wont be making the next MotoSL race, which is round #9 at Mooz, will be out of town celebrating christmas wiht my family who lives all over the place and hard to get together somethimes, i wish all riders luck, go Archer =)

Group1 GP Racing league holds another test....

2008-12-19T13:33:00.013-05:00

Wednesday we held another test race , this time at the Nuerburg sprint layout. The test was a little bumpy, and had to be restarted one time, but otherwise was alot of fun . This was our first test using what will more than likely be the official class cars of the league , LMP 675 prototype Sportscars.

These speedy cars require discipline on the twisty road tracks , a slight mistep and you will be involved in a costly spin out. In the test race , Jafo and myself seemed to have the steadiest hand and drove a close race for almost the first half . But alas my fellow test racers made a few costly pit stop miscalculations ( or no calculations as it were) and i won with Jafo only 10 seconds behind despite his error.

The Group1 GP league will be for any SL based racing enthusiasts willing to come out and particpate. We will be racing a 10 race season over hopefully 10 to 12 weeks time . With cash prizes for each race and end of season . We will be racing on full sized real world simmed tracks. Most tracks are 3 to 4 and half miles in length. With lap times around 1:30 to 2 minutes each .

Official races and tests are held at 5pm SLT on wednesdays , and maybe bumped up to 5:30 pm to accomodate some drivers RL schedules. We have also been racing on other days if we feel like it , infact in this pre-season mode anyone participating can request a test for anytime and we will see what we can do about getting some drivers on the track .

Race format includes a open practice, a open qualify, then the race itself, which.. although we are racing Le Mans style cars, will be short, 30 to 35 minutes , which is approx 15 to 25 laps on these full size courses.

Races will include pit stops , spin outs and crashes , full computer regulated rules and penalties, including yellow flags , blue flags and black flags for naughty drivers . Computer doals out penalties automaticly for such infractions as.... jumping the start , cutting the track , speeding in pits , disobeying blue flags . Penalties include... drive thru, stop and go and of course the black flag, which means disqualified.

Only 4 drivers this test , but we expect to grow after the hollidays from 5 current drivers testing to 7 or 8, and hope to have 10 to 15 when we begin the official Season. We will continue to run our test races to get new drivers used to how the show runs and the nuances involved, so hopefully no one is beffuddled about any aspect when the green drops on opening day of the season . If this interests you , contact me in game about details , and hurry up and join our tests before Jafo T. gets much more practice out there =)

MotoSL Season #4- Snowpeach GP 2

2008-12-15T21:29:00.028-05:00

Annie Gufler takes her 5th top step of season

This round of the MotoSL season takes us back to classic Snowpeach for the 2nd time, which is fine with me cause i like this track alot =) . This synergy seemed to pay off , when i managed to qualify 3rd despite a very laggy qualify round for me , and my seeming inability get off the proverbial "Schnide" as far as qualifying .

Annie was hot , grabbing her 2nd straight pole with a lap nearly a half second faster than Yuriko in 2nd, Jafo landed on 4 and TFox Tammas 5th , for a all Archer/ AM Pro top 5 .

This showdown would have to wait though , as Just Catteneo made a bid to join the Group A party. Just qualified 16th , which means he was on pole for the opening D race, which he won decisively .This race also saw some good racing from Nella Boccara 2nd, Hakuna Albatross 3rd and track owner Count Bayliss 4th...these 3 put on some good racing as Just ran away with it.

With the group D win Just advances to 6th on grid for Group C, which had league favorite chimpanzee... Ford Roffo on pole. But to be honest im not even sure what happened to poor Ford, slingshot-fast-starting-pro Ram Pharoah got a great start from the 3rd spot and sped away into lead after the 1st turn , with Just Catteneo close behind all the way from the back .

Just got by Ram on lap 2 , Holden fell back by lap 4 , the remainder of the race was Just in the lead and Ram in hot pursuit but unable to overtake . Just , Ram , Suzy Cuddihy, Holden , Rattra Raymaker and Ford was the finish order.

Just stayed on his bike and on the track as he waited for the field of the group B race to roll out onto the race track . Josephina Gears was on the pole though and would not be denied, despite a valiant effort by Just who ran 2nd the whole time untill a late race fall let Stang Voom by, Stang finished 2nd , Just 3rd.

Hoping my bad luck of last several rounds might finally be behind me ...i started out well as the green fell on the group A race. I got past alot of trouble at the first turn hairpin and was in hot pursuit of Jafo who came thru the start cleanest and jumped to early lead. Annie accidentaly shut the door on a faster accelerating Yuriko and sent her crashing into the grass even before turn 1 , and Annie got the worst of the trouble at the pin , and fell back to 4th .

Lap 2 is about where my luck ran out , i was hit by some bad lag , not sure if just on my end , but hard to say as i fell from 2nd , all the way back to 5th . Annie jumped to 2nd lap 3 , and then got passed Jafo who crashed on lap 8. Yuriko had made her way up to 3rd and Joesephina Gears was running 4th .

I chased far behind untill i passed a fallen Joesephina lap 13 and was soon hot on Yurikos heels . I rather see Yuriko win the race , then be fighting over 3rd with her , but a race is a race, so all i could do was wish her luck and do my best ....unfortunately Yuriko fell lap 14 and i was by into 3rd where i finished, with Yuriko 4th , Josephina 5th, Fox Tammas 6th .

My 8th career podium at Snowpeach was bitter sweet, as AM Pro Rider Annie Gufler , after 8 races, stretched her lead to 29 points over Yuriko in 2nd, and 36 over Jafo in 3rd. Its the holliday break for MotoSL now , but will return on January 3rd for round 9 at Mooz.

Below is a screenshot introduction to a new pet project of mine, been putting together a group of SL based racers to compete online in the Rfactor racing game. So far we have a small group and it is growing, if you race rfactor or just want info , contact me in SL and i will see what i can do =)

MotoSL round #7

2008-12-07T20:37:00.024-05:00

Annie Gufler of AM Pro takes 3rd win straight
MotoSL Season4 , Round #7 PSU2 Long track @Snowpeach sim

Finally after what seemed like the longest 2 weeks in SL ever , we reach round #7 . This round was punctuated with close hard fought racing and hard disapointment for the author, will try to focus on more of the former than the latter. Lets just say i suffered technical issues on race day , qualifying 7th and finishing 11th overall .

Annie Gufler grabbed her first pole of season , with Jafo 2nd, Yuriko Nishi 3rd, Holden Saunders 4th and Suzy Cuddihy 5th for the Group A qualifiers.

Each race today had some exciting highlights , Group D's story was first time racer Caz Freschi leading wire to wire for the win , with vets Nella Boccara and Bikey Bekkers chasing him the whole race, Nella fell and Bikey got by for 2nd .

Group C was all Bikersites.com rider Josephina Gears making a return appearance this round, but White's Bike's rider Molly Fitzgerald made the viewing box start to stir and murmur with a great 5 lap comeback, where she steadily gained each lap , from -4.4 seconds lap 5 to -1.2 seconds at the finish lap 10 , alot of riders had a steady race, Brave Ashbourne finished 3rd.

Group had Ram Pharoah on the pole.... zT Racing's Stang Voom gave him a chase the whole race, but Ram never faltered and got the win and the advance to Group A . With Sulla Looming passing TFox Tammas last lap for 3rd.

Group A started off with a nice chase , Annie Gufler in front and Yuriko Nishi close behind for the first 3 laps , then Yuriko went down . Annie motored ahead and led the race to the finish . For the rest of the field , the remaining race was a a 12 lap back and forth battle for positioning .

Jafo moved to 2nd after Yuriko fell, and stayed there 1 lap till he crashed himself... Yuriko moved back into 2nd lap 5 untill she took a big spill . From there Suzy Cuddihy took over the 2nd place position and ran a steady race. Yuriko fell to 5th , then down to 6th at lap 7, while Ram and Jafo battled over 3rd .

Lap 8 onwards Yuriko began made her move in attempt to make a comeback, passed Holden into 5th when he fell, then by Ram into 4th at lap 11. Soon she was chasing Jafo around in the closing laps of the race. The last lap of the race started with Suzy in 2nd place by a decent margin over Jafo in 3rd and Yuriko in 4th .

It didnt take long for that to change, 1st turn , Jafo goes down and Yuriko is in 3rd. Annie crosses for the win , Suzy can almost see the finish line as she comes around the last turn of the race.... 9 and almost 10 steady laps in 2nd place and Suzy has mechanical failure and she goes down mere dozen or so yards from the finish, Yuriko is past finishing 2nd, Jafo beats Suzy to line in 3rd, Suzy 4th, Ram 5th , Holden 6th .

Only a week break before the next big race at Snowpeach, Annie Gufler now has a 16 point lead over 2nd place Yuriko Nishi . Another big finish next week could be all Annie needs to coast to the championship, it is yet to be seen .

MotoSL Season 4 ...Round 6

2008-11-23T14:32:00.044-05:00

Annie Gufler wins second straight at Backwards Canyon GP at RD Motorsports

Congrats to Annie Gufler for a convincing Round 6 win , with this she moves 10 points ahead of Archer Racing's Yuriko Nishi and 20 points ahead of 3rd place Jafo Tendaze.

25 turned out saturday to qualify, showing the dedication of the participants in a season now 2 months old and at its half way point. The qualifying rounds took its casualties, some drivers not getting the times they hoped for , and Sulla Looming suprising everyone , most of all herself by grabbing the pole position. Annie Gufler 2nd, Jafo 3rd, Yuriko 4th and Crippy Oh 5th .

Holden Saunders got pole for Group B , being a top rider this was a extra challenge for other riders in the group to overcome and advance up to A , this included Brave Ashbourne who finaly got off his duff and scored a nice win in the Group C race, Ram Pharoah, Suzy Cuddihy, Stang Voom and TFFox Tammas, a very solid field all around .

The Races started off with a bang in the 7 bike Group D race, with atleast a 4 bike spill at turn 1 , BBB rider Hakuna Albatross survived and led the field around for 5 laps before Hakuna took a spill allowing Racers Island rider John Alturas to close the gap quickly.

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Alturas passed Hakuna on lap 6 when he took another spill. Silk Bamboo like a ninja sprung on a ooportunity when Alturas wrecked and Hajuna blinked, Silk up from 3rd for the win, Hakuna just off her by .183 seconds , John Alturas 3rd just barely edging out Molly Fitzgerald, Mille Sands 5th , Nella Boccara 6th, Ford Roffo 7th .

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Group C race, Raver Bellow on pole. Just Catteneo surged from the 2nd spot on the grid and was able to get the hole shot after a little bit cleaner start this race, but only held it for 3 laps untill Brave Ashbourne jumped ahead and led around rest of race for the win . Just Catteneo was in position to make the most of any slips Brave had, but he didnt slip, Raver came in 3rd with MoR rider Rattra Raymaker 4th , Silk Bamboo 5th after nearly rallying to 3rd place, and BBB-GP rider Johnnie Gears 6th.

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Group B race saw pole sitter Holden Saunders of ZT racing , runaway with the race lapping the whole field i nthe course of a single lap on lap 10 . Meanwhile while Holden ran away with it , a tight group of riders consisting of Suzy Cuddihy, Brave Ashbourne and Ram Pharoah fought tooth and nail for every inch of track the whole race, trading off positions thru all 12 laps of the contest . Brave led most of the ways , but fell back for a couple laps to Ram ... in the end , Brave got 2nd place, Ram 3rd, Suzy 4th, Stang 5th and Fox Tammas 6th.

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Last but not least was the 15 lap Group A race, this was Annie's from the start , except for a spill in the tunnel where she lost the lead for very short time to Sulla Looming .

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For myself , sitting on 5th spot in grid , I wanted to see the race develope first before commiting to going all out . Into the 1st turn gently and and I see both of my team mates wipe out , im commited , I gun it thru into 4th place close behind Holden . I get by Holden lap 2 , and am chasing the lead group for one of few times this season for me , Sulla and Annie not far ahead.

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I chased Sulla into the tunnel lap 5 and there was Annie after her spill, Sulla got by , but i was even with Annie coming down the straight to the start/finish line , into turn 1 and I was too shallow crashing hard on the dirt, my bike slid up onto a small hill where I had difficulty moving off of it , i slowly backed my bike off while riders passed by, resuming the race I had fallen back to 5th .

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I chased Holden in 4th and Sulla in 3rd for 4 laps untill they both spilled , i was then able to move back into 3rd. Jafo had managed to run a steady race and was in 2nd after my spill on lap 6. Then it came.... the dreaded sim freeze, lap 12 all riders controls freezed up , most crashed cause of this , stuck in a hard right turn i went head first into the fence.

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Unfortunately so did season points leader Yuriko Nishi, who had just gotten up to 4th place , Yuriko's bike became tangled in the fencing , unable to get going quickly , Yuriko fell to 6th where she finished. Sulla 5th, Holden 4th, Crippy 3rd, Jafo 2nd .

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Next race will be held in 2 weeks on the PSU 2 track , Annie is looking to expand her lead, while winless Jafo, and Yuriko Nishi, who has fallen to 2nd in season points after the hard break of getting tangled up in the fence......have only victory and revenge on their minds for round 7 .

Friday was a big deal atleast for me personally , I scored my 4th win in the Legends class this 2008 SLASCAR season , giving me the season championship, unfortunately I came up short in the Late Model class and Super Stock class, congrats to everyone on their championship wins for the season as the multi-class SLASCAR season winds down to its completion. Big Grats to Greg Drayman who grabbed a season high of 4 titles.

Grid for SLASCAR 2008 season Legends class finale at Otway raceway

MotoSL4 - Round 5

2008-11-17T17:02:00.047-05:00

Annie Gufler Wins Parking Lot GP at Snowpeach

Round 5 of Second Lifes premiere racing league.... and attendance hasnt slacked off, 24 riders showed up after a 2 week break to run for the first time on Les Whites new track.

Dubbed the "Parking Lot"... from the sky it appears like a oblong oval , besides the 1 tight hairpin the rest of the track is one fast sweeping turn after the other , making it the fastest track so far of the series, with riders clocking laps in the 14 second range . Due to this, Les expanded the usual number of laps per race to accomodate. Group D was to be 10 laps, Group C 12 laps, Group B 18 laps and Group A 20 laps .

Whatever confidence had built over the last 2 weeks of practice seemed to poof into the ethers for me personaly as my poor qualify performance landed me 11th , but more notably was the great qualify performance by up and comer Molly Fitzgerald who got 10th , old time vet and one of few riders from season 2 , Yamaha Harley got 9th , Bikersites.com rider Suzy Cuddihy 8th.

AM Pro rider TFFox Tammas 7th and points leader Yuriko Nishi having a nervous qualify landed in 6th . The top 5 included on Pole Jafo Tendaze, 2nd IDK boss Just Catteneo , 3rd AM Pro franchise rider Annie Gufler , 4th for his highest qualify position since entering RaceSL , Racers Island one and only Brave Ashbourne with ZT rider Holden Saunders filling in 5th and final set A Group position.

Each Group, except D , has 1 open spot , available for whoever is able to win the previous race, and this ritual began in earnest with the Group D race.

Ram Pharoah of the Slodcast team got the hole shot and never looked back, which might have been the best as there were some bad multi-bike crashes at the hairpin. Ram won and got the advance, Racers Island ace John Alturas grabbed 2nd and Indie Monkey rider Ford Roffo in 3rd.

Next was the Group C race, which had me, having qualified 11th on the pole. My confidence was not great in this one , i fell at the hairpin and had to make up alot of ground with 2 long time MotoSL vets Motorato Ware and Raver Bellow on the track . Raver took over 1st and I chased him, his ride was flawless for several laps before he spilled, it was quite a good duel and one point Raver and I trading off positions.

Somehow I was able to hold on for the win and advance, Moto passed Raver in the closing laps for 2nd and Raver got 3rd. Ramsses made a good run at 2 in a row finishing 4th, Rattra Raymaker and Millenium Sands finished out the field, both with very well run races.

Next was the Group B race with me 6th on grid and Yuriko 1st , and alot of good riders in between . I couldnt tell you exactly what happened at start, around the hairpin and cautiously as I could, I saw bikes crash to right and some fly off to left , I just pointed bike into hole and gunned it and was thru to 2nd and after Yuriko.

I stayed in reasonable contact till my first spill , then Yuriko was almost a mere speck ahead after my 2nd crash . As the race winded down Yuriko must have gotten in some trouble cause the gap slimmed again, but again I crashed . Yuriko got caught up in traffic the last couple laps , but there would be no more breaks for me , Yuriko crossed in 1st and got the advance, I finished 2nd a half lap behind Yuriko. Suzy Cuddihy 3rd, TFFox Tammas 4th, Molly Fitzgerald and Yamaha Harley respectable 5th and 6th.

It was off to the spectators box for me to watch the Group A race , Jafo grabbed the hole shot and led the pack around for 5 laps before hitting the pavement allowing Annie Gufler by into the lead and Yuriko, who had quickly worked her way up the field , into 2nd. Just Catteneo chased the lead group in 4th and gave Jafo a good chase before falling back.

By lap 15 Annie had a 6 second gap on Yuriko with Jafo closing in fast lap 18, Yuriko fell lap 19 and Jafo got up for 2nd place , Annie with the big win. Yuriko 3rd. Just finished 4th, Holden 5th and Brave Ashbourne's noble efforts wrapped up the field after a exciting race.

The season nears mid point with only 2 winners so far this season. Annie closes in on Yuriko who holds a 5 point lead . Its starting to develope into a exciting points race for the top , but if the 3rd thru 6th position riders ...Jafo, Crippy, Holden and Brave, want to even pretend to be more than just spectators in it , are gonna have to score some wins in the upcoming races.

Round #6 is slated for 1 week , November 22nd at RD Motorsports on the Canyon track again, this time we will be running the layout backwards. Already word from the paddock is that Jafo, Yuriko and Annie are putting down fast times with Holden Saunders improving towards the top level every day .

MotoSL Season 4 - Round #4

2008-11-03T13:39:00.032-05:00

Yuriko Nishi takes her 3rd win... 2008 Mooz Iron GP

Round 4 of the current MotoSL season saw another heavy turnout of 27 riders seeking to test their mettle on the "Iron" Layout at Mooz. Pre-Race benediction at the difficult chicane and we were under way, running the show today was our own Yum Divisdero , who did a wonderfull job.

Yuriko nailed her 2nd straight pole position .500 seconds ahead of the field , Annie Gufler qualified 2nd , Jafo Tendaze 3rd, and the ZT team twins Holden Saunders and Stang Voom landed in 4th and 5th . Leaving me in the lucky #6 , which is basicly pole position for the B race.

With Qualify set , we moved onto the group races, BBB racing team rider Johnnie Gears had pole for the D group race. Johnnie got the hole shot , but after a fall, lost the lead to his team boss Bikey Bekkers. Bikey drove a solid race and never relinquished the lead, although he had some pressure from Am Pro boss Abacus Mimistrobel. Bikey got the checkers and the advance to Group C, 2nd was Abacus followed by Whites Bikes rider Molly Fitzgerald.

Group C race was a steady ride by Bikesites.com rider Zari Gears , AM Pro rider TFox Tammas gave him a good chase but Zari never faultered , Racers Island team leader and vet MotoSL rider Raver Bellow was able to take 3rd. Zari moves on to Group B .

Group B race, with Crippy Oh on pole , Just Catteneo 2nd grid, Ram Pharoah 3rd on grid, Yamaha Harley 4th, Brave Ashbourne 5th and Zari Gears 6th . A strong field which made my little fingers tremble knowing I had to win to advance up to Group A .

Ram and Just were on my tail the whole race, sometimes coming closer sometimes further, I took it as easy as I could , but that meant I had no room for falls since my speed was too slow to gap the field much . I fell once when entering the chicane at the moment of a lag bubble, but was lucky enough to not lose the lead.

After chasing me a few laps , Just fell and Ram slid into 2nd and also gave me a good chase . I managed to keep the lead for the win and the advance, Rammses 2nd , Just 3rd, Zari came close to getting 4th , but had a few bad laps back to back allowing Yamaha to get 4th , Zari 5th and Brave 6th .

Group A race, and believe me at this point im happy just to not be watching this one from the bleachers. Yuriko got the hole shot she needed and ran hot out front with Annie Gufler giving her a close chase the whole race. Lap 9 and Annie got by Yuriko , but failed to capitalize on it and crashed same lap , giving Yuriko the position and the time to bring it home for her 3rd win in 4 races.

Now at the same time, on the other side of the track , far far away , was the rest of us flopping around like fishes trying to stake claim on the finishing positions that were left over . Being last i got to sit back and watch the others surge full bravado into the grinder...err i mean chicane at the race start. Holden im affraid , didnt make it thru to other side, he hit the grass on the right and slid thru grass and hit fence on the left , that was the last time i saw him till race was over.

Lap 2 and Stang slips letting me by him into 4th , right behind teamie and defending champ Jafo . Lap 3 Jafo goes down and im in 3rd . But that didnt last long at all, i failed to make most of it and fell myself , letting both Jafo and Stang by me , im back in 5th again.

The 3 of us fought it out lap after lap , swapping positions now and then , but also falling further and further behind the lead group of Yuriko and Annie . Jafo stumbled 2 laps in a row, laps 5 and 6 , first letting Stang by into 3rd, then allowing me to get thru to 4th .

For 5 laps Stang led us around , me in 4th , Jafo's engine buzzing in my ear in 5th...untill crucial lap 11. I had be holding Jafo off for 5 laps , but he finaly was able to hit the hairpin tighter and faster than me and got by , I watched as he screamed down the finish straight after Stang, who just had problems coming thru hairpin cause he was limping along accelerating still.

Stang and Jafo reached the chicane at the end of the straight around same time , Stang in first followed close by Jafo, i was prolly close to a second behind still coming down the straight , when a huge lag bubble hit the sim. Already commited to their turns into the chicane , Jafo and Stang tangled and flew into the grass and fence ,as i entered the chicane , the sim was still bogged with lag , going thru was like slow motion, but i made it thru .

As ive stated a few times in this post, its all about making most of your chances , this time i made it stick and held onto 3rd, with Stang still close behind untill he fell again. I crossed the line getting 3rd place , Jafo 4th, Stang 5th and Holden 6th.

Another successful round of MotoSL in the books , cheers to Yum for doing great job, much thanks as always to Les for making it all happen .

After 4 rounds Yuriko Nishi sits ready, willing and able to walk away with this one, with 88 points so far . Annie Gufler isnt ready to let that happen just yet , with Yuriko still in her sights at 74 points. Defending champion Jafo Tendaze is still trying to dial in his racing this season, win less with 63 points, Jafo always remains a threat to make winning look all so easy. Crippy 4th with 52, Holden 5th with 44 points.
Yuriko is looking strong , but any of the top 10 who strike it hot in the remaining rounds are a threat to place well this season . Location of next race to be edited in when i find out =p.

Also i would like to note..... if any racers reading this , have anything interesting to comment about your race from your perspective , please feel free to to leave a comment . Alot of stuff happens each race and how it unfolds can often be interesting .

MotoSL 4 , Race #3 at the Canyon

2008-10-27T09:08:00.026-04:00

Yuriko Nishi wins her 2nd MotoSL GP of the season

A fine day for racing on SL and a fine turnout of 25 racers to compete in Round 3 of the current season . The MotoSL calendar runs with 2 races then a week off , so there is a 2 week break before next race, meaning 2 weeks of practice leading up to race day , being round 3 , it was one of those races . Having 2 weeks to prepare, a good amount of drivers show up race day razor sharp and the anticipation for a tight race is tangable .

Qualify was fast with Holden Saunders setting a quick early pace that only landed him 5th on grid after all 25 racers finished qualification, Yuriko Nishi grabbed her first career pole position, with Annie Guffler 2nd, Jafo T. 3rd , Crippy O. 4th , Holden 5th , and Suzy Cuddihy 6th after she advanced from a Group B victory.

This was a day of good races from beggining to end, low lag... allowing the riders to put all the hard practice to work, Group D started the day with some close racing between IDK Racing's Yamaha Harley and AM Pro rider Spdx Exonar , with Yamaha prevailing in the end.

Group C was another good race, with a twist of heart break, RaceSL contributor and Racers Island team captain Raver Bellow was running away with the race by half way , with most of the action for 2nd place between Just Catteneo and ZT captain Stang Voom . On the last lap Raver came on too strong approaching traffic near the tunnel and he went down after a collision, Just made most of his chances and brought home the win .

Group B race was nothing short of exciting , especialy since it was BikerSites.com rider Motorato Ware taking to the grid for first time this season . A little messy at the start , a different person crossed the line in 1st the first 3 laps , Ram Pharoah and Suzy Cuddihy dueling in the front , but Ram crashed Lap 4 , allowing Suzy into 1st and Just Catteneo to move up to 2nd and in close pursuit of Suzy.

Generaly a pack of riders fighting it out is a blessing for riders trying to make up time and Moto made most of this with steady riding the first 8 laps allowing her to eventualy catch the lead group of 3 riders. Laps 9 and 10 the top 4 are extremely tight with lead group all within 3 seconds of leader , Just fell back , with Moto getting by into 3rd, then Ram Pharoah slips on the grass and Moto slips into 2nd, while Suzy Cuddihy starts to make a gap in the lead and run with it .

Last 2 laps were close and exciting, with 2 skilled riders... Moto Ware and Just Catteneo fighting it out for 2nd, came down to the last turn of the last lap , they were literaly exchanging paint side by side, slowing each other with contact, but Just was able to slip passed and grabbed 2nd , Moto 3rd, AM Pro rider TFOX Tommas grabbed 4th from Ram who finished 5th and Brave Ashbourne, who had even a rougher day than me =p finished 6th .

Group A , im sitting 4th on the grid remembering earlier in the day we were casualy joking about how dangerous it is to start in the middle of the pack, at front or back being preferable. staring at Annie Guflers back knowing Suzy was behind me staring at mine .

The lights go out and Yuriko jumps fast from pole and gets the hole shot into 1st. I also get a good jump at the start , while Annie doesnt get such a good one , the result is we come together at the tunnel entrance and im in 6th coming out the tunnel . Yuriko leads, with Jafo 2nd , Holden 3rd. Jafo holds 2nd place till a 3rd lap slip sends him down to the cellar with Suzy and me .

I trailed both of them as they swapped positions and paint for a few laps , untill Jafo rubbed out on the outside tunnel wall . Although I got to see most of this race from last place, opportunities did come my way, i stayed steady enough to pass the people i was chasing when they made mistakes, but i failed to capitilize.... crashing out after getting 2 big breaks , up to 4th , but back to last before much more than a lap passed.

Meanwhile a big slip by Annie in 3rd, and mistakes by Suzy and myself let Jafo work his way from last place lap back to 3rd by lap 12. At the front Yuriko ran a strong crash free race, with Holden Saunders stalking her within 4 seconds the whole race, a great performance by both riders, kudos to Holden for doing what he needed to do to win this race, but thats not a easy prospect if the person you are chasing for the win makes no mistakes.

Grats to Yuriko on her 2nd victory in 3 races, she leads the season currently, with Annie in 2nd , Jafo 3rd, Crippy 4th , Holden 5th , and unfortunately Josephina Gears of BikerSites.com team did not make the race, she fell to 6th but still also with striking distance of the top with some steady performances in upcoming races.

Next race is Saturday November 1st at Mooz on the "Iron" layout , a tough chicane that will make or break many racers day . Returning this week we have Silk Bamboo's wonderfull stat presentations hosted on Bikersites.com at http://www.bikersites.com/sl/racesl/. Also we have the SLodcast video of this race from perspective of race winner Yuriko Nishi and the other races so far this season at the Slodcast site http://www.motosl.slodcast.com/.

MotoSL4 Race #2 at Snowpeach

2008-10-11T23:24:00.045-04:00

Annie Gufler wins Snowpeach MotoSL GP

Second Lifes most prestigious race series attracted 26 riders to compete for the top step today.
After some bumping and grinding with both Yuriko Nishi and Jafo Tendaze, Annie Gufler scored her 1st MotoSL win and the 1st MotoSL win for Am Pro Racing.

Josephina Gears held steady for a impressive 2nd place finish after Qualifying 13th on the grid and in Group 3 , proceding to win the Group 3 race and the Group 2 race. Josephina drew a hot hand today and finaly got a well deserved rest after racing 3 full races... standing up on the 2nd step .

Yours truly had a shaky qualify , just barely landing the 5th and final spot in Group A . My main problems started... oh about 300 feet into the race when I and Stang Voom came together trying to share the same line , the result was a hard crash into the wall taking us right out of the lead group at the start.

Stang got the worst of it having flipped over the barrier wall , it took him awhile with help of race stewards to right his bike and get under way . I on other hand was able to procede fairly quickly after righting my bike .

For awhile after that it was a lonely race for me , all alone on track as far as i could see, Stang far behind and i couldnt see anyone ahead, lap after lap , thinking i might be seeing riders thru the chicane (S turn) as i round the turn before it .

Finally around lap 8 i caught up to Yuriko who had taken a turn wide and come to a near stop on the grass to avoid going down . I chased Yuriko for several laps , but it was so-so driving vs good driving and i fell behind again .

Lap 11 and i came around the big sweeping turn before the chicane , and as in races past, suddenly i came up on 3 bikes , Jafo, Yuriko and Stang trying to get going after a bad incident near the entrance to the chicane , i was able get thru cleanly but Jafo was fast behind me being able to recover fastest from the accident area, from 5th just a moment earlier, i crossed the line lap 11 in 3rd.

Jafo was close behind for the next several laps , but i was able to make some space in the last laps and crossed lap 15 in 3rd. Jafo fast behind in 4th, Yuriko Nishi, who won Archer Racing's first ever MotoSL GP last week, came in 5th and Stang an unfortunate 6th after a nice qualify where he was 4th .

The Group 2 race was all Josephina Gears after some early race excitement with Raver Below and Just Catteneo dueling it out in the early laps , but both came upon misfortunes and steady Josephina was able to take the lead and gap the field. Brave Ashbourne of the Racers Island team, held on strong for 2nd place with Just Catteneo getting 3rd.

Group 3 was a great duel between BikerSites.com team mates Suzy Cuddihy and Josephina Gears. Trading off the lead several times, the race looked like it could go either way. The pair put alot of distance behind them to rest of field as they raced each other . Josephina finaly was able to get a little gap , winning the race, with Suzy 2nd and Holden Saunders after having the roughest qualify round of the day finished 3rd.

The Group 4 race might have had some of the loudest cheering of the day , with Snowpeach Raceway and MoR racing team owner , Count Bayliss surging out to the front of the pack early on and holding onto the lead for several laps , but the entire time , White's Bikes team rider Molly Fitzgerald, was hot on his heels.

Molly has been quite dedicated to improving her skills at MotoSL , practicing long sessions at the tracks before each race, and it paid off today. Several times Molly almost got by Count , but was held off. Possessing the more trained hand in this one despite Counts valiant efforts, Molly was just waiting for her moment to get by and get into the clean air where she knew she could pull away .

Finally her patience and skill paid off and she was by the Count , she was never challenged again and brought home a solid win . Count Bayliss held on for impressive 2nd place finish , with BBB
team rider Hakuna Albatross coming in 3rd.

Grats to everyone for some great racing , the schedule now has a week off with Race #3 taking place at Mooz on the Canyon track on October 25th .

After 2 races , Annie Gufler currently leads the points race, with Yuriko Nishi close behind in 2nd, Jafo Tendaze looking to repeat his championship last season in 3rd, BikerSites.com rider Josephina Gears 4th and Archer racing Crippy Oh 5th

Next post, during the MotoSL break week will be --- Past Champions: MotoSL season 2

MotoSL 4- Season opener Race #1

2008-10-05T21:42:00.032-04:00

Yuriko Nishi wins Mooz Classic GP

39 people crammed into Mooz raceway to see and participate in the season opener of Season #4 of MotoSL . 29 riders entered the que and ran in the qualifying round , which was one of my few bright spots on the day . Accidentaly stopped 1 lap short (hard to count gloved fingers =p ), but still managed to get 2nd spot .

Holden Saunders landed the opening pole position with Yuriko Nishi 3rd, Annie Gufler 4th and Jafo Tendaze 5th to round out qualifiers for the group 1 race, the final grid was 7 bikes since the top 2 of each previous race advance to next race.

Suzy Cuddihy has been looking steady early this season and managed to win the Group 2 race with a strong performance. Josephina Gears grabbed the 7th grid spot after also advancing from the Group 3 race .

Unfortunately today was a bit laggier than normal and everyone experienced problems at some point . Despite this, the early races on the schedule managed to be close and exciting with BBB team captian Bikey Bekkers tenaciously hanging on for the Group 4 win , new comer John Alturas made a mark in his rookie opener by getting 2nd and advancing to Group 3 with Bikey .

Group 3 race was another exciting one with Sulla Looming and Josephina Gears gapping the pack , but not each other . They fought back and forth for a good part of the race, Sulla prevailed and took the checkers, Josephina advanced with a 2nd place. Yamaha Harley came in 3rd, Bikey Bekkers 4th, Hakuna Albatross 5th and Abacus Mimistrobel 6th and John Alturas 7th

Group 2 race was all Suzy Cuddihy, winning by 6 seconds, with Josephina Gears holding strong onto 2nd . 3rd was Stang Voom , 4th Brave Ashbourne, 5th Sulla Looming , 6th Just Catteneo and 7th Ford Roffo.

Group 1 race, a bit laggier than we are used to in RaceSL , but still managed to be a good race up at the front , with Yuriko Nishi leading mostly wire to wire with Jafo and Annie hot on her tail most of the 2nd half of the race.

My highlight and low light of the day was all on same lap . I moved from 5th and almost caught 2nd place rider on same lap , several bikes came together at the gate and i was forced wide and missed the lap counting , i finished the raced in 7th at -1 laps .

In a bold move Yuriko prevailed past Jafo and Annie to take the checkers, Jafo 2nd , Annie 3rd,
Suzy 4th , Josephina 5th and Holden Saunders 6th. Another big start for Archer racing , also nice one for BikerSites.com team represented by Suzy and Josephina.

Race #2 is at Snowpeach in just 1 week , practice time for the race will be short, but races at the ultra tight and claustrophic Snowpeach are always exciting . Ram Pharoah and Slodcast filmed the race using 4 cameras and VJ Shojo commentaed the race, the video can be found here.....

http://www.motosl.slodcast.com/

MotoSL season 4 track preview

2008-09-28T02:20:00.020-04:00

One of the hallmarks of MotoSL and RaceSL is the wide variety of tracks we race on, and this season promises to have the most tracks so far of any season . With Les Whites new track rezzer system , he can build tracks, pack them up and then rez them in the sky of one of the leagues sims when its needed. This is a much more efficient system than having to acquire a whole sim for each track .

The crown jewel of the RaceSL circuit is the home track of Mooz , one of the oldest tracks and one of the leagues original raceways. Mooz' unique setup , allows for different layouts for each race at this location , walls are rezzed to change it to 1 of 4 or more unique layouts. One of the most dangerous being the speedway , a 4 corner partial oval that crosses a narrow suspension bridge , races on this layout are known for alot of crashing .

The other remaining original league track is Snowpeach. Built and owned by Count Bayliss , Snowpeach is modeled after the Brands Hatch road course in the United Kingdom . But while Brands Hatch is a winding, wide open, long road course, Snowpeach is often narrow and clausterphobic , more resembling a narrow city course , a fast track when mastered, Snowpeach can prove to be hard to master . Most people love or hate Snowpeach , but theres no doubt Grand Prix held here are often quite exciting .

Rising from the ashes of the other original RaceSL race track Misp , is PSU CS199, which filled the void when Misp was retired before FormulaSL season 1, cause it is only a Class 4 sim . Les replaced the hard and tight Misp track with another hard track known as PSU 1. The new track proved technical and difficult and was source of much consternation for this racer.

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During MotoSL season 3, Les introduced the PSU 2 track, pictured above. . PSU 2 isnt as technical as PSU 1 , but it is more wide open and faster , but still with some difficult spots on it that could make or break a big race.

The most exotic of the RaceSL grand prix tracks is the newer canyon track , which is basicly PSU 3 as thats the sim it resides in. The track looks like it sits in a desert canyon with part of it flowing thru a dangerous tunnel that has already seen its fair share of pile ups since the track came into use during FormulaSL season 2. The canyon track is one of the more technicaly difficult tracks we use , making it difficult for most racers to stay grounded on the track during the full course of a race.

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Recently Les unveiled a new track in the sky of Misp , this track has not been raced upon yet , but already has proven to be one of the fastest tracks yet , with few really sharp turns , the tracks overall shape is much like a oblong oval or peanut shaped , with long fast turns .

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With this new track , the league now posseses 6 tracks already , including all of Mooz' variations the schedule may contain up to 9 unique layouts during its 12 race course , an impressive variety , and a challenge to the comptetitors to stay sharp for the next race on the schedule .

Archer Racing MotoSL season 4 and other news

2008-09-21T14:47:00.033-04:00

Archer Racing Team for the 2008 MotoSL racing campaign

The time has arrived, the pre-season came to a close on saturday September 20th at the PSU2 track . The season has been officialy scheduled to open on Octover 4th at Mooz Raceway using the classic layout. This was the 4th pre-season race, and although its location was a late announcement on last wednesday, riders were able to get in enough practice for a very competitive day .

There were some exciting moments in the lower group races , with Xia Mirabeau stirring up some cheers by leading for a bit in the Group 4 race, but at the finish it was Abacus Mimistrobell and Molly Fitzgerald moving on using the new top 2 placers in lower group races ,advance to next higher group, should see some exciting runs by riders qualifying in lower groups during the season .

In the end , Yuriko Nishi scored the win after taking the pole , both firsts for Yuriko congrats =)
Jafo 2nd and Just Catteneo 3rd. 21 riders competed today and there were some missing , so its looking like 25 plus will be competing once the show gets rolling .

This is my usual beginning of season post introducing the new team gear , all new stuff since this is Archer Racing's first entry into MotoSL. Les and Jafo came up with the design of our new bikes , sporting the team colors of black, gold and white.

We enlisted the skills of VJ Shojo to create our new uniforms for this season , we are quite happy with the job hes done, VJ is also one of SL's top DJs so keep a eye out for him around the grid .

Having won the last MotoSL season championship, Jafo Tendaze has decided to ride using the venerable #1 that is custom for the championship defending rider to use. Already in the Pre-season Jafo has proved he hasnt lost a step , winning 3 of 4 races. Last season Jafo finished with

234 points , 5 wins , 8 podiums and 6 poles for the NSG team . Jafo is the rider to beat for anyone looking to make their mark in MotoSL .

Yuriko Nishi has re-signed with Archer Racing for this MotoSL season after a great performance in FormulaSL season 2 with the team . Last MotoSL season Yuriko rode with Motorato ware and Silk Bamboo on the OMG team .

Yuriko finished 9th in MotoSL season 3 with 79 points overall. Yuriko is looking fast for this season having won Pre-season race #4 with a pole position too , Yuriko is all ready to give Jafo a run for the money .

Crippy Oh , spent MotoSL season 3 on the Pure racing team , finished season 3rd overall , with 171 points, 2 wins , 6 podiums and 2 pole positions . Looking forward to see how the team looks as a motorcycle team, there are a few very good teams out there ready and willing to knock us (hopefully mostly Jafo =p) off our high horses this season , its gonna be a exciting season as RaceSL always promises and delivers.

This season the team is back to its independant roots , sporting no sponsors except for Yuriko's own motorcycle company --- YUNI Motorcycles.

MotoSL season 4-- Preview #1

2008-09-14T13:47:00.036-04:00

Saturday 9/14 , we ran our 3rd official pre-season race for the upcoming MotoSL season , top 3 finishers were Jafo T. , Annie Gufler and Ram Pharoah . At the race were several of the new team bikes for the season , heres a sneak preview of some of the teams whose bikes are all ready to go for opening day .

AMPro led by Abacus Mimistrobel are looking strong with Annie Gufler also on the team and looking like a top contender .

This is the new bike for the Racers Island race Team , led by Raver Bellow, they have a full team so far with Brave Ashbourne and Spd360 Exonar.

Xia Mirabeau and Molly Fitzergerald are both looking in good form this pre-season, representing the home team for White's Bikes , both are looking to be in the points many times this season .

Top MotoSL rider Silk Bamboo returns this season as captain of her own team, the BikerSites.com team.
Silk has signed on racing veteran Suzy Cuddihy and as 3rd rider , Motorato Ware, who hopefully will be able to make a bunch of races this season .

Stang Voom returns to RaceSL with his Zero Tolerance team , which includes veteran SL racer Holden Saunders , both of these riders have been running very fast on the pre-season tracks and could be quite a threat this season once they get some races and experience under their belts.

Lavoxy Uriza

2008-09-07T22:58:00.007-04:00

Blood spatter on my wall

Our very first conversation, blood spatter on my wall. Something normally a person would dismiss as vile or disturbing to look at. With the right eyes, beauty can be seen. On the outside, you were hard an abrasive to some, cold to others. I saw a tremendously funny, charming and loving person. A person whom could make me laugh, cry, feel joy, and challenge my thoughts. You gave me new ways of looking at the world. New points of view that made me think.
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I am sorry I was not there to hold your hand in the dark. I wish i could have shown you the light you gave me and others. Rest in peace, my fallen angel.

May the road rise up to meet you.

May the wind be always at your back.

May the sun shine warm upon your face;

the rains fall soft upon your fields and until we meet again,

may God hold you in the palm of His hand.

Motorbikes and mini-cars

2008-08-28T23:30:00.013-04:00

Season 4 of MotoSL gearing up for action .......

Its the time of season for the next round of MotoSL . Les White's brand new superbikes are just about ready . Rider and team registrations will begin September 1st. Currently we are running a Pre-season to test the bikes and tracks, and to let new riders join and get acclamated.

Info for the new season is being posted at http://racesl.com/, already a few new comers have shown promise and everyone is looking forward to another exciting 12 race season .

Anyone interested in what is often a exhilirating experience... yes you heard right ... forget the bad experiences youve had driving most vehicles in SL , these ones are actualy alot of fun, and complicated and innovative enough for the die hards..... come by Mooz or PSU CS199 and try out the new bikes.

This coming saturday August 31st is the 2nd Test/Pre-season race. Jafo T. Ram Pharoah and Yuriko Nishi finishing in the top 3 last weekend at the first test race.

Small scale racing at Aybabtu

Also catching my fancy lately is the fun and innovative racing at the Aybabtu sim. Instead of trying to introduce a new full sized car racing league. Aybabtu Aabye has decided to scale down the vehicles 1/2, allowing for a larger track .

So far this has been quite fun , and first time this blogger has really had interest perked by a SL racing league since the first time I TPed into Mooz

Here is overhead comparison of my FormulaSL car and to the right a Proto-type body built at Ayb's scale by Sulla Looming. Yes racers actualy ride in these small cars, the pose folds up your body and a invisibility prim hides you . The ride is very smooth and is one of the easier forms of racing in SL to pick up quickly.

FormulaSL awards ceremony

2008-08-17T00:31:00.009-04:00

Today was the awards ceremony for end of FormulaSL season 2. A nice event hosted by Motorato at her Hot Spot sim. Plaques, trophies and money were handed out to the top 10 drivers and top 3 teams . http://www.bikersites.com/SL/raceSL/ for the full stats of the season .

Thanks to Les, Moto, Rayne , Jerry and MAS racing , VJ Shojo, Shiryu Musashi, Isolone Torok and and all of Archer's supporters this season .

Grats to all drivers and teams, this season was alot of fun and looking forward to MotoSL season 4, which has officialy entered the testing phase with alot of interest. This season of bikes will have a new model, Les White's Wrath 10R , replacing the venerable Hawk 10R . A new track layout , with most likely more to come also .

I also will be blogging soon about Aybabtu Aabye's new racing league . Besides RaceSL this is the most creative builder and league ive seen in SL so far , its been alot of fun , im gonna miss the season opener on Sunday 8/17 , but hope to not miss any after that .

FormulaSL season 2 Finale at Snowpeach

2008-08-11T22:44:00.021-04:00

MAS/Archer captures 2nd straight Team and Driver titles

Crippy Oh hangs on by slim margin to win Driver championship

FormulaSL season 2 , completes its course after many dramatic and exciting moments over the course of the 12 race season . Controversy , heartbreak and close competition all found in the 11 races preceding the finale.

If it had been a rocky road to this point , the final race promised to not disapoint . After the smoke of 11 races cleared, Jafo Tendaze sat on the verge of a amazing comeback in a attempt to defend his FormulaSL title and win his 3rd straight RaceSL Driver/Rider title.

Crippy Oh was in 1st place by just 7 points , the score at 208 to 201. Week 3 Crippy fell to 2nd after Kandy Tommorow took a big win , but had retained 1st place since. Jafo sat willing, able and determined to spoil that streak in the final race.

Only 1 week seperated races 11 and 12, so Snowpeach saw a flurry of practicing and preparing all week long . Setups were fined tuned, tire and pitstop strategies tweaked , tested and reworked .

Drivers braved often pitifull SL lag to try to hone their driving lines , to commit the track to memory and repetition , knowing mistakes are made in a split second, drivers must practice for many hours to be prepared for as much of the unexpectated as possible.

The first drivers slide into their cockpits in preparation for their qualify laps , officialy starting the final event of the season . Annie Gufler captured her 5th straight pole position , I managed to turn the 2nd fastest lap , Jafo did not qualify as strongly as some might have thought , taking the 3rd spot by just .001 over Yuriko Nishi in 4th , with Dolli Dreamscape being 5th qualifier for the Group 1 race.

The 20 lap group 3 race was dominated by Racers Island driver Brave Ashbourne , Rattra Raymaker 2nd , upcoming new driver Molly Fitzgerald 3rd, and the Kells Dragon team finishing out the field and grabbing up the last points spots , grats to Xia and Ravena .

Group 2 is 25 laps long and determines who gets 6th spot for group 1. This time around Yum Divisadero didnt wait around to tangle with Neko Carter , dominating the race even after falling to 4th after pitstops , she cruised to the win . Neko 2nd and Suzy Cuddihy 3rd. Yum moves up to Group 1.

Group 1 race, 30 laps . I was able to jump in front of Annie and lead field to the first hairpin, but after about half the lap , Annie jumped ahead and i fell to 2nd . I was there for 3 laps till a incident sent me back to 5th place in one fell swoop . Danger Will Robinson , there was many outcomes that would give Jafo the points he needed . Jafo 2nd and me 5th was deffinately one of them .

Combos that Jafo needed to win were, 1st and me 3rd.... 2nd and me 4th ect... a very slim margin with the leagues point system . Lap 7 and I was able to get by a surging Dolli Dreamscape and Yuriko Nishi, back into 3rd. Lap 9 Jafo took the lead from Annie , i passed into 2nd place again , untill Annie sent me back to 3rd.

A collision lap 19 sent Jafo all the way back to 3rd, I was in 2nd again , untill Jafo got by me lap 26. For 11 laps during the race , if it had been the final lap , Jafo would have made a truly great comeback run , but for 19 laps , including the final lap , I was able to be in position to stave that off.

In the end Annie won her 3rd straight race, Jafo 2nd , myself 3rd, only losing 4 points to Jafo I finished the season with 224 points , Jafo 221. A very close finish between 2 good competitors who , I certainly can say for myself , truly admire the other as being a top racer across SL .

Neko Carter got 3rd place overall, being from Switzerland i think all can agree was quite a feat, including a win at PSU during the season, Ram Pharoah another European driver came in 4th and had a couple podiums, Annie Gufler 5th , Yuriko Nishi , who has been a great addition to the Archer family 6th . YumYum D. a very respectable 7th , considering her very limited time to prepare for each race , she did great including a podium finish at Mooz.

Started April 19th , 2008 at Mooz , lasting nearly 4 full months , FormulaSL season 2 has concluded, the league now turns towards the return of the venerated Superbike series with MotoSL season 4. Testing has begun, sign ups will be announced when ready http://racesl.com/

Round 11 at PSU Canyon

2008-08-06T23:04:00.005-04:00

Sunday August 3rd, Round #11 of 12 FormulaSL season #2. This week we headed back to the newest track on the circuit , the canyon track at PSU .18 drivers qued up after a hour delay due to unforseen circumstances, attendance had slimmed some since the start of the season where we had 25 strong each race, but even 18 is a impressive number for a a SL racing event.

Annie Gufler grabbed her 4th straight pole position , with Archer's own Yuriko Nishi 2nd, Silk Bamboo putting in a great qualify for 3rd, Jafo 4th , and Caz Freschi 5th for the Group 1 race.
I ran cold in the round and only managed to get 7th in qualify , landing me in Group 2 for 3rd time this season . Group 4 proved practice pays as rookie driver Molly Fitzgerald ran a strong race winning wire to wire and advancing on to the Group 3 race.

Molly again ran strong early in race before her car was lost in a bad wreck, Yum Divesadero ran this one wire to wire for a deserved win, strong performances from Brave Ashbourne who got 2nd and Dolli Dreamscape who got 3rd.

On to the Group 2 race, basicly my championship bid this season is riding on this race, and i was able to find a zone and run as strong as i could , leading the 25 lap race wire to wire , giving me the 6th spot in the Group 1 race i needed badly.

Neko Carter beat YumYum at the finish line by .01 seconds to grab 2nd , Yum 3rd, Sulla Looming, who was able to make her first FSL race, after so much promise in the pre-season had been ended by new RL work schedule, finished 4th ( or 9th overall) in her FSL debut, FOX Tammas 5th and Suzy Cudihy 6th .

Group 1 race , sitting in the back of the pack, 2 Archer cars in front of me , Jafo directly and Yuriko 2 rows up . The first major turn on this track is a hard left thru a enclosed tunnel , so as the lights went out i held back some letting the pack thru , but searching for a hole , lap 2 i found a little one , jumping ahead of Caz into 5th , but a slip and he was by me and again i was trailing the field in 6th .

5 laps passed i chased 5th place Caz and 4th place Silk as close as i could , but there was no mistakes to exploit , by lap 6 Annie led the field , with Yuriko in 2nd , and Jafo 3rd.
Finaly lap 7 Caz blinked and slipped a bit on the dirt and i was by him into 5th . Lap 12 Silk finaly had a bad moment giving me the chance to jump into 4th , the rest of the field had remained the same before the 1st pit stop, Annie , Yuriko then Jafo.

Laps 14 and 15 the field makes their pits , Yuriko's pit crew make both crucial tire and fueling mistakes costing her a deserved spot on the podium, but it was a mistake that allowed me to get by before she recovered, and sneak into 3rd place. Jafo led for 1 lap as Annie pitted , but his car stalled hard, although i dont remember passing him , next thing i know , lap 17 of 30 and im in 2nd place.

Lap after lap im suprised everytime i see it say my name in 2nd place, i never saw Annie's gate spam , but next thing i know , after a couple mediocre laps , lap 23 and i see Jafo's gate spam in 3rd just 2 seconds behind me . Twice Jafo surged within passing distance on laps 24 and lap 28, but twice he fell back .

Annie took her 2nd straight win , Crippy 2nd, Jafo 3rd, Yuriko 4th, just off podium for 3rd time . Caz got 5th in his first Group 1 appearance and Silk Bamboo 6th .

2nd place in this race to Jafo's 3rd gives me +4 points , bringing the duel for the League championship down to the last race of the season with the points score at Crippy 208 , Jafo 201. Anything can happen in FSL so no one will be counting any chickens till the cork pops on the final race of this season.

FSL Race #10 Mooz Super-Speedway

2008-07-27T03:04:00.005-04:00

This post is a little late considering the race was ran a week ago on July 19th , but i figured better late than never.

This round we were back at Mooz, but this time for the dreaded Speedway layout . The fast outside ring track at Mooz. Basicly this amounts to 6 cars going 300 kph around a quarter mile semi oval. With a small bridge span thats tight quarters on exit with a hard left towards the finish line. All the ingredients for a disaster ...and round 10 did not disappoint.

I broke a small streak of not so good qualifies with 2nd on grid this day, with Annie Gufler grabbing her 3rd straight pole . Jafo 3rd, Silk Bamboo grabbing a impressive 4th and Dolli Dreamscape with her 3rd Group A appearance in 5th.

The cleanest races of the day were the Group D and C races with Just Catteneo taking the Group D and challenging a hard charging Neko Carter in Group C , but Neko held on for the win. Group B was the kinda race you watch with your hands over your eyes, with a dramatic finish of Ram Pharoah leading the race and crashing on the final lap, Yum Divisadero got by for the win and transfer to Group A.

Group A ...uhh what can i say , lots of traffic for me in this one , the first couple laps were tight with me right on Annie , but at some point i encountered heavy traffic and struggled to keep my car on the course. Meanwhile Annie raced a superb race to capture her first victory, with Jafo in 2nd and Yum Divisadero taking her and her teams first podium of the season in 3rd, i managed 4th as my podium drought continues. Dolli 5th and Silk 6th .

The season is coming down to the wire with just 2 races remaining , I still lead as i have all season, with Jafo just 3 points behind me . The next round takes us back to PSU canyon track , stay tuned , the finish of this season is promising to be drama (exciting drama im refering to.. not the waste of time drama ) =)

Race #9 SLBloggers Grand Prix at Canyon track

2008-07-12T23:58:00.010-04:00

The race weekend started out at Fairgrounds on friday , for my 2nd race of season this time in Late Models on the big oval . This time I actualy did ok , qualifying at back of pack , but getting up front after some laps to battle for 2nd with Jafo , with Greg Drayman running away with race.

Some iffy driving and i shuffled back to 3rd where i finished , with Greg in 1st and Jafo in 2nd. The 40 lap race had no red flags and was a great one overall .

Next up was Race #9 at the new Canyon track at PSU , sponsored by SLBloggers. This one promised to be tough from the get go , as practice times from many drivers all week had been very close .

Qualify was the usual nail biter, some people got lag , that hampered their efforts . I got 5 clean laps , but failed to score a superb lap . In the end Annie Gufler took her 2nd straight pole position . Ram Pharoah 2nd, Neko Carter 3rd , Jafo 4th , Silk Bamboo 5th, and myself in unlucky 6th for 3rd time , putting me on pole position for Group 2 race.

Caz Freschi ran away with the Group 4 race , but nothing prepared the drivers and spectators for the carnage to come in Group 3 race. From the get go the field drove in tight formation, banging and rubbing paint around several laps .

Rattra Raymaker was forced into his backup car after his starter was destroyed in a wreck. Early leader Suzy Cuddihy also lost a car on lap 8 . Caz led for 7 straight laps before being passed by Abacus Mimistrobel , only to pass him again on last lap for the win . Caz advanced again to Group 2 race.

Group 2 race, i just knew i had to win this to get into the Group 1 , so i lowered my head and just tried to drive right, i had fewer slips overall in the 25 lap race than i did in the 5 lap qualify round . I got the win , Yuriko Nishi had been right on my tail for the first 13 laps , fell back some , but finished 2nd , YumYum 3rd, Caz nabbed 4th , Brave Ashbourne 5th and TFFox Thomas 6th .

I made it to Group 1 race, only 5 good drivers in front of me....it wasnt promising for me , but I was happy to make it that far. Off we went , first majot turn on track is the hard left thru the tunnel , I let everyone else charge thru first and it paid off somewhat , I was in 4th after lap 1 , where I would remain most of race. The early part of race was Neko in 1st , Annie chasing him close in 2nd , Ram in 3rd.

Lap 6 I passed Ram, but Jafo passed me , then finally passed Annie lap 11. Neko led wire to wire for a great win . Jafo 2nd , Annie got her 2nd straight podium in 3rd, Crippy 4th, Ram 5th, Silk 6th .

I still lead Jafo in drivers championship by 10 points with 3 races to go , next one being in 1 week at Snowpeach. Grats to Neko for a great win today.

EMH Grand Prix at Mooz

2008-06-30T13:36:00.006-04:00

Jafo Tendaze takes 3rd straight FormulaSL win

Saturday was race #8 of the FormulaSL season , taking place at Mooz on the classic layout, sponsored by Frageurs Hock and LUCA of EMH motors. This go around we had the smallest turn out so far of season with 20 drivers signing on to compete in the race.

Qualify round for me was even more nerve wracking than usual , with a thunderstorm starting to brew in my area, i could hear the thunder getting louder as i waited for my turn. I qualified in the last group of the day , and didnt run such a good round , i slipped on the grass my best lap , only good enough to get me 4th on the grid, with rookie sensation Annie Gufler grabbing the pole , Jafo 2nd , Ramesses 3rd, me 4th and Yuriko got 5th for 3rd straight 3 Archer cars in Group 1 race.

There were several good lower group races, with Just Catteneo shining above the rest , winning the Group 3 and Group 2 races to get into the A race. Brad Lytton won the Group 4 race decisively, but only managed 5th in the Group 3 race.

Group 1 race promised to be a good one , i just didnt know not for me. The light went green and the field was off, that is where my problems began , another car went wide heading into turn 1 sending me into wall and my hopes of a win with it .

I recovered and chased the field in 5th place, where i settled for a bit, closely chasing Just C. for 6 laps , with Yuriko in 3rd, Annie in 2nd and Jafo leading the field . Lap 7, Annie and Yuriko came together in the turn after pits , allowing me and Just to slip by , suddenly i was in 3rd, chasing Just who was in 2nd .

For 12 more laps i chased Just , who was intent on a huge day at the track . But the strain of racing 3 races was showing on him and his car and i was able to get by him into 2nd on lap 21.
Just's car completely stalled lap 25 and he could only manage 4th place.

For the rest of the race i ran mostly on clean track, 9 laps trying to gain ground on Jafo, i got up to minus 10.8 seconds distance but was too much , eventualy i dropped back more and Jafo won wire to wire for 3rd straight, i got my 3rd straight 2nd place, Annie got 3rd for her 1st podium in her 2nd FSL race. Just 4th , Ram 5th and Yuriko 6th after having a hard time during 2nd half of race.

Jafo narrows the gap on my lead, leaving me with 17 points ahead in the drivers championship, with 4 races remaining . Ram Pharoah is in 3rd, Neko Carter in 4th and Just Catteneo in 5th . Race #9 is in 2 weeks at the brand new canyon track . A new track that Les has built and set on the PSU sim , its a fast track and alot of drivers have been posting very fast times in early practice, its starting to look like this next race might have the closest qualify session of the season .

SLASCAR, FSL race #7 and The Misfits

2008-06-23T16:00:00.011-04:00

Had a full weekend of SL , starting with the opening races of the 2008 summer SLASCAR season on friday night . Although im only running a few classes this season , one of them ...Super Stocks was the first race of the season . Frustration and quarter panel kicking were the highlights of my night as i failed to qualify for the main event . Suzy Cuddihy took the checkers in Super Stocks and Suku Ming grabbed the win for the season opener Super Modified division race.

Next up was saturday afternoon and race #7 of FormulaSL season 2 at old PSU raceway. Jafo grabbed pole position in what is prolly his best and favorite track, i qualified 2nd , Just Catteneo 3rd, Neko Carter 4th, Archer's own Yuriko Nishi landed on 5th spot on grid , for 2nd straight race with 3 Archer cars in the Group A race. Ram Pharoah continued to be hot hot and moved up to 6th spot after winning the Group B race.

What can i say about this one , it was Jafo's from the get go , using a 2 stop strategy , he out speedstered my 1 pitstop strategy to win . I got 2nd after some bad driving late in the race, Neko Carter grabbed his first Podium for the MoR team coming in 3rd, Yuriko got 4th , and still has her eyes on that elusive podium, Ram Pharoah 5th and Just came in 6th .

As i mentioned , Ram won Group B with Yamaha Harley 2nd , Silk Bamboo 3rd. Group B also featured Moto Ware...SL race fans can never get enough of the hard charging and skilled driving of the MotoSL and FSL veteran Motorato.

Yamaha took the win in a good Group C race , with 2 skilled newcomers Ish Jaxxon and Annie Gufler . Yamaha running on nubs for tires and almost out of fuel , barely edged out Dolli Dreamscape in the last turns of the race for a exciting win. Dolli 2nd and Toast Racing Caz Freschi 3rd.

Group D featured even more rookie debuts , including Ish Jaxxon , who won the race to advance to group C , also racing were FSL rookies Brave Ashbourne and Rattra Raymaker. Nice to see some new faces for the 2nd half of the season , attendance is still very high , with 26 drivers throwing their hats in the FSL ring for this race. Race #8 is saturday June 28th at Mooz .

Sunday it was time to take off my stinky driving gear and put on torn jeans and t-shirt to attend a Misfits concert at club Primal Chaos, performed by the tribute group Bad Ampitude. These concerts are always alot of fun , one favorite song after the other for over a hour , while the group performed the stage show. Michael Graves, Jerry Only, Doyle and Chud , great fun . Cant wait for next show . You can find info and scheduling for Bad Ampitude at http://badampitude.ning.com/

FSL season 2 ...Race #6 at Snowpeach

2008-06-13T23:58:00.011-04:00

Took a bit to get the post-race report off on this one , raced on june 7th at Snowpeach , our 2nd time stopping at Count and Bibi Bayliss' this season . Was hoping to do a little better this time , getting 8th place last time out .

This one was a bit marred by several incidences that in end caused several drivers to depart the league , this was unfortunate and im affraid product of people losing perspective, this is racing in SL people , SL wasnt built for racing .....Les White built this racing for us ( interested racers), the money it costs to provide this comes right out of his pocket , most times with thanks , but this time , a few peoples conduct was uncalled for .

Anyways , the race, again it was the usual tension filled qualify session , i managed to get 1 good lap out of 5 and landed my 3rd straight pole position , Jafo got 2nd, and Yuriko got 4th spot , to put all 3 Archer cars into Group A for first time . Neko Carter in 3rd .Dolli Dreamscape of Depo got 5th and Ram Pharoah 6th after he won the Group B race.

I was able to jump to the front at the start , with Jafo falling to 3rd for several laps , i felt i was running pretty good , but traffic slowed me some , and before i knew it Jafo was able to blow by me after i had been leading the first 20 laps. We had a few close laps as i chased him, but in end he was able to pull away and get the win , i got 2nd, Ram got his first podium of season with 3rd,

Neko 4th , Yuriko got 5th to help the team get 3 of th races top 5 , Dolli came in 6th .

Ramsesses won Group B race after a nice duel with team mate Suzy Cuddihy who hasnt shifted into 6th gear this season, Pure are deffinately a threat to sit 2 cars in Group A . Ram also won group C race , finishing just ahead of Toast racer Caz Freschi. With newcomer rookie Hecter Janick winning Group D , his 1st FSL race. Grats to all , some great racing all around in this one .

After the driver shakeup, Im still in 1st , with Jafo in 2nd now, Ram Pharoah sits in 3rd, Gros Decuir in 4th and Neko Carter 5th . Next race is on June 21st at PSU , on the old track .

FSL Season 2- Race #5 at Mooz

2008-06-04T15:16:00.013-04:00

Race day , Second Life is being its usual charming self and not allowing FSL Race director Les White online . Gathered in the spectator room is the usual group of suspects , and every wanderer by who happens to enter the unlocked sim , by the time Les shows 58 people are gathered , after the smoke clears 42 remain , for largest group in sim during a RaceSL race .

26 drivers register and qualifying starts , the suprise of qualifying is rookie Stang Voom who ends up grabbing 5th spot on grid and is in the Group A race . Gros DeCuir ends up in Group B for the 1st time this season . I somehow managed to grab my 2nd straight pole position , with Jafo next to me in 2nd , Ram Pharoah 3rd , Kandy Tommorow 4th, Stang 5th , and Just Catteneo winning the group B race to advance to the group A race.

Group D started off the day of racing with a nice win by Miss Dolli Dreamscape , moving her up to the C race. Unfortunately Dolli didnt fair as well in the C race , finishing 6th to a talented field , with Yamaha Harley 1st, Toast racing's Caz Freschi 2nd, talented veteran driver Holden Saunders 3rd, Archer Racing's own racing godess Yuriko Nishi 4th and Macmost's Mango Birdbrain .

Yamaha moved up to Group B , but did not fair well either finishing the race 5th , hot as lava IDK driver Gros Decuir suprises the crowd with a 6th place finish , depo racing Matriach YumYum Divisadero came in 4th , Pure Racing speedster Suzy Cuddihy 3rd, Museum of Robot's own Neko Carter , who got the unlucky 6th place in qualifying ( which is pole position B race) , came in 2nd behind Just Catteneo.

Next was the group A race , came into this one with a little confidence , but still realistic knowing 1 bad slip against this field can be difference between podium and last . The layout for the race is know as the "Iron" layout (thats what its shaped like from air) , the significance of that is the starting line is staring point blank at the trickiest portion of the whole track , a tight little chicane (S turn) that guarantees pain should a field of 6 cars attempt to charge thru it .

Sitting on pole here , only hope is to get thru the gears before the 5 cars behind you do.....3-2-1, loud roar of 6 cars flooring the gas and trying to fly thru the gearing , all I know is there was a white flash as Ram Pharoah surged from 3rd on grid with a perfect move , splitting both Jafo and I and flying thru the chicane and into the early lead.

Not quite as good driving bymyself found me slowly falling thru the positions in the field till I finaly settled in 5th place going around lap 1 , i got by Just into 4th before the line for lap 1 , up ahead Jafo was in 3rd , Kandy in 2nd and Ram in 1st .

3 laps Ram led around before he came together with Kandy Tommorow in turn after pits . Jafo got by the tangle into 1st , and i was able to jump from 4th to 2nd . I chased after Jafo for 8 laps , keeping up but not getting any good passing chances. But we were catching up with traffic , unfortunately for Jafo he caught up to Ram and Stang at the hairpin turn , he got caught on the outside of them and was taken wide for a 3 car pile up , i cut the turn tight and slid into the lead , it was lap 12.

18 more laps and i got my 2nd straight win of season , with Jafo in 2nd , for Archer's first double podium of season , Kandy Tommorow , who had another race with alot of contact , raced the fastest , at one point i was stalking lapped traffic and saw Kandy race up on me , i just swerved out of way letting her by back onto lead lap...she was flying , managing to catch and pass Just Catteneo and come in 3rd, Just in 4th , Ram 5th and Stang 6th.

I think i was stunned after race and didnt remember to thank the people who help make this all possible Les White , Rayne Niven , Jerry and MAS Racing , Shiryu Musashi, VJ Shojo the voice of RaceSL , my team mates Jafo and Yuriko.

and a special reminder , tonite is game 6 ...go Pens !!!!!!

FSL Season 2 Team Profiles- IDK Racing

2008-05-25T00:33:00.023-04:00

Next up in the FormulaSL season 2 Team profiles series, is another talented team , consisting of Veteran Just Catteneo and up and comer Grosmanteau DeCuir . IDK was first team this season to score a double podium finish in the last race at PSU .

Formed by Just Catteneo to compete in MotoSL season 3 , IDK quickly proved themselves a threat as Just often took up the role of rider to beat , Just finished 2nd overall with 4 wins and 7 podiums and IDK finished 4th.

Grosmanteau only sat in on 4 races in MotoSL , but has come into his own early this season , grabbing 2 podiums and a pole position . Gros is in 3rd place after 4 races , Just is in 8th place after having missed a race so far, while IDK as a team is in 2nd place and well within striking distance of season leaders Archer Racing .

IDK races using the IDK F1 model , designed and built by Just , the car has performed well so far getting the team 3 podiums and 1 Pole position, although Just did flip and burn in one in Race #1 at Mooz , it has held up well so far.

Sponsored by Catteneo Developement , a company owned and operated by Just Catteneo , who builds dirt motorcycles that are quite fun and various other things. Both drivers honed their Formula racing skills by participating in the Silver Island Formula 1 series and Just has raced some in SLASCAR , both have come a long way with their skills and have approached this season with their eyes aimed at the top .

FSL Round 4 ---PSU Raceway backwards

2008-05-18T00:40:00.018-04:00

GimmeSL.com Grand Prix at PSU Raceway

Crippy Oh with the win , IDK takes 2nd and 3rd

Round 4 of FormulaSL season 2 brings us back to PSU Raceway for a reverse layout run at this speedway. 27 drivers put there names in the virtual hat for what promised to be a strongly contested round . With Epic studios film crew filming away and our beloved VJ Shojo prattling as he does best , drivers climbed aboard for a sometimes laggy round of qualifying.

Holden Saunders made the best of the rookie que sitting on top before Jafo came up with a 21.5 to sit himself on the pole , but qualify has still just begun , 15 more riders had to take their turn . The 8th round proved one of more exciting ones featuring Kandy Tommorow and Gros Decuir , 2 heavy favorites to capture Pole position for the day.

Kandy pulled out a great 20.2 to gasps from the crowd and sitting her up top with room to spare. Round 10 , was my turn , with Vinnie Niangao qualifying with me . the first laps werent so great , i think i got a 20.8 maybe in there, but with alot of luck , i hit many turns on my 5th and final qualify lap just right and got a 20.0 and Pole position for first time this season.

Next up in usual order was the Group 4 race lasting 10 laps , winner moving on , Caz Freschi a up and coming new driver impressed all with a nice win , moving on to the Group 3 race which he also won , beating out Yuriko Nishi who led solidly for the first 8 laps of 15 . Yuriko got 2nd and new KC Motorsports racer JoThor Theas grabbed 3rd or 13th overall , in the points his first race.

Caz now moves on to the Group 2 race, 20 laps , with YumYum on pole , Jafo 2nd , Just Catteneo 3rd, Suzy Cuddihy 4th on grid , Yamaha Harley 5th and Caz 6th position..yes thats a Group 2 grid , reads like group 1 class drivers , which is how tight the competition is this season , even the best drivers better not blink wrong or can be looking at Group 2 or Group 3 starts .

Just Catteneo ran a great race, leading entire time, except the lap he pitted, this race was much closer than that though, for the lower positions . Jafo , Yum , Yamaha , and even Caz battled it out for a good while . Jafo was able to hold 2nd place for most of race, passing Yum lap 5 , but lost it to a hard charging Yum last lap , Yum 2nd place, Jafo 3rd, Caz 4th , Yamaha 5th, Suzy 6th.

Just moves on to the Group 1 race, myself for MAS/Archer racing on pole position, Kandy of KC Motorsports 2nd, Grosmanteau DeCuir of IDK racing 3rd , Rammesses Pharoah of the Pure team 4th , Neko Carter for MoR racing 5th and Just Catteneo of IDK racing 6th .

To be honest , you will prolly get better account of this race from our video by Epic Studios or Les White's account on http://racesl.com/ hehe , but i will tell what i remember .

To start with i was using a long distance strategy and setup , medium tires lots of wing and downforce, i didnt know who on the grid behind me was using the faster soft tires , maybe no one , maybe everyone , i knew i had to get away quick at the start or be ran over by drivers with faster setups.

Off we went and all i could hear was engines whining loud right on my butt into first turn , some pushing and shoving , key was not to touch the grass or it would slow me down, turn 2 i took as clean as i could , turn after turn the engines got fainter , i relaxed some and tried to race as smooth as could , although i knew even a small mistake would be all Kandy or Gros or any of them needed to catch up .

Behind me the reports are there was quite some hard position fighting and contact , Kandy took it bad , having to pit for damage or risk losing her car . i pitted lap 15, allowing Gros to pass me into 1st after he took a earlier pit . Gros led around with me in 2nd for 5 laps , before the soft tire strategy forced him to take a 2nd pit .

I didnt hit alot of traffic in the race, Neko Carter was a gentleman and let me by, when i came up on him to lap him. At one point i was close behind Ramses and Kandy who were battling it out , i kept my distance, finaly around the sharp left to the pit straight they collided , one bounced right into the fence , the other left towards the pits , i had enough momentum to drive inbetween and move into clear, this was closest incident for me.

In the end , Grosmanteau got 2nd , Just was 3rd after just barely edging out Kandy who charged all the way from 6th to take 4th place , just missing 3rd by .200 of a second , Ram got 5th place continuing his overall solid performance this season, Neko came in 6th.

Once again the points race tightens up , the Pole and Win gives me a 1 point lead over Kandy Tommorow , Grosmanteau moves up impressively to 3rd, Jafo Tendaze 4th and Rammses Pharoah in 5th . http://www.bikersites.com/SL/raceSL/standings.fsl.cfm

Next race will be in 2 weeks with location and layout To Be Announced. Will post info for link to this race's video , done by Jessicaan Wrigglesworth and Epic Studios.

FormulaSL Race #3- at Snowpeach

2008-05-11T23:05:00.012-04:00

Lovely Snowpeach raceway , modeled after Brands Hatch in the UK . 25 racers gathered today to contest round 3 of the FormulaSL series. I had some hopes thru the week , always being fast here. But in the end my fortune wasnt good , i qualified 6th for a 2nd unlucky time this season sticking me on the pole for the group B race.

Group D and Group C races but went ok depsite the high amount of contact considering this is the smallest venue we race at . Fox Tammas won a convincing Group D race , but had troubles in the C race. The story of C group was Motorato and rookie Caz Freschi, Moto dominated most of the race but in the end Caz was able to nose ahead for the win and berth in group B.

Group B started well enough , Jafo qualified 7th , so he was beside me on the grid , he was quicker out of the blocks and beat me to turn 1 , somewhere in there i was able to get by and cross 1st lap 1 , but my luck was short lived , coming around to cross for lap 2 i struck a car under caution , and fell to 4th place, pretty much putting the win out of my reach, Ram led for a bit , but Jafo was able to overtake him for the Group B win , ending my 7 race podium streak with a 8th place overall finish.

Jafo advanced to Group A and this race promised to be a good one and they didnt disappoint, the early stage of the race was a neck and neck battle between Jafo, Kandy Tommorow and Yamaha Harley. All 3 of them swapping the lead in a back and forth battle.

Lap 9 and Yamaha fell out of the picture , Kandy gained some ground on Jafo and led comfortably for 3 laps untill a few slip ups allowed Jafo and and speedy YumYum Divisadero to come racing back, Yum jumped into the lead lap 13 and battled with Jafo as Kandy fell back a bit and pitted lap 14.

Jafo and Yum held on a little longer pitting lap 16 , a tense moment there and they were both off at same time , but Yum was able to grab the lead again lap 18 after the pit times had been sorted. Jafo fell back and Yum and Kandy battled closely for the lead for 6 laps , Yum crossing in front each lap , but Yum ran into trouble lap 25 , letting Jafo by into 2nd and Kandy leading by 5 seconds.

Jafo ate this lead lap after lap untill they were both battling it out the final 5 laps , Jafo got ahead lap 29 and crossed the line for his first win of the season , the close racing of this Group A race was some of the best ive seen in RaceSL .

In the end , Mas/Archer are able to extend our team points lead, while Kandy moves ahead solo in drivers points, with me a distant 2nd and Jafo close behind me in 3rd. KC Motorsports is in 2nd , with IDK close behind , close behind them is a surging MoR team and the Pure Team in 5th -
Next week will be Race #4 at PSU with a backwards layout , it promises to be another great meeting of this highly competitive field of drivers. Race #4 will also be the first filmed by Epic Studios who will edit together a reel of the race including the live commentation of our own VJ Shojo.

FSL Season 2 Team Profile - KC Motorsports

2008-05-07T00:02:00.012-04:00

Next up on my series of team profiles for this Formula season is KC Motorsports. KC entered RaceSL a bit after the start of MotoSL season 3 , and immediately got themselves known as top competitors with a handfull of podiums and a exciting last lap win for Kandy at Snowpeach .

KC Motorsports consists of Caine Beresford , Kandy Tommorow and occaisionaly Len Imako.
KC begun their SL racing careers at the now gone MyControl Speedway. A fun little road track that had hills and tunnels and a suprisingly fast layout.
Coming into season 2 of FormulaSL , alot of eyes are on KC to be at the top , both Caine and Kandy can register some extremely fast times at practices.

Unfortunately hailing from Australia can cause alot of problems for Caine , who sometimes is unable to live up to his potential on race day due to the technical constraints. Meanwhile Kandy, who lives in the US is a notable threat to get on the podium at every race.

So far this season Kandy has gotten a win and a 3rd place and is currently tied for 1st place overall . Caine is currently in 16th place, but not for long if he can get a clear conduit on race day . KC is 2nd amongst teams in points.

KC drive the KCM-08, a car designed and built by Kandy . Kandy has competed in SLASCAR and Teller Motorpark series. Caine is a member of Zoe Connoly's Caledon airforce and flies a cool custom painted tri-plane. I know i will have my eye on KC this season as they show alot of promise and skill.

FSL season 2 Team profile - MAS/Archer Racing

2008-05-04T02:01:00.007-04:00

Formed in May of 2007 , by Jafo Tendaze and Crippy Oh, to compete in Season 1 of FormulaSL, Archer racing is one of the older teams of this season's field. Coming in as the under dogs we managed to do well and capture the season 1 team title, and Jafo won the driver title.

Since forming Archer also began racing as a team in the SLASCAR series capturing many division titles in the last year. We have merged with our new sponsor MAS Racing , to form the MAS/Archer team, along with Holden Saunders racing the stocks with us , we hope to continue our winning streak in the upcoming summer season .

This season we added a 3rd driver for the first time , Yuriko Nishi for her driving skills and technical expertise. Yuriko owns YUNI bikes , and builds detailed choppers that drive very nicely also.
We feel Yuriko has been a great addition to the team, having cut her RaceSL teeth with a superb performance with OMG racing during MotoSL season 3. A bike person , she has already excelled behind the wheel of Les Whites Formula cars.

Our cars this season are the 2008 Longbow, built buy Jafo Tendaze and painted by VJ Shojo. Our main sponsor is MAS racing representing MetroLexus, Lexus of Las Vegas , and Lexus of Akron. Returning as a sponsor this season is Shiryu Musashi and Musashi-Do, also onboard are the gentlemans and music club ; Club Genesis and E.Watkins Equestrian.

As defending champions going into this season and the strong field of drivers out there , we know we have a target on us and hope we can come thru the season having fun and doing our best . At the time of this post we are leading the team championship point after 2 races.

This is the first in a series of posts , each featuring one of the many teams participating this season. More info can be found at http://www.racesl.com/.

Also in the news, Epic Studios will be filming race 4 at PSU , this will be edited to include voice over commentary by our own resident DJ/ Builder / painting expert , VJ Shojo. Advertising slots during the race are also available .

FormulaSL - Race 2 at PSU

2008-04-27T01:28:00.018-04:00

This was one of the tougher races for Archer and myself personaly in a little bit , i managed to claw my way up onto the podium finishing in 3rd, but just by my fingernails.

I landed 5th on the grid after a nervous qualify where i didnt quite get the time i had been looking for , Yuriko qualed 3rd and Jafo an unprecedented Group C qualify . All the Jafo-heads out there are wondering, when will robot Jafo make a return and make a bid for a 3rd straight RaceSL season of domination.

Group D race was won by Caine Beresford, Group C with Jafo was taken convincingly by Just Catteneo , Jafo finished at record low for him...14th.

Yum Divisdero ran a great Group B race for a nice win and free passsge into the Group A race. Yum lead from lap 5 to lap 20 , putting the field further behind her every lap.

Last but not least , the group A race, with Ram Pharoah on Pole , Kandy Tommorow 2nd , Yuriko Nishi 3rd, Gros Manteau in 4th slot , myself 5th , and YumYum 6th on the grid .

Not alot of memories from the early part of the race, it wasnt my best , some tussling with other drivers, some contact ( which damages and slows the cars now on the newest car versions). I made a bid to move up in field , but after some bad breaks i was still in 5th , some more sliding on lap 4 and i politely let YumYum by and fell to 6th.

Running in 6th for 2 laps , i was back by Yum... after that i was just running as hard as i could to catch the field, Gros and Kandy were far up front racing a close 1 -2 race untill Kandy began to pull away lap 7.

Lap 14 Ramses musta had some problems, cause he fell way to the back of the pack, from 3rd to 6th , putting me into 4th , Yuriko had a slow 2nd pit and i was on her and by on lap 21. I was in 3rd and continuing to try to make ground on the front .

Fortunes had changed for Kandy and Gros , with Gros getting by on lap 18 and pulling away , at one time having a 7 second lead over Kandy , closest i got was 9 seconds at very end . Lap 24 on Kandy slowly made progress on Gros.

Gros musta had a bad slip on the grass lap 28 cause Kandy closed the gap to 1 second going into the last 2 laps , with Kandy passing Gros on last lap and winning it by .6 seconds , i held onto 3rd even though Yuriko caught me and came close to passing me a couple times.

Grats to Kandy and Gros , and Yuriko for her highest RaceSL finish , thanks to everyone that came out to support us , Jerry and Rayne , and we know Dolli Dreamscape and Vinnie Niangao are really closet Archer/Jafo fans hehe.

This race puts me into tie with Kandy for 1st place , with Ram in 3rd, Gros in 4th and Yuriko in 5th . Mas/Archer leads the teams , with KC Motorsports 2nd and IDK 3rd,

First Race of FormulaSL season #2

2008-04-20T02:28:00.013-04:00

Finally after many long weeks and trials and testing , RaceSL founder Les White gave the go ahead for the season to begin and Round 1 be held at Mooz on April 19th . In classic RaceSL form , the track was a buzz with drivers practicing for the big race all week long .

It was a great turnout , 26 drivers joined the que to run in the qualify round for the day . Qualify as usual is a tense situation im telling you , lots of nerves waiting to see what group you will be racing in. I got some lag during my round , but managed 1 ok lap , enough to put me into 3rd at the moment , but there was still a ton of good drivers left to qualify.

Just Catteneo sent me down to 4th , with Jafo and Kandy Tommorow left over to run their round, only the top 5 qualify for group A , so im on the bubble . Kandy knocked me down to 5th , then Jafo grabbed the pole and sent me to Group B .

Some pics during qualify , Archer team , Kells Dragons , depo and Pure teams .

I still have a hope to get into Group A though , new rule this season is winner of each Group race advances to next race. YumYum won the Group D race and battled hard with her own teamie Dolli Dreamscape in the Group C race, but Yum hit heavy traffic and Dolli got away for the win.

Next was my race , Group B, lots of good drivers chasing me , Yamaha Harley beside me , Gros Decuir, Yuriko Nishi , Silk Bamboo and Dolli close behind . I was able to hold on barely and win a close one with Yamaha coming close to catching me after i ran into some traffic on last couple laps.

That puts me 6th on grid group A , with Just, Neko Carter, Kandy Tommorow , Ram Pharoah and Jafo on pole ahead of me . The next 30 laps was quite a ride , starting with big pile up at one of the first turns , the crush of cars veered to the outside to my right letting me thru on the left , next thing i know i see clear sky on straight to clubhouse with Jafo just in front of me.

There was many bouts with weird spikes and lag , but without that it was pretty smooth , i chased Jafo for a bit , untill some heavy lag took him wide out of the hairpin, letting me slip by into 1st . I led around untill i pitted , i htink i was first pitter im not sure, in and out , i was in 4th , one by one the cars leading me pit and im back in the lead.

This is the same exchange the next pit , around lap 26 i sail pass pits seeing Jafo in for fuel and tires, and im back in lead with 4 to go . But the traffic was heavy the last couple laps , next thing i know Ram Pharoah is right behind me and closing , i cant wait to see Silk Bamboos graphs on this one , cause the last several laps were a sprint , couldnt breath wrong, i could hear him right behind me which means close . But i was able to hold him off and take win , Ram grabbed 2nd, with Kandy 3rd, Jafo in 4th, Neko 5th and Just 6th .

On the podium for my 3rd win at Mooz ever , After the race , Jafo, Yuriko, me and our top sponsor Madsen Dreamscape of MAS Racing .
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Next week is Race #2 of the series at PSU Raceway, the quality of teams this season is very high , KC team of Kandy and Caine, IDK with Just and Gros, depo with Yum and Dolli, Count Bayliss' MoR Team is looking very strong , with Yamaha , Silk and Neko ,VJ Shojo's Macmost Team of Mango and Bigfoot.

Redline racing with Yetrates and Peldon. Abacus Ministrobell's Mach2 Team with Vinnie Niango and TFox Thomas, 2 englishmen both easily capable of making it to Group A on any given race, Kells Dragons with Xia , Revena , and Gordan Merriman . Not to Mention MAS/ Archer team Jafo, Yuriko and Crippy. Gonna make round 2 and onwards very interesting for sure .
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Archer would like to thank Les White, Avaya , MAS Racing , VJ Shojo for our great cars, Shiryu Musashi for the great uniforms, it was a very nice start to the new season .

Archer merges MAS Racing and some catching up..

2008-04-12T01:49:00.011-04:00

Lately ive been busy busy in RL and SL , lots of stuff going on and not much free time , havent been posting as much as i would like to.

Ive been working as PR and Communications director for RaceSL , lots of talking and not enough deals landed, but always hopefull to find new people interested in RaceSL on any level .

Have been talking to SLCN some about broadcasting RaceSL , but for various reasons this has not quite worked out, always a chance in the future though .

Hoping to have Slodcast film our upcoming FormulaSL season 2 , one possibility is streaming it live to several places holding events for the broadcast, more news on this soon, gonna have raffles and races will be commentated, adding color and making it easier to follow, hehe its always nice to know whats going on . =p

Spring 2008 season of SLASCAR has come to a close , and i managed to defend my Super Stock title with another championship in that class. Jafo won the Baby Grand and Dirt Modified divisions , Quick Gazov took home Midnight Madness championship and Holden Sanders won Pure Stock division title . Grats to all racing , it was alot of fun and looking up with Havok 4 live now .

Next up for SLASCAR will be the big Summer season , and it is promising to be very competitive and close , Archer Racing (Jafo and me ) have signed on to race as part of the MAS racing team as the MAS/ Archer team in SLASCAR .

But even bigger news is tonite we finalized deal with MAS Racing as a major sponsor this season of FormulaSL for us. The team will also be called MAS/ Archer Racing , and we will be including 3 RL Lexus dealerships as part of our sponsor family, which already includes, Musashi-Do, Club Genesis and E.Watkins Equestrian.

Also been sailing my Beach Cat catamaran some when i find time , lots of fun . Went to the Dive Dive sim i read about in Dinee's blog, very pretty and cool. Penguins up 2 games vs Ottawa hehe . go Pens .

MotoSL 3 Awards ceremony

2008-03-24T00:38:00.005-04:00

On Saturday March 22nd , RaceSL held the end of season awards ceremony for MotoSL season #3 to close off the successful season . Riders , sponsors and fans alike attended the event hosted by Les and Motorato at Hotgates.

The end tally for the season was ---

Rider Champion : Jafo Tendaze

2nd place: Just Catteneo

3rd: Crippy Oh

Team Champion : Pure Racing

2nd Place: OMG racing

3rd place : NSG

The league now continues to move towards the start of FormulaSL season 2 , still much testing to do to adjust the cars to Havok 4 .

Race #12 , MotoSL season 3 finale

2008-03-09T00:46:00.005-05:00

Lot of nerves going into this one with team championship at stake. A long week of practice for many who put alot of time into getting ready for this one . 23 riders came to play .

Unfortunately the qualify round had some lag for many , most of it not serious lag , but even a little during qualify can dash someones hopes on the day .

I hadnt had more doubts about my chances in a race than this one in a long time , wasnt too confident i would make Group A. Just trying my best was my main concern at this time .
Some how that translated into me grabbing Pole Position in Group A from Caine Beresford by just .003 seconds.

The attendant crowd was treated to 3 good races for LCQ, Group C where YumYum took her 3rd straight win in that group. Group B where Doll Kabuki won big and made it 2 in a row for the depo team .

Group A consisted of me on pole , Caine 2nd, Just C., Jafo, Fox Tammas and Kandy Tommorow.
For me i can sum up my view of this race simply, the back of Just Catteneo's trousers.

After a crowded start where i fell at least to 4th place about half way thru track, i ended up crossing lap 1 in 2nd hot after Just in 1st , and thats how the whole race played out , me chasing Just , id gain , id lose, the last couple laps i fell back a little more , bust most of race i was less than a second behind him.

Just won, i got 2nd place, Caine 3rd. Kandy stalked Caine for a bunch of laps to grab 4th place, Fox Tammas finished 5th and Jafo had a bad wreck and came in 6th.

With it all said , Pure was able to get the Team Championship , even with the proverbial fighting us with one hand tied behind there back and hopping on one foot , due to lag , RL commitments ect... OMG still almost whooped us , it made for a exciting end of the season.

Now RaceSL moves towards final testing stages of FormulaSL season 2 , the rosters are filling up and the series will be run on the Havok 4 physics engine on all tracks .

Heres a link to video filmed by Ram Pharoah of group A race , filmed with camera on me whole race http://www.slodcast.com/media/fsl/motosl_12.html

A wedding and a superbike race

2008-03-01T23:43:00.013-05:00

Not the typical saturday on SL for me , online at 9am SL time , into my leathers and off to Mooz to practice for 2 hours for the days big race. Back home at 10:45am and i changed into a dress to attend my friend Dinee's wedding at 11am .

The wedding was beautiful, Dinee looked amazing in her dress and DOC was very handsome. Both exchanged sweet words of affection while Crippy dabbed her eyes , it was very nice =) I hated to have to leave so quickly , but at 11:20 am it was back to home , out of dress and back into racing leathers, then off to Mooz for last minute warmups .

12am, MotoSL round 11 of 12 , Mooz grand prix---26 riders Qued today for what many thought was gonna be Pure's make or break race in trying to catch OMG for the team championship. Both teams fielding a full compliment of 3 riders each, Motorato Ware, Silk Bamboo and Yuriko Nishi for OMG, Ram Pharoah, Suzy Cuddihy and Crippy Oh for Pure.

Qualifying....Once again the auto-matic Querer chose me to run the first round after the rookie Que was finished. Unfortunately after a little bit of tussling , a fall and other difficulties made this a nerved fill qualify for me, but somehow i got around well enough to get a 23.3 , suprising me quite a bit hehe, amd sticking me in Pole position.

Untill it was time for Moto Ware, Jafo Tendaze and Just Catteneo to run as a group in one of last qualify rounds. Jafo registered a 23.2 his first lap and stuck me at number 2 on the grid where i would stay ....because of the first turn quick Chicane (a small S turn) , spot #2 , 4 and 6 i dreaded cause of ther possibly dangerous approach to apex of chicane, collisions there happened in every race.

A couple good early races , highlights being Yum Divesadero's strong win in group C, and Suzy Cuddihy's (possibly) do or die win in the group B race. Then onto the grid rolled the Group A in order of qualify, Jafo, Crippy, Kandy, Caine, Just and Silk.

Soon Les activated the start gate and we were off , flying thru gears straight at the narrow Chicane, Jafo was thru quick ahead of me , but was hit from behind and lost some time coming out of chicane , allowing me to dodge ahead into the lead, and i led the first lap around. But i was in for not such a good lap , smacking into the chicane fence, Jafo is by me , i then hit the Hairpin turn fence on the same lap , 2 more bikes fly by me , suddenly im in 4th place.
Around after Caine , i chased him, trying my best to look for a clean pass and not force anything dangerous, for 4 laps i stalked him untill he took a corner too shallow and wiped out on the grass, im into 3rd.

The next lap i was on Silk who was in 2nd , but i took a risk and got run off into grass, was quickly able to recover and was off after Silk , chasing her , till i got by her near the pits , i was a bit wide and slow , while Silk was low and fast, her wheel clipped mine sending me onto the rough pit surface and sending me tumbling, Just Catteneo zoom by us both , sticking me back into 4th .

Another lap around and Silk had some trouble negotiating the chicane , slowing her enough for me to catch up, we took the same line, unfortunately i took it faster, my front tire hitting Silks and sending her into the grass as i moved by into 3rd again , on lap 13.

Around i went , lap 14 then last lap 15, suddenly coming thru the Chicane i see Just Catteneo is down , im passed him and into 2nd , but Just is back on his bike and fast after me , i cut the hairpin turn too tight and woulda hit fence if i didnt steer wide and lose momentum going into final straight, Just hit the hairpin dead on , the final straight was a drag race, with Just gaining every meter....but my wheel crossed the line first by .062 of a second and i grabbed 2nd place for the day , Jafo with his 5th win , no suprise as he is arguably steadiest racer at Mooz. Just in 3rd, Silk 4th, Caine 5th and Kandy 6th .

Pure gained 10 points in the championship total , narrowing OMG's lead to just 12 points, with 1 more race to go . I wish OMG was gonna field a full field of 3 , to make the final race a true showdown , but unfortunately Silk wont be able to make the race, leaving Moto and Yuriko still a better than decent chance of holding us off at race 12 at PSU 2.

FormulaSL pre-season and other stuff

2008-02-23T23:32:00.009-05:00

Today was the 2nd Test race of the upcoming FormulaSL season 2. Held at PSU raceway on the brand new PSU 2 track, the longest track weve ever run on , and a very well put together layout by Les White.

Excitement for the upcoming season has been growing, we had 15 driver Que up at Test #1, and 25 Que up at today's Test #2. So far there has been controversy within the Archer ranks on what car we will race this season , Jafo has put together a very nice model he built himself , but when it came down to race time , Jafo saddled up in the car built by Just Catteneo and i stuck with the car built by Abacus Ministrobell .

3 cars ran qualify at once this time, and luck would have it , Jafo and i were amongst the first group. Jafo ran fast and set and held pole position. I wasnt so lucky , registering a so-so time and slowly lost position as the other 22 drivers after us took to the track . In the end i ended up in 5th overall.... setting the top grid at Jafo, Grosmanteau DeCuir, Just Catteneo, Dolli Dreamweaver or whatever , Doll Kabuki's new racing alt, me and Yamaha Harley.

The other group races were exciting , especialy Group B where the lead changed several times with Mango Birdbrain coming out on top . Group A race promised to be a good one . Onto the grid we went and Les sent us off with a gate countdown . The first couple laps were very tight , i kept Jafo, Gros and Just close in my sights with Yamaha right on my tail . Poor Dolli hit a patch of grass and flipped her car early , taking her out of running for the win.

Lucky for me the 3 cars ahead of me were all over each other , eventualy allowing me to slip by into the lead, with Yamaha still running fast behind me , round and round the track we went , the sound of his engine very loud in my ear. At some point i think he slipped on a little grass, and i was able to pull away . A few laps later, after i seemingly fended off the attack of team mate Jafo, Yamaha came from no where and passed me , but he pitted the same lap , allowing me to pass back into the lead.

Into the pits i went the next lap , coming out i was 2nd , at some point i think Yamaha had some troubles and i was able to jump ahead of him again and never look back, even after my 2nd and 3rd pit stops i remained in the lead till the end , crossing the line for my 2nd win of the FormulaSL pre-season (having won test race #1) , with Yamaha 15 seconds behind me .

The next stop for FormulaSL i think will be Mooz where Les plans to make it Havok 4 after the upcoming MotoSL race next week . 4 victories out of the last 5 MotoSL events , i dunno if im eating my wheaties or what , but i like it and hope my luck doesnt run out soon .

And other stuff----

The other day i was hanging out at Mooz race track and met Niki Wilder and McKinney Allen who run Air Races out of Niki's sim. After going over the whole RaceSL spiel with them , telling them the whole story and format of the league , we went off to Les Whites playground at Misp .

There we were joined by Jafo , we played Sim Invaders, Les' space invaders type arcade game , where your AV stands at arcade machine , but the game itself is in the sky above you , very cool. we played Arena ball , a indoor soccer type game , we flew airplanes , even dogfighting a little, since Niki wanted to try flying in Havok 4, which is what Misp has.

Then we took to the sea , rezzing our Siege Guild warships and fighting a sea battle , lots of fun .
After all this Niki took us to her sim where we tried Air Racing around pylons , i found it to be very challenging and fun. Although i hoped to participate in their league races this Thursday , i was too busy , so more practice and hopefully i will next thursday .

upcoming posts ....Finally ! i will post about Yuni Motorcycles, beautifuly done high prim Motorcycles by Yuriko Nishi .
Also a pictorial tour of Haven Manor , the new house i share with Rayne Niven .

MotoSL Round #10 ...Victory at Snowpeach

2008-02-16T23:55:00.012-05:00

Finally...after coming 2nd at Snowpeach , my fav track on RaceSL circuit, 3 times in the past ....i finally grabbed my first win ever there. Although for this round the track was run in reverse direction.

No crashes for me allowed me to hold off a hard charging Kandy Tommorow who gained .500 or more time per lap for last 3 laps , but finished 3 seconds behind me. Kandy also took the Pole Position for the day ...sticking me into spot #2 by beating me by .002 of a second. Also by a coincidence Just Catteneo ran the fastest lap of the race, beating my fastest lap by .002 seconds!

Just Catteneo finished 3rd, Jafo 4th , Doll Kabuki 5th and Caine Beresford finished 6th . This win puts me in 3rd in individual standings overall , and finally allowed us to pass Jafo Tendaze and the NSG team into 2nd place in team standings.......Jafo had literaly been holding us off nearly single heandedly for the last 9 races.

Group B race was a good one, although crashed filled except for Yuriko Nishi who led the field flawlessly throughout, unfortunately Yuriko took a bad spill on the last lap allowing Matt Birke to make up a 9 second gap and beat her by just .313 of a second.

Group C was another thriller , a 10 lap neck to neck battle between Pure rider Ram Pharoah and Depo rider YumYum Divesadero. Yum did quite well holding him off untill lap 6 when Ram got by, Lap 7 was still very close , but Yum encountered heavy traffic and fell back almost 5 seconds on lap 8-9, Ram fell the last lap and Yum squeeked by to win by just .134 seconds.

The event was a great turnout , 25 racers queing up for the day , now the series moves to the 2nd to last race of the season at Mooz in 2 weeks , with a FormulaSL test race next week.

Im hoping to keep up my momentum gaining 67 points in last 3 races, and thats after only getting 23 points in 4 races before that.

2007...a Year in review

2008-02-06T01:50:00.000-05:00

After a failed attempt to get into playing SL in 2006 , encouraged by tales from my friends Charmed Daehlie and Dinee Ghia, i decided to give SL a 2nd try and on February 2nd , 2007 Crippy Oh was born . I spent a fair amount of time on Helper Island to familiarize myself with the game system and later that same day (rez day), Charmed logged on and began to show me around , buying me my first hair , lending me some cash and showing me the best freebie places.

My first day in SL

My experience with SL this second try was much more positive , the first time it was just plain too laggy for me. My first couple days were spent being enthralled by Charmed , her home , her many beautiful outfits, i was quickly becoming entranced with SL and its wide open possibilites.

A more refined Crippy after playing a few days . Shopping at one of my fav stores , Delicious Results.

By day 5 i had started to explore a little more and happened upon Club Prominence owned by Hanako Calamari. It was at Prominence i got my first job as a dancer, and met several people who remain friends of mine to this day , including Emilie Watkins, EcleticJohn Niven,and Misty Gentil. Charmed came and worked at Prominence for a short time , but eventualy the club closed when Hanako returned to her studies as a medical student, i still have many fond memories of this place and it was my first real hangout in SL. Emilie Watkins currently has a successfull clothing store in SL , making riding clothes and various normaly hard to find clothing items.

My 3rd incarnation after playing about 1 month, wearing my Dragonfly skin

After Prominence i had more spare time on my hands and began to explore SL more , around this time in early March i came upon Motorati Island, i got my first car , then first motorcycle , soon i was standing in the infield at Fairgrounds speedway , wondering , how do i get in on this . At Fairgrounds i met many people who are also still my friends to this day , YumYum Divesadero, Doll Kabuki, Jafo Tendaze, Suku Ming , Toby Rainbow , Subwoofer Fuhr, Sabrina Lachman. Getting involved in the SLASCAR league consumed my time on SL , even after getting hired at Club 250 thanks to Misty Gentil who was a manager there.

Posing with my FormulaSL and SLASCAR trophies

Club 250 became another important segement of my time on SL, meeting long time friends Frosty Sinatra, Skates Coronet and Lilyu Jewell. Lilyu soon became one of my closest companions in SL and remains a important part of my online life. Club 250 was a great hangout , from dancing on the tables , to dance events , to just hanging out chatting with strangers and friends. Frosty even sponsored one of my SLASCAR cars before he left the club for a career in poker.

Crippy Oh today

Skates Coronet eventualy completed his long time project , Club Genesis , and this became the next phase in SL for me , meeting friends Ronni Boa , the gorgeous Rayne Niven who also became a close and very important companion to me to this very day, and many other lovely personalities i still see and speak to time to time.

During my time working at Genesis i finally made my way to the venerated race courses of Mooz and Misp and met people who by this time were nearly legendary to me by now , Les White, Motorato Ware , Silk Bamboo, Suzy Cuddihy. I formed Archer racing with Jafo Tendaze and competed in Season 1 of Les Whites beautifuly done FormulaSL, going on to win the team championship with Jafo. Over time RaceSL has become my passion on SL, and ive met many great people thru it , Shiryu Musashi, VJ Shojo, LUCA Rosmer, Chester Orbit, Bennet Dynamo and all the nice people at Depo.

In flight hunting for Doll Kabuki

During this period my interests in SL became many and varied, sailing at the Hollywood sim and its ajoining sims, Dinee Ghia introduced me to Bloggers with Blades where i met Tiana Merriman , Zoe Connoly and Desertwolf Longstaff. Spurred on some by Zoe Connoly's very nicely done blogs and my interest in the Victorian period i became quite interested and involved in Steampunk in SL and some late 19th century play. I became a Human Assassin in the SL world of NoR , a post-apocalypse setting based on race, experience points , skills , levels and roleplay .

Looking back at 2007 , i enjoyed my time in SL very much. Im still very involved in SL , managing Archer Racing and hoping for a successfull 2nd season of FormulaSL. Mooz Raceway and Club Genesis are still my main haunts. I have just moved into a beautiful Victorian mansion with Rayne Niven . I still enjoy very much hearing about the RL and SL of my friends, when i get a half a chance to catch up with them. Heres to hoping 2008 is a fun, involving and engaging as 2007 was.....

MotoSL Round 9---Crippy Oh...2 in a row ??....no

2008-02-03T01:34:00.001-05:00

This saturday was MotoSL round 9 at PSU raceway , always a fun event , 22 riders showed for the toughest racing competition in SL . Gonna keep this one short and sweet though.

Qualifying round was a bit of a bear this time around a sweaty bear lol, Just Catteneo and i decided to ride around and clunk heads for a bit before finally getting in some good laps , wasted 3 of the 5 qualifying laps though, but it was good enough to get me 3rd overall on grid, with Jafo on Pole position and Just 2nd, also in Group A race was Silk Bamboo, Caine Beresford and rookie Grosmanteau DeCuir.

One thing i love about MotoSL is im much faster out of gate at start than in the Formula1 cars, lights went out on the group A race and i was off, Jafo in my crosshairs, i was tight around first turn and into 2nd place chasing Just.

Just crashed his bike lap 3 and i was in the lead. One bad point for me for this race , was computer problems , i was racing with no sound , alot of shifting and knowing how close people are to you is all based on hearing sound . But i didnt let that phase me , 11 laps i led the field, at one point by 12 seconds.

I got hung up on the hairpin fence once and crashed my bike another time, but was still able to hang onto lead. But Just Cattaneo was closing fast. Just was by far the fastest on the track during the week of practicing , i knew i better pick it up. No sound though , means not hearing person is close behind you and Just found his spot and made his move , cleanly passing me on lap 13.

Another crash on last lap and Jafo was able to pass me , in the end i got a podium and 3rd place, but another missed opportunity to score big. Kandy Tommorow ran brilliantly again and won the group B race, Yamaha Harley and Vinnie Niangao put on quite a show , dueling it out for 10 laps in the Group C , Yamaha was like a rock though , Vinnie would beat him into a turn and Yamaha would beat him out , Yam came home for the win .

Next MotoSL race in 2 weeks at Snowpeach , like this week , the regular layout will be run reversed for the race.
---On a side note today, saturday February 2nd was Crippy AVs 1st rez day =))

SLASCAR -Winter Season wrap up

2008-01-31T16:53:00.000-05:00

January 20th , the last cars crossed the line at Dirtfield to end the Winter Mini-Season. Due to its short length of only a couple months , the competition was fierce for the top spots. Many veterans returned to stake their claim, Jafo Tendaze, Doll Kabuki, Subwoofer Fuhr, Suzy Cuddihy, Greg Drayman, Aybabtu Abaye, Mango Birdbrain, Sonic Costello, Valiant Jewell, Mater Gamba, Dekul Runo. Challenging the vets this season was a skilled crop of rookies including Quick Gazov, Mac Heron, Katier Reitveld, Innes Merriman and Holden Saunders.

With all these vets and fast fresh faces , competition was at its highest since i started racing in SLASCAR, in the end i raced in a total of 19 races, i missed a bunch because of RL work and the holidays. I won 4 races, came in 2nd twice and in 3rd place 4 times. It was enough to bring me home 2 championships , in Baby Grand stocks and Legends.

Final standings-

Baby grands: 1st : Crippy Oh, 2nd: Jafo Tendaze, 3rd: Quick Gazov

Midget cars(Dirt track) : 1st Jafo Tendaze, 2nd : Sonic Costello, 3rd: Subwoofer Fuhr

Pure Stocks(Dirt Track): 1st (tie): Jafo Tendaze & Subwoofer Fuhr, 2nd: Sonic Costello

3rd: Greg Drayman

Legend cars: 1st: Crippy Oh, 2nd : Subwoofer Fuhr, 3rd: Jafo Tendaze

Pro Trucks: 1st: Subwoofer Fuhr, 2nd: Doll Kabuki, 3rd: Crippy Oh

Midnight Madness: 1st : Quick Gazov, 2nd: Mac Heron, 3rd Holden Saunders

MotoSL Round 8- Mooz with a vengeance!

2008-01-26T23:30:00.000-05:00

Ive already stated in my series of blogs that Mooz raceway is not amongst my favorites of the RaceSL series. It was first track i raced in lower than Group A race. I had a horrible race there once in FormulaSL where i was absolutely mugged to little pieces by 2 rookies. Although ive had some ok races here, most memories are not good.

MotoSL round 8 started as all other events, everyone at track de-scripted, and then clicked on the Queuer to enter there names in the race. The Queuer then randomly picks 3 riders to qualify together , 22 racers entered , a field of 5 rookies and 17 pros. The rookies ran their rounds together , then it was time for the pros .

Always ready to go , i waited for Les to hit that button for the 1st pro qualify round , and once again....this has to be 3rd or 4th time , i was in the 1st round .Which means i gotta gear up and get out there and do my thing with 2 other riders first , and my partners are very good riders also, Kandy Tommorow and Yuriko Nishi . After my failure at Snowpeach , where i qualed so badly , i was ready to go , my 1st lap woulda been good enough to stick me into 3rd overall , but my 2nd lap got me Pole Position, which is good , cause none of my other laps were any good, i fell twice.

After the first round i had to sit thru 14 more riders giving it there go , each one a class act and many , serious threats to topple me from Pole , Just Catteneo , Jafo Tendaze, Moto Ware, Yamaha Harley, Ram Pharoah, Doll Kabuki, Caine Beresford, all gave it a go in succession, but when the dust cleared i had held Pole Position =) my first ever in RaceSL .

Sitting on Pole with Jafo on my right sitting 2nd on the grid , nerves were hitting me , but in the end you have no choice but try to do your thing and just get thru it . 3-2-1 go and i got off very good , with Kandy hot on my tail . She got very close several times, the roar of her engine was very loud in my ear, after a lap or 2 Jafo got by Kandy and was after me .

Each time i passed the gate i looked for the rider behind me gate spam , if i can see it before i go around next turn , i know they are close. After a little bit Jafo's spam faded, and i decided to cruise a little easier . After several laps of no spam , i had a slow lap, around thru the gate , then suddenly i could see Jafo's spam as he came thru behind me , hot on my tail on lap 10 . I knew i had to pick up the pace.

3 laps he chased me , gaining on me and was within .980 seconds, when he hit the tires near the pit on lap 13, this gave me clear sailing the last 2 laps , just needed to stay on my bike..........which i did ..hehe . My first ever MotoSL win and 2nd ever RaceLS win, needless to say im very happy.

Moto Ware won the Group B race, with YumYum running a solid 2nd and Ram Pharoah getting 3rd. Doll Kabuki ran a solid Group C race with a big win and rookie Neko Carter came in 2nd in his first RaceSL race ever.

This win puts me from 6th place in standings to 4th place, just ahead of Silk Bamboo, on a sad note, Silk missed this race, even though she showed up just a few minutes too late to get in as a entry . Silk is a top notch competitor and she will be back i know that for sure.

Round 9 is next week at PSU, we are running the course in reverse, which will be very interesting .

Road to Snowpeach ...Round 7 MotoSL

2008-01-13T02:27:00.000-05:00

Last week Jafo Tendaze took his 4th MotoSL series win at PSU raceway , this week the series is back at the venerable Snowpeach complex owned by Count Bayliss.

The highlight of this event was the Group A race, specificly the battle between Motorato Ware and Kandy Tommorow. Jafo led the pack early , but spilled on lap 3 , giving Kandy a brief lead before Moto was able to jump in front . Kandy was hot on Moto's tail the entire race, falling back some , but then slowly creeping back up during the final laps , heading into the S turn before the finish line on the last lap , Moto didnt quite have the best line and struck the wall sending her flying , Kandy sped past and to victory .

Much congrats to Kandy Tommorow on her win , in the last 1 and half seasons of FSl and RaceSL (18 races total ) only 4 people out of the dozens of participants, had ever won a race, Jafo Tendaze, Just Catteneo , Moto Ware , and me (Crip Oh) .

Silk Bamboo won a controversial Group B race and Suzy Cuddihy's tenacity and persistence won her the Group C race. oh ya i raced too , i fell while leading the Group C race, on the last lap , letting Suzy by for the win .

The last 4 races have been poor performances for me , im now in 6th place overall , with Jafo in 1st, Just Catteneo 2nd, Moto Ware 3rd, Silk Bamboo in 4th, and Suzy pasing me into 5th . Gonna have to sharpen up to keep up with this extraordinarliy talented and competitive field . Next race is 2 weeks at Mooz , time to step up or go home =p

Pic of Silk Bamboo giving me Reiki therapy saturday after the race, at her clinic. Thanks Silk needed that =)

Homeless Crippy Oh

2007-12-27T15:00:00.000-05:00

Since losing my home on Mistress isle , life has been a little different for Crippy Oh in
SL . Often i find my self waking up in the park , the flowers smell nice and the grass is
soft and comfy , but still not the same as my big bed and silk sheets. Here i am waking
up at sunrise in the park at the Fallen Reflections sim, very nice, but not home.

Good thing about parks is usualy plenty of pretty waterfalls to bathe in , i just got a nice
new menu driven shower , but this is nice too , but also public . Here i am bathing in a
waterfall at Fallen Reflections.

Being homeless doesnt make you shop less i found out , but now it seems i have to
go to public areas and sandboxes to try on new clothes.
Club Genesis has become my hangout , which has its perks, that... or you will find me
ejecting jerks at Mooz raceway. Hopefully very soon Rayne and i will have a nice new
big plot of land to put our new big house on.

Archer Racing signs Musashi-Do as sponsor

2007-12-25T03:37:00.000-05:00

On December 17th, Archer Racing proudly announced Shiryu Musashi and Musashi Motorsports as our first official sponsor looking towards Formula SL season 2 , which should begin in early 2008.

Already Les White has released specs for builders to create the new line up of cars for the Formula SL teams to choose from. VJ Shojo has already completed his model, and it looks great . VJ supplied a model last season and was amongst Archers top 2 or 3 choices. a Very nice car , it ended up being the trademark car of the Depo Motorsports team. From what i know Vincent Nacon and Ramses Pharoah are also working on theirs , as im sure several other builders are.

Les has many good ideas for his re-construction of the Formula 1 cars , and soon will be putting them into the scripts , very excited about it.

To get the support of Shiryu is a thrill for me and the team , ive been a fan of his cars and clothes since i stumbled on his nice store at Motorati when i was just a weee bitty newb. Search Musashi-Do to go visit his stores and see his very nice lines of fashions and cars.

The Weekend in SL

2007-12-23T03:35:00.000-05:00

Had quite a full weekend in SL this week , starting with friday races at Fairgrounds Raceway , the track has moved from the Pontiac Garage sim (pontiac is leaving SL) to a new sim owned by Aybabtu Aabye. This has been a wonderfull change. Instead of laying down a prim track which causes problems with jumping and prim seams , the track is made up of just of terrain , terraformed and textured to look like a banked oval. This method proved to be superior to the prim track .

The first races of the new track was 3x 50 lapper races in Super Stocks, Pro Trucks and Late Models . After a long and tough qualify round i managed to make it to the main event in all 3 races. First up was the Super Stocks , and i love these babies hehe. Sonic Costello gave me quite a run , but i was able to lead this one nearly start to finish for the first win by anyone ever at new Fairgrounds track =))

Next up was Pro Trucks , this was a points race for the winter season, Pro Trucks and i dont like either much , so i never do too great in these, all i remember is i was upfront some, then all the way back around 7th or 8th place and managed to work my way up to 4th for the finish , i forget who won, but im sure Jafo, Subwoofer and Doll Kabuki were most likely the top 3 .

Last race was the Late Models , fastest cars of the night , and one of my favs . This was a good race, i battled out front early on , with Kandy Tommorow hot on my tail for a long time . A unfortunate accident involving me brought out the yellow flag and dashed my hopes of a 2nd win on th night , sending me to the rear of the pack for the restart. Still managed to work my way back up to 2nd place, but Kandy Tommorow scored a impressive win .

The night at new Fairgrounds was very successful, everyone is quite impressed with this track, it goes a long way to eliminate 3 annoying things from the old track. Random jumping from colliding with prim edges, cars sliding when at a stop sometimes on the grid , and lag , alot lot lot less lag , improve the benches and this place is a mecca. =)

Next up on the schedule was a Time Trials event on saturday for the Hawk 10R bikes at PSU Raceway , this was a non-season event for fun. 3 rounds of qualify laps for each person , the top 8 moving on to a 10 lap race to end the event. 1st round of qualify was a suprise, Mr. Les White decided to reverse the direction, going backwards is something no one practices , so suddenly everyone is on even footing .

To perhaps everyones suprise, i won this round , with the best time , and the only person to get around in less than 27 seconds. But the following rounds it was back to racing the right direction so my lead was out the window as some of the best riders can score a lap in 23 seconds here.

My 2nd round was ok and my 3rd round stunk, i scored good enough to land 6th overall and get a spot in the race.

10 laps and fun followed, my decent racing weekend continued as i jumped off in the lead after the first lap , with Jafo close on me . But little mistakes eroded that and soon Jafo was able to pass me . I wrecked around lap 6 and this allowed Just Catteneo to catch up some and begin to chase, Just drove great , catching and passing me on the last couple turns of the last lap , so i got 3rd , still alot of fun .

After the Event , was the depo Christmas party held in one of their many sims . Wow this place was decorated nice with ice skating, giant tree and tiny train going around it , banquet area, lots of large Christmas sculptures like elves, snowmen and Nut crackers. Ice skating , dancing and drinking , fun was had by all .

Eventualy the depo crowd melted away as many of them are from the UK, and all that was left was the usual list of suspects , the Race Pack , Jafo, Silk, Les White, Yamaha Harley, Motorato. This has become a great little communtiy in my opinion, a fairly close knit group of people who enjoy each others company and get along well , even though we enage in heated battles on the practice and race tracks everyday , we can still pull up a beer and make each other laugh, always alot of fun.

It was a fun weekend and its not even over, tonite (sunday ) is a round of races at Dirtfield, which is still located in a Pontiac sim . Following is a screen shot or 2, unfortunately i dont have one of new Fairgrounds yet .

Bye bye Mistress isle

2007-12-14T17:16:00.000-05:00

This article is a little bid adieu to my home in the Mistress sim....due to a situation with finances that should have never happened , my group of friends and i lost our plot here.Our Gorean neighbors allowed us a week to stay and then basicly started nailing eviction notices to our houses.

Im not gonna name names and try not to speak to badly about anyone involved. But various goreans claim friendship with various people in the group of us that owned our plot , and all i have to say is this gorean person knew we were close to losing our land.. and if they were really a friend as they claimed.... would have contacted their friend voicing concern..... instead of virtualy wringing their hands in anticipation of our demise, maybe we coulda worked out a deal for sale so we didnt lose 100% of our investment.

For me the best way for this to come out, is to upgrade and come out better than before, so stay tuned i will profile my new house when its up and complete , not alot of details yet , 8000sqm plot and a big house are the plans.

MotoSL race #5 ...Storm at Teller

2007-12-11T10:07:00.000-05:00

Gonna be blunt not alot of good to say about this one as far as myself is concerned , having engine and weather problems all week , problems compounded race day . I qualified 15th in the field and my first Group 3 race. But i was not lonely, it was a stacked group 3 , with Kalel Mommsen , Yamaha Harley , Doll Kabuki and Bike Racer...yikes.

A race with those names featured is gonna be good and it was , with a steady battle between Yamaha , Kalel and myself unfolding early. Plenty of wrecking and colliding as the lead exchanged several times, some bad spills for me and i found myself in 5th or 6th place on the last lap . I come around the back half of the track and start passing bodies and broken bikes along the way , around the last hairpin and more bikes and crashed riders, somehow everyone in front of me managed to crash on last lap and i crossed the line in 1st , 13th overall on the day .

Our race was prolly the closest as far as race for win , Just Catteneo easily took Group 2 race with nice performances from Pure Team mate Ram Pharoah. Jafo Tendaze easily won Group 1 race. With Silk Bamboo and Motorato Ware joining him on Podium, also in this race were depo teamies , Suzy Cuddihy,Yum Divesadero and Vinnie Niango . Luckily Ramses and Suzy pulled up my slack and were able to keep Pure in the run as far as points , we are still in 3rd place chasing NSG, but depo is closing fast , for myself , im still in 5th, with the top 4 pulling away from me and the rest of the field closing fast Suzy Cuddihy my lovely team mate 2 points behind me , and Yum Divesadero 6 points behind .

This was first MotoSL racew at Teller Motorpark, although most drivers were happy with the track provided, the sim itself was whoafully inadequate. Thanks to BNT and SandraDay OConnor for doing their utmost for other wise a fun event .

In RL ive been very busy with work and have not had time to post much here, i feel im falling behind. Soon i hope to do articles ive had planned for long time , including a Builder profile on Yuriko Nishi and Augustus Miles, 2 motorcycle builders who make some of the sweetest bikes on SL , my forays into the world of steam punk, a end of the year wrapup article , and even some pinups of myself perhaps , also in future i plan Builder articles on Emilie Watkins and Lilyu Jewell. More to come soon.

MotoSL race #4...Mooz

2007-12-02T02:03:00.000-05:00

Race #4 at Mooz , on the "Iron" layout was already shaping up to be a crash fest , with a tight S chicane right after finish line , its difficulty rating is high , with alot of riders crashing there during the week long pre-race practice.

Mooz already was on my shitlist to be honest , ive qualified there slow 3 times i think. Today was no different , just didnt put the rubber around the asphalt quick enough , qualified 9th out of 30 riders who registered today for the race. Only good enough to get me into the Group B race for the first time this season...ok..... so this isnt such a big suprise, im no Andretti......The really big suprise on the day was the field i had to face in the Group B race, for places 7th to 12th overall on the day .....Motorato Ware, Silk Bamboo, Yamaha Harley , Doll Kabuki and Bike Racer, 5 riders who could win the Group A race given half a chance....never mind B.

A good start for me kept me in 2nd for the first lap of the race, right behind Yamaha Harley , but trouble in the chicane slowed him allowing me to jump out front. I led the field for 3 laps , then took a spill, at the chicane. Yamaha jumped back out front , i was in 2nd for rest of that lap , then got hung up on fence at Chicane , allowing Motorato by ...then Silk Bamboo and then Bike Racer, i fell all way to 5th. Another hang up on fence didnt cost me a position , just time... as i was on Silk Bamboos tail for 3 laps before it.

In the end , Bike Racer tumbled lap 9, getting me up to 4th , then Yamaha Harley crashed out of 2nd , down to 4th , putting me in 3rd..which is where i finished.....9th overall on the day .

POG rider Kandy Tommorow looked impressive to win the Group C race. Group A was shaping up to be a nice race, with 3 Depo/Pure riders in it today , Suzy Cuddihy, Yum Divesadero and Vinnie Niango . Pole was taken by Jafo T. this time around , with Just Catteneo in 2nd , Suzy C. 3rd. For the early stages of the race, Jafo led , followed close by Just and Suzy.
Suzy took a spill lap 4 and fell to 6th place.

Jafo led Just around for just 1 more lap , crashing out lap 5. After than Just C. cruised for another 10 laps almost making it look easy for the big 2nd in a row win . Jafo had several other incidents, but never fell out of 2nd place. Vinnie Niango was very steady and claimed 3rd and Team depo's first podium ever, but unfortunately there was a incident lap 11 with Yuriko Nishi , a bit of a collision with Vinnie and Yuriko was taken out , falling from 3rd to 6th overall . Suzy grabbed 4th , with Yum and Yuriko 5th and 6th .....next week race, Teller Motorpark..

MotoSL - race #3...Oh no...Oh so close

2007-11-25T00:21:00.001-05:00

Race #3 of the MotoSL season at Snowpeach , was another packed house, 28 riders qualifying on the day, this being one of my favorite tracks on the circuit i was hopefull it would be a good day .

Luck struck first kinda during qualifying , where i ended up qualifying in the very last group of the day , a long wait , but the advantage was that only Doll Kabuki and i lined up on the grid to run our qualifying laps , while the rest of the field ran in groups of 4 .

I tried to overdue it a bit knowing the lucky break we had, i got a good enough lap to qualify me 4th on the day on my first timed lap, but i went for more, which resulted in 2 wrecks and 2 not as fat laps hehe, oh well not complaining about 4th on the grid. Just Catteneo took pole position away from Jafo Tendaze, who had been holding onto it since the first Qual group of the day ran .

My Pure and depo team mates Suzy Cuddihy and YumYum Divesadero both ran great races in the Group 2 race to take 1st and 2nd , 3rd Pure Driver RamsesIII Pharoah took the checkered in the group 3 race, all looked very impressive .

Next was the main event for places 1st to 6th , usualy my strategy is to take it easy on the start , alot of problems happen in the 1st couple turns that can really set you back , and with a field consisting of Just Catteneo, Jafo T, Motorato Ware, and Silk Bamboo, such a mistake can be unsurmountable to make up.

But this time was different, i dont know why , i just went for it. 3-2-1 go, and all 6 racers jammed thru 6 gears to hurtle towards the suicide hairpin.. i was pretty clear on all sides with Jafo and Just in front of me , im sure Moto close beside, i hit the sweet spot and jammed on the brakes while flipping my gear down to 3rd, around the tight right hand hairpin , i dont know who , Jafo and Just im sure, close around me , a quick left turn after the hairpin...4th gear , 5th gear , 6th gear , then one of toughest turns a hard fast left , down to 5th gear , back up to 6th gear , by now i was in the lead.

In the lead , thats where i would stay for the next 14 laps , dodging fallen riders and bikes, surviving lag pauses , short ones when someone wrecked bad, long ones when bikes collide together, doing whatever i could just to stay on my bike. Reading gate spam i could see Silk was in 3rd as i passed behind rez lane after the hairpin, this told me one thing ...whoever was in 2nd place was between finish/start line and me , which is not a big gap.....lap 13 , relaxing trying to just play it safe , lap 14 goes by , if someone was very close behind me , i would see their gate spam before i reach the hairpin turn 1, but nothing...no spam , turn 1 , turn 2 ...final lap, turn 3 ............

turn 4

i go too far inside , the side of my bike scraping against the concrete wall, i go down in a crash ....hurrying to my bike... i have troubles getting it pointed right way , but i soon get going , rounding turn 5 , i find disaster, at least 3 riders crashed..i get stuck in the melee of riders trying to get going again .... finaly i get around the final turn and across the finish line....3rd place, what i would describe as 3rd place the hard way lol.

Just Catteneo took his 1st MotoSL and RaceSL victory , with Silk Bamboo in 2nd , Moto Ware in 4th, Blackjack 5th and Jafo 6th .. Very happy to say even with 3rd i still manage to capture my first MotoSL podium spot and first podium for depo Motorsports, our generous and very gracious hosts and sponsors.. next race is slated for next week on December 1st , maybe at new circuit track Teller speedway , but atm this is still tenative .

Pontiac Raceway Park season comes to end

2007-11-22T01:56:00.000-05:00

After a blistering 8 month season the Pontiac Raceway Park season has come to a end . It was here at the Motor sim i came so long ago it seems and met Mr. Tiger Noh in the infield painting his cars , seeing those and hearing that there was organized races held at the beautifully done track , i knew i had to get involved. I bought my first cars , #84 B-mod and #77 Nova Street stock and i was ready .

My first race on the track was just a few days away on a friday i believe, it was the street stocks . I think i suprised myself as much as everyone else, by leading most of the race untill i T-boned Sabrina Lachman who had spun out , i finished 2nd behind YumYum Divesadero , and i was hooked.

127 races later (according to the records i kept all through the season), the Monster season comes to a close. I managed 26 wins in that time , which i feel is decent vs such talented drivers as Jafo Tendaze, Subwoofer Fuhr, Doll Kabuki, YumYum, Dekul Runo, Greg Drayman , Tiger Noh, even track owners Suku Ming and Toby Rainbow sometimes, and many others who always showed up ready to race for first place.

In the end i managed to wrap up championships in the Super/Street Stock, Late Model stocks, Mini-stocks and tied for championship with Subwoofer Fuhr in the Grand American Modified division.

Subwoofer took home the championship in B-mods , Legends, Pro-Trucks, Racing Karts and a tie with me in Grand Ams.

Jafo Tendaze brought home championships in Dirt Midgets , Dirt late Models and Pontiac Solstices.

Doll Kabuki wears the crown this season for Pure Stocks and Sprint cars.

Throughout the long season there was many exciting races , at one point after 2 consecutive wins in Street stocks , i had beaten Subwoofer Fuhr in both races by a combined time of less than 1 second difference.

The limited winter season has already begun and theres been already several exciting races, looking forward to the 2008 season which begins in march 2008, and hopefully the positive changes that will come with the release of Havok 4 =)

MotoSL ....Race 2

2007-11-11T01:27:00.001-05:00

This saturday was race #2 at Mooz Raceway ....32 drivers competed, with a sim load of 38 people . Those numbers alone are enough to send most people familiar with SL screaming bloody murder into the night in fear of painfull lag . Most events in SL you attend with 30 , 40 or more people , your lucky to get 1 frame a second and usualy have to hope the friend that tped you into that mess was in a good location , cause even just moving around is a chore.

But luckily RaceSL races are no script events , so most people were able to enjoy it with minimal lag , although a few with higher pings still suffered unfortunately.

As with each event , the qualifying round gets things started , more stressfull than the actual race, qualifying determines which group race your in or even if your gonna be racing at all, top 23 move onto 1 of 4 group races on the day . Luckily i was able to get in one of my better qualifying rounds since i have been racing in RaceSL and ended up 4th in a very competitive and tight field, only 1 second seperated 1st place qualifier from the 12th place qualifier.

Group 2 race was notable with Depo team mate Doll Kabuki running a excellent race, leading nearly wire to wire, with bike pro Silk Bamboo giving her a serious race after a first lap crash started her out early in back of the field . Lap by lap Silk crept up on Doll, the excitement was building in the observation room , Doll held her own very well, but it was obvious on the last lap Silk was gonna be in position to try a pass. Doll held her off for half of the lap , and looked in controll, but it seemed Doll was hit with a lag pause narrowing the gap between them to nothing , into the next turn they went side by side and collided, neither went down , but Silk got the worst of it allowing Doll to pull away to a impressive win .

Next was Group 1 race, with me sitting 4th on the grid , and high hopes. 3-2-1 , and were off, i fall to 6th in the first turn , which isnt bad when 1st is still within sight. But turn 2 resulted in a collision with Yamaha Harley, and i got the worst of it going down . Getting back on my bike i never really recovered , chasing Yamaha for more than half the race, he ran very well, with no mistakes to allow me to catch up.

Bike Racer went down , putting me up to 5th still chasing Yamaha , although i was making a few mistakes here and there, allowing him to pull away more and more. Even after another wreck , i was still in a good position , Pole sitter Just Catteneo went down and fell back to last , putting me up to 4th place. But again just sloppy riding put me down on the ground on the 2nd to last lap , Bike Racer (thats his name) passed me , and i ended up 5th . Jafo Tendaze led wire to wire for his 2nd straight win , Yamaha Harley ran a excellnet steady race and ended up 2nd , after Motorato Ware had just 1 costly wreck putting her in 3rd.....looking for redemption in 2 weeks when the series moves to Snowpeach .

Pontiac Raceway Park '07 Finale

2007-11-09T22:20:00.000-05:00

Fresh from the race tonite , a 250 lap throw down , featuring one of the banner classes of the league, the Late Models. Late Models are basicly NASCARs .

At first, with a early part of the race fraught with troubles, including me flying out of racetrack twice and the sim crashing, i didnt think i would have much to say good about this race, but it ended up being quite a race.

My early troubles causing red flags , put me at the back of the line on the restarts several times, but then things began to click. After a "proto-type" pit stop around lap 50 , the first thing of this type tried in the league, i was able to pop up into 2nd place, hot on Subwoofer Fuhrs heels.

It was quite a duel , lasting about 30 laps before i was able to pull ahead of Subwoofer. i led for about another 30 laps before another red flag brought the race to a halt again, a good opportunity for racers to rest there sore hands. The Late Models can be quite challenging to drive and can wear out your hand after just 30 laps, and we were up to 120 by now .

I was sitting in the front of the line for the restart hoping to keep my groove going , but disaster struck after just three quarters a lap, i hit the wall and flipped on my roof, another red, Crippy back to end of line ( the rule for causing a red) .

Race restarts again , lap after lap i claw my way up again finaly its Greg Drayman and me dueling it out for 1st place, for atleast 20-30 laps we traded the lead back and forth , very close racing , but Greg and i became stuck for a moment , causing yet another red flag . Back to end of the line for Crippy.

By now we were on i think around lap 200 to 210 , my hand aching , there would be no more come backs, Jafo started out restart in front and stayed there till end for the win, i was in 4th most of rest of race, battling up to 3rd a little . But falling back again, a couple brutal final laps and rough dueling between me and Subwoofer , i some how managed to cross the line in 3rd...sorry Subby, race over , thank god .

This wraps up the 8 month 2007 at Fairgrounds and Dirtfield, a upcoming blog will detail the final results and standings of the 13 car divisions .

MotoSL Season opener

2007-10-31T06:37:00.000-04:00

Saturday October 27th , beautiful day at PSU Raceway for the season opener of season #3 of MotoSL. 28 Riders showed, a very impressive turnout for a SL racing event, but even more amazing , with Les Whites low lag track, full descripting of everyone in attendance , and the low script nature of the bikes themselves, this event compared to every other racing event on SL was virtualy lag free.

Yes there was the occaisional blip or 2 of lag for everyone, but even with the crash sensitive bikes.... who will go down with just a little rub on the grass, any lag was manageable and not too detrimental.

I qualified 4th overall and finished 4th overall, not as quite as good as i hoped, but still happy about it . Jafo Tendaze won his first MotoSL race, Motorato Ware 2nd and Silk Bamboo 3rd.
My Team mate Suzy Cuddihy finished 8th overall, crashing and losing the lead in her race to Yuriko Nishi at the very end. Doll Kabuki finished 5th overall in her first Group 1 RaceSL race, congrats Doll =)).

So far OMG magainzine Team has a nice little lead in Team standings, with Jafo and Nacon in 2nd, Suzy and i are in 3rd, with Yum and Doll on the depo team in 4th .
Lots of fun was had by all, next race will be the 2nd saturday in november at Mooz Raceway, looking for to more action .

An Introduction to...Pure Racing Team

2007-10-22T18:01:00.000-04:00

Racer Suzy Cuddihy and me , make up the Pure racing team for the MotoSL season #3. Recruited and brought together by Team manager YumYum Divesadero, we are looking forward to a fun season of motorcycle racing.

Pure is a client company of the main sponsor of MotoSL and FormulaSL , Depo. Pure is a UK outfit that works with businesses and private households helping them become more green in their energy management.

Depo is also a RL company that has literaly brought their business to the virtual world of SL. They have set up a cluster of 7 sims into a business park, where several of their RL clients have virtual offices....they use SL as a form of virtual conferencing in which they conduct their companies RL business day to day . Depo works with companies to help them maximize their online developement for the benefit of the company.

Some of the projects Depo is involved in besides sponsoring racing are , a cinema in SL for the BBC, fashion shows and developers fair, they also run a virtual art gallery and lately begun work with World Society for the Protection of Animals.

As far as MotoSL goes, it looks like its gonna be quite a season , this last saturday the 20th of October we had the final test race, 27 riders showed , and this was Les Whites time to shine as the premier Race event manager , providing a nearly lag free competition, ran with utmost proffesionalism even with so many people involved.

Pure as a team didnt quite shine as we did in the previous Test race, Suzy and i only qualified for the Group B race, racing for positions 7th to 12th , we made the most of it though , finishing 1st and 2nd , with our Depo racing team sister Doll Kabuki finishing 3rd.

The season opener is this next Saturday at PSU Raceway , and were practicing hard with hopes of a good showing ..wish us luck =)
More info on Depo can be found on their website at http://www.depoconsulting.com/index.html

FormulaSL wrap-up Awards ceremony

2007-10-14T17:27:00.000-04:00

Today was the FormulaSL award ceremony at Hotgates, trophies, money and awards given out for Top 3 teams , and Top 10 drivers. Hosted by Les White, it was a classy ending to a classy SL racing season. With Havok 4 in beta testing , things look bright for a Season 2 . Already the best cars in SL, with acceleration thru RPMs and gears , Pit stops , advance setups, hopefully Havok 4 will take it to the next level.

For those not sure what im talking about (although im not expert) , the Havok system is the physical code in SL, how objects move and interact.. The current system is Havok 1, theyve been developing a new one for a long time, so long its called Havok 4 now.

Jafo and i hoisting our Team Championship trophies during the ceremony

The trophy and plaques i got today , thanks and grats to the other award winners today , it was alot of fun, looking forward to MotoSL motorcycle season #3 .

Just a few screenies

2007-10-13T23:57:00.001-04:00

Heres a few screen shots of what ive been up to lately, not alot , but wanted to get these on here somewhere.

Here is a pic of Archer Racing 2007, just after we wrapped up the F1 Team Championship title at Snowpeach. Crippy Oh, Lilyu Jewell (benefactor) and Jafo Tendaze.

This is a nice pic of Snowpeach from the air after FormulaSL season 1 race #12. Owned by Count and Bibi Bayliss, this is always one of my fav tracks to race.

This is a photo of a photoshoot. Depo team captain/manager YumYum Divisadero arranged for SL phototographers Netrosanct Studio's , to come take some nice publicity pics of us . I got to see the final product , it looks very nice, cant wait to get a copy.

Thats all for now, hope to have more soon, Les White was out of town saturday, so no MotoSL test race this week . Next post will be on the FormulaSL awards ceremony which is being held tommorow. Will have more on SLSCRA soon, as the 8 month season at Farigrounds and Dirtfield winds down this month , hoping to wrap up 4 division titles, so far i have 1 wrapped with the Mini-stock division.

FormulaSL -Season Finale - Archer 1st -2nd

2007-10-07T13:21:00.000-04:00

Last Week at PSU Raceway Jafo Tendaze wrapped up the FormulaSL Drivers Championship with his 7th win of the season.. The series this week came to Snowpeach for race 12 of 12, with several points races still undecided.

Starting in 6th position on the grid at the start , i watched the field peel away from me towards the suicide turn 1 hairpin. The 5 cars in front of me broke up into small groups scrumming for position, at the top of the hairpin was Yamaha Harley, Suzy Cuddihy and Silk Bamboo tangled up, already clear of the hairpin was Jafo and Motorato dueling it out.

I cut the Hairpin sharp below the group of 3 cars to my left, and to my right i saw Moto and Jafo going wide right , suddenly it was like the red sea parted , as i drove thru unscathed into the lead. But unfortunately this lead was not long lived , lag , nerves , and some bad driving eroded my lead allowing Jafo to catch me after 3 laps up front. Motorato and i dueled it out some for 2nd several times , i was able to shake her off, but she got by me while i was in pits for my first pit stop.

Much of the rest of the race i was in 3rd, but some shaky laps allowed the 4th and 5th placed drivers to get right on my butt . i could hear Silk Bamboo's engine roar in my ear for several laps , she finally hit a wall and i was clear. Hoping to retain 3rd place and get a podium spot a swept around the pit turn on lap 28 of 30 and saw Motorato , who had been leading the race for several laps , had spun out and i was by her into 2nd place, where i finished .

Archer Racing started the season race 1 , 2 and 4 , finising 1st and 2nd and we ended the last race 1st and 2nd , it was a very happy moment , securing Archer the Team Championship of FormulaSL season 1 . Also i was able to hold onto 4th place overall from Silk Bamboo who had a late season surge and was threatening to send me into 5th.

Season 1 is over! =) and with great Success for Archer Racing , in the off season we will be hunting for a sponsor to bring us up to the next level as a SL racing team . We move on now to Season 3 of MotoSL , for now Jafo and i part company, he will race for Vincent Nacon while i will race for Pure Racing .

MotoSL -- Pre-season race

2007-09-23T04:16:00.000-04:00

Saturday was the first Pre-season race of MotoSL , 21 riders came out and gave the track a spin in qualify and 4 group races. Fun was had by all , i think , i heard no complaints hehe.

This season is shaping up to be quite a interesting mix of teams when compared with FormulaSL. The top 3 FormulaSL team drivers are all riding for different teams in Moto SL . Motorato and Xia form OMG's bike team , Silk Bamboo and Thorn are the Red wings, Yamaha Harley and Bike Racer ride for Domino Designs, Jafo Tendaze and Vince Nacon race for Vince's team, and Suzy Cuddihy and me , ride for the Pure team. Thats 6 team mates in FormulaSL that now ride on 5 different teams.

As for the Group 1 race of the day itself i will cut and paste the short narative from the RaceSL website---

Motorato Ware of OMG Magazine gave us all a refresher course on why she has the number 1 plate with a clean victory after 15 laps. Crippy Oh of Pure Racing was hot on her tail after a battle with Jafo Tendaze, but unable to close the gap by lap 15. Crippy finished second over all with Jafo 3rd

=))) ..more to come on MotoSL, this is also a big week for FormulaSL leading up to next weekends Race #11. After the Motorcycle race i went to a Horse race in the Antiquity sim , it was very cool, although i didnt see any racing before i crashed, i got to see lots of horses and thats what counts =)

Crippy's new ride

2007-09-18T16:59:00.000-04:00

Les White just finished my new bike for the upcome MotoSL season 3 . I will be racing for the Pure team with Suzy Cuddihy. This weekend coming up, F1s are taking a break and we may be getting in a pre-season bike race. More info in blogs to follow about MotoSL, Pure and depo.

Crippy Oh turns 101...easy on the SLex please!!

2007-09-14T06:39:00.000-04:00

Last night Crippy Oh hobbled her old butt across the finish line in her 100th and 101st races of her Pontiac Raceway Park career. I came in 2nd place in Go Kart and Late Model races held at Mooz Raceway. As always big thanks to Suku Ming and Toby Rainbow and my fellow drivers, Jafo Tendaze, Doll Kabuki, Suzy Cuddihy, Subwoofer Fuhr, Greg Drayman , Mater Gamba and the whole crew it was a fun night as it always is . Subwoofer got the win in the Go Karts and Greg Drayman got a big win in the Late Models , which he has been training hard for . Grats all .

My placement stats in 101 races add up to the following -------
Wins: 21, 2nd Place: 26, 3rd Place: 24, 4th place: 6
5th place: 11, 6th place: 6, 7th place: 1, Did Not Qualify: 6

Race # 9 FormulaSL -Crippy returns to podium

2007-09-10T02:31:00.000-04:00

Finally the internet gods allowed me to be online long enough to make it around 30 laps of the Group 1 race and come in 2nd place. Timing had to be impecable though cause i crashed offline just 15 minutes after the race was completed, which as the new rules states if you crash offline while in a race.... you are out... DNF (did not finish), no place , no money, no points. Grats to Motorato for her 3rd win of the season and grats to Suzy Cuddihy for her 2nd straight podium at 3rd place, both have really been kicking some butt.

But it did turn out well =) Motorato Ware of the OMG magazine team is looking hot in this final part of the season and is putting pressure on Jafo for the driver title and on Archer Racing for the team title . 3 more races remain, the next one being at Mooz , were gonna have to pull out all the stops to come out on top. For the full official run down of race # 9 at Snowpeach raceway, check out http://www.racesl.com/ , for pictures and race commentary , and the SLodcast video of the event, which should be up soon.

A Day in the Life ..of a SL Race Car Driver..part 2

2007-09-06T01:41:00.001-04:00

So anyways .....after sunbathing , reading , gossiping , playing gammon ect... i needed to relax some , so its time to hit the Hot tub. Life on the island has been alot of fun . We are still slowly terraforming and expanding upon it .

We share the sim with the city of Herlit a Gorean role-play city , they are very nice and neighborly, we've have had no problems with them at all...well except for the occaisional cutie in a loin cloth coming over for one reason or another ...like i said ....no problems .

By now its Noon SL time , and for me that means 1 thing , my baby Rayne is gonna pop on during part of her lunch time at work . This is always a time of day i look forward to . We usualy share some close moments in her tea house or my house , or the new Koi pond she has built and supplied with some very nice pose balls .

Rayne and i have been dating for over a month now , and have grown quite close , she is fun and loving , a big supporter of my endeavors and just someone who is always there for me.

Classy, warm and stylish... Rayne is what was missing for me in SL for a little while , ive always had close friends since being here, Charmed Daehlie, Khrys , Ronni, Isolone , YumYum, Doll faced Kabuki, Dinee, Tiana , Jafo and others ...but Rayne has certainly filled a empty spot in my SL life.

As sweet as lunch time is...its also short , usualy still giddy and excited , its time for some adrenaline. A quick hop on the swing set will take care of that .....come by sometime if you ever want a good swing , i love my swing set , its good for drying hair , catching bugs in teeth , counting your toes or just plain getting sick on lol.

By now ...its actualy time to get down to business, what day in a life of a race car driver would be complete without ...well....racing cars

First stop.. is the site of the next FormulaSL race, for some intensive Formula1 practice.

The Formula 1 training for me is amongst the most involved i currently do , practicing at the track every day .The league uses 3 tracks (so far ) and the most advanced race cars on SL , created by Les White, these cars have advanced set ups , whose parameters must be tweaked for every track and every race.

They are scripted to burn fuel and wear out tires , so races include critical pit stops , proficiency at them can spell a win or loss, up a place or down a place, it can be quite a challenge at times. Visit Mooz raceway or http://www.racesl.com/ if the premier top of the line racing league in SL interests you . bring your wallet or a sponsor though, its pricey , but worth it.

While im at one of Les White's Grand Prix tracks , its always good to get in some practice on Les' racing motorcycles for the upcoming MotoSL season. While the Formula 1 cars Les has built are the best and most advanced race cars in SL , these bikes are easily the best vehicles created so far in SL period, they drive so smooth and nicely .

Unlike most cars and bikes in SL these arent hit the gas and go vehicles , you need to accelerate (and decelerate) thru 6 gears and a tachometer( same with Les' Formula 1 cars also ) , giving you plenty to think about out on the track, gearing , your racing line , your opponents , plus with these babies , you accidentaly stray from pavement to grass and the bike will wreck , sending you flying .

Im quite looking forward to the upcoming season (MotoSL season 3 ) , ive already been picked up by a team sponsored by DEPO and Chester Orbit, a generous sponsor who has done great things to help sponsor the RaceSL leagues.

Next stop is my first love in SL racing , Fairgrounds raceway , i came here in what seemed so long ago and was immediately inspired to become involved in the racing season here . Run by Suku Ming and Toby Rainbow, if its variety in SL racing you want , this is where they keep it . 2 full sized oval tracks , 1 paved , 1 dirt , that also include several tracks within both sims . A paved large oval, paved small oval and paved figure 8. The dirt track owned and run by Toby Rainbow includes a large dirt oval and dirt figure 8 . These sims are sponsored and part of the Pontiac collection of sims .

The variety doesnt stop there either, Suku and Toby offer 13 classes of cars to race, 6-8 races on 2-4 days a week. Car classes include Late Models (pictured , Nascar type car) , Street Stock, Limited modified, Grand American modified, Mini-stock, Dirt Midget , Go Kart, Pure Stock, Pro Truck , Pontiac Solstice, Dirt late model modifieds, Legends cars and Sprint cars . Teleport into the Garage sim sometime and check out the wide variety of cars available on the vendors located at TP spot .

So finaly another hard day is coming to a end , time to peel out of my stinky racing leathers and become a lady again. I like to put on a nice dress, and get into the arms of my sweetheart Rayne and go dancing somewhere nice , passing the rest of the day with my loved ones..... with another day just on the horizon .... i cant wait . Thank you for sharing in some of the activities that occupy a typical day for me on SL =)

A Day in the Life...of a SL Race Car Driver...part 1

2007-08-30T01:07:00.000-04:00

Everyday on SL for me , begins here at my house in the Mistress Sim. I share the land with my friends Rayne Niven , Khrys Bailey , Ronni Boa and Wren Hyun. We own 1/4 a sim, not a huge amount but very cozy . The tropical setting and seaside life is very nice. This pic shows sunrise from my house.

--This new home is years away from the craphole neighborhood i used to live in at the Marwood Sim, typical mainland sim , mish mash of junk , clubs that are always empty, buildings that were there before i even got there, ive never even seen used or anything .

--Of course cant mention my old home in Marwood without mentioning my neighbor, who owned atleast 5000 sqm of land smack dab in front of me , i talked to him a few times, his goal was to make his land look like a ghetto/ slum....buddy you sure did, warehouses with broken out windows , annoying signs , burning trash, burning cars ect.. ect..

The first business of the day is to put on my bunny slippers and wander on down to Khrys' house and enjoy a cigarette and cup of coffee on her cabana. Khrys' house is very nice, right on the water , nice breezes blowing in, the sound of seagulls .....ok Khrys' house has streaming porn on a wide screen TV, who can blame me for hanging out here alot . Its a nice place to get my first fix of nicotine and caffeine and contemplate the agenda for the day .

Soon enough the sun has risen a bit more in the

sky, and what better thing to do... but lay out in it like a lazy bum. Here i am sunning myself on my lounger, sipping a pink flavored drink, and enjoying a copy of OMG magazine . A very nice magazine , with articles on fashion , locations , gadgets , profiles on racing arenas around SL ....ok...its also full of scantily clad women i admit it. But the articles are nice too. To the left in this pic is the white victorian style house owned by my girlfriend Rayne Niven ...right next door....love it hehe

By now ive burned off enough of the clock that Khrys has come online, and what better than to enjoy a nice game of Backgammon with a friend. Here i am strategizing moves to use on Crazy Doll Kabuki. Of course Doll beats me too quickly for me to ever use these moves ....have you ever captured fireflies in a jar and shook them up....sometime id like to find a big enough jar and do that to Doll hehe , and believe me it wouldnt take a big jar either.

----Also seen in this pic is one of my fav boats , my Trudeau Bluewater Schooner, i sometimes take it to Starboard yacht club and sail . Starboards is a very nice place located in the Hollywood sim, they hold regular Flying Tako races there that are always a lot of fun. Also nearby the yacht club is a scenic full 18 hole golf course, a very nice place over all.

----To be continued

Crippy Oh Abducted!!!!!!...oops i mean inducted

2007-08-28T16:18:00.000-04:00

Today i was honored to be inducted in the SL Racing Hall of Fame , but its easy to be humbled by the thought of my fellow peer drivers who also deserve such a honor , mainly Jafo Tendaze, Doll Kabuki , Yum Divisadero , Silk Bamboo, Subwoofer Fuhr and others.

Race #8 at PSU Speedway

2007-08-26T02:52:00.000-04:00

Im doing 2 posts in a row cause ive been wanting to post about our new uniforms but never got around to it .

I was hoping this would be a happier post , but the gods of the internet worked against me this time . Everything went as planned , i would estimate i practiced atleast 20 hours for this race, trying to get it down as good as i could.

Race day comes , and im happy my girlfriend Rayne is able to make it to the race, her support is always appreciated =) Qualify session begins , each 2 car teams take turns running 5 timed laps to determine the race order for the days races. The drivers are then split into groups of 6. Group 1 races for places 1st to 6th, Group 2 races for places 7th to 12th ect...

Teams qualify in order of their ranking , being in first place Archer qualifies last , this may have its advantages allowing us to see what times we need to beat from the whole field , but its hell on the nerves i tell ya lol.

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Actualy driving the qualify laps is no relief to sweaty palms either, after my first 3 laps , even though i felt i had done enough to get into top 6 , my laps were falling short. Lap 4 my hands start to shake a little knowing its coming down to the wire hehe , but you just have to suck it in.

Lap 4 ended up being the trick for me , sticking me at 4th overall of the 15 drivers racing .

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First up is the Group 3 and then Group 2 races, good friend Yum Divisadero was having graphics problems or im sure she would have won the Group 3 race.

Crazy Doll Kabuki was steady and fast in the Group 2 race, and after race leader Abacus Ministrobel took way too long during his 2nd pit stop, Doll rolled by him to get the checkered flag for her first FormulaSL win =)

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Next up was the 30 lap Group 1 race. It started well enough , i put my usual plan in effect , just trying to stay steady and consistent , and it worked well enough , i soon found myself in 3rd , behind Jafo in 2nd and Motorato Ware in 1st . Moto took a spin and hit the wall , Jafo was by her , and soon i was too . Thats how most of the race went , i was constantly watching for Moto expecting her to come roaring up behind me with every little error in cornering i made or slip of my tires.

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Jafo musta spun out or hit a wall cause at some point around lap 19-20 i was right behind him , it would be bad team work if i tried to force a pass , possibly messing up both our races. But a couple bad laps , where i lost traction and had cornering problems and Jafo pulled well ahead of me . Its been awhile since we finished 1st and 2nd , and this was the scenario i had been working towards all week long .

-------

Lap by lap the race counted down , i think i saw Moto a few times , but she wasnt making significant gains as long as i didnt completely crack up. Lap 28 i rounded the hairpin that would send me down the front straight across the line and begin the last lap of the race, and barring any errors during that ...1st and 2nd places again for Archer.......suddenly my car rolls to a stop, i try to get out and resit incase it was a car error... nothing happens...i immediately IM Les White the race director letting him know my problem.....about this time i glance over to see my Comcast internet cable modem ...has crashed. It takes 10 minutes to come back and i get back online .

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Race is over , i get 6th place, or last place i should say . Leaving plenty of work to be done for the next race at Snowpeach , which will be in 2 weeks . Grats to Jafo on his 5th win of the season .../shakes fist at Comcast

Gearing Up

2007-08-26T02:44:00.000-04:00

This week we recieved our new team uniforms , thanks to Shiryu Musashi of Musashi Motorsports. Jafo and i were already fans of his work and were happy when he agreed to make our new custon uniforms . Please search Musashi-Do to find his clothing store , he has a wide range of clothes available, beach wear, casual, formal ect... all every nicely done. Located near his clothes store is his car shop where he sells several models of high quality vehicles.

An Introduction to .....Archer Racing Team

2007-08-23T15:24:00.000-04:00

Having raced at the Pontiac Fairgrounds for several months , i decided to see what else was out there. One of the first vehicles i got in SL , was the Hawk 10R racing motorcycle, created by Les White. I knew Les had a couple tracks and there was a league involved , but for one reason or another i never got around to checking it out .

I went and visited Mooz raceway for the first time , where i learned Season 2 of MotoSL had just ended. But busy Les White was hard at work on Formula 1 race cars for a new series he planned to start within a couple months. It was a expensive league to join, but i immediately could tell Les wasnt messing around and intended it to be the best in SL , so this got me giddy and hyper to get a team going to join in on the fun .

My first couple attempts to recruit a team from the Fairgrounds failed (spank Yum Divisadero and Doll Kabuki). But luckily i found interest in it from another Fairgrounds driver , Jafo Tendaze. Jafo was fairly new to Fairgrounds , but was already winning races and proving himself to be a talented driver.

Thus was formed Archer Racing , we paid up our dues and our Black and gold cars were the first ones completed for the new league . Competition looked very stiff, Motorato Ware and Silk Bamboo formed a team for OMG magazine , both already proved themselves top notch racers in MotoSL season 2. Several other top drivers including Kalel Mommsen and Jake Abramovich , certainly made us feel like under dogs coming into the pre-season races.

Jafo quickly proved his skills in the pre-season , qualifying for all the Group A races , and eventualy winning a string of them including the first 3 regular season races, i dont know how many in a row total, enough to make the other racers mumur of bodily harm and make them loiter around his car looking for ways to sabotage him /giggles.

As for me , i didnt qualify for any Group A races during pre-season, but won several of the Group B races , which boosted my confidence. But opening day was gonna be the true test , i managed to qualify for the Group A race and Jafo and i ended up finishing 1st and 2nd . In fact we managed to finish 1st and 2nd in 3 of the first 4 races, including Race 4, where i broke Jafo's streak by winning the race myself .

Currently Archer Racing still holds firmly onto 1st place in the team rankings, with OMG closing the gap and the Codename: Denmark team not far behind them . Jafo leads the league in individual points. Unfortunately after 6 races in 2nd place , i fell to 4th place after 3 poor performances in a row . Next up is Race #8 (of 12) at PSU raceway on Saturday, to me its a race of great importance, my goal is no less than getting Archer 2 spots on the podium once again (Podium is 1st thru 3rd place) and hopefully make up some ground ive lost over the last 3 races.

If top of the line SL racing interests you , please check out RaceSL.com, the leagues home page.

You can find standings, detailed narratives of each race , photos and videos. Its been great fun so far , stay tuned for my take on race #8 on saturday /knocks on wood /makes sign of benediction ect... /giggle

Crippy Oh Blog opens

2007-08-22T15:08:00.000-04:00

Hi this is Crippy with my first blog post , i think my goal for my blog will be shed a little light on the parts of SL i enjoy and support.
Currently this includes racing in the Pontiac sponsored Second Life Stock Car Racing Association (SLSCRA), Racing in FormulaSL and MotoSL leagues. Sailing (some racing too ) , my new home on the Mistress island sim , some combat aspects of SL including NoR and Combat: Samurai island. I also lead a active social life in SL and may perhaps touch on that now and then hehe.
Also always exploring and trying to invlove myself in new things i come across .See you there =)
Crippy Oh