Knowing the weather was doubtful for any activity on the salt at all, everyone was up and in the truck before daylight. It was still dark as we rolled out to the pits across the salt, but a faint glimmer of the beauty to come could be seen to the east.
We pretty much had our pick of the pits as there were only a quarter at most of the entries there on Thursday.
While unloading we were greeted by a photographer who called himself “Porkpie”. He was an engineer for Porsche living in Germany but coming to the salt for the SCTA Speedweek and the BUB events as well as the World Finals each year. He said he had adopted the name from the British slang for “second chance” as he had been a streamliner pilot and crashed hard a number of years ago. Realizing he had been given a second chance at living, he made it a point to return and enjoy the racing he loved and not “wait until there was enough time”. Using the backdrop of a spectacular sunrise (see the last photo in the gallery) he took photos of both bikes and the crew. We are waiting for him to send the CD of the shots at this time.
Following much the same routine as the previous two days we went to the starting with a jet change to make the first run of the day. The bike’s performance was sluggish again, even though the same jets that had yielded the one good run the day before were in it. The exhaust gas temperature stayed at a sluggish 1400 degrees indicated and the power just wasn’t there. I turned off after the first mile and we went back to try and figure out what to do next.
Posted by Bill 