CONFIRMED: ‘Furious George’ is NOT ‘BY-09’

Despite plenty of questions in pitlane at the 2009 RACV Energy Breakthrough last month, we’ve now got a picture to answer the question – “Is that BY-09?”

This pic above confirms that Bendigo Youth Racing’s AIPP-winning ‘BY-09’ is a different trike to Bendigo South East SC’s EB-winning ‘Furious George’. It was taken recently at a Bendigo Presentation event.

Bendigo South East (BSE) worked in partnership with us through this year to develop our new canopy shape and chassis. Why?

• We could share resources & workload
• It cost both BYR & BSE less money to share the production costs
• BYR Tech Chief, Daryl King, was also teaching at BSE
• More people could learn along the way
• BSE would be able to continue to use the shape into the future

The chassis of Furious George was produced in term 1 this year as a prototype to see if everything (and our riders) would fit for both teams.

“It (Furious George) was built well before BY-09, so I think that says a lot about these students and their design skills.” BSE teacher & BYR Tech Chief Daryl King told me after the EB.

Regular readers of our blog would know that we spent plenty of time trying to produce a front wheel drive vehicle. (Read our post about that) Unfortunately, we had to abandon those plans mid-year.

So, for a crew with one Year 8, two Year 9s and five Year 10s (including a great chick - Bronte) to construct a vehicle of such a high standard, put it on the track in Maryborough and have people think that it was built by us makes me pretty chuffed.

We have to say though 'Furious George' did use BYR's windscreen demister system at Maryborough.

BYR would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

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Training Ride: Daryl's Loop

This Training Ride, unofficially called Daryl's Loop is a great 40km hit out around Bendigo which includes a number of hills to test the legs and the option of a few sprint points if your crew is feeling frisky.

Despite it's length it is challenging to get a 30 km/h average on this course as the terrain is constantly up and down.


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A story of a Training Ride: January 2, 2008

As we (Big Deano, Daryl, Deven, Cal, Mark Anson and Nige) rode our first group ride for 2009 today, we enjoyed some warm hit 20' degrees temperatures and a chance to catch up on all of the happenings over Christmas and the New Years.




Apart from the sprint point near the Emu Creek Tennis Centre, a highlight was Daryl breaking a spoke clean out of his rear wheel. Cal was volunteered to return back to Maccas to pick up Daryl's car and head back to pick him up. Nigel also scored a slow leak in his rear tyre, so not particularly good omens for the start of '09.

• Check out Daryl's Loop here on Google Maps
• Check out more training rides
  

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BY-06 Finishes a Strong 2nd at Casey Fields

Bendigo Youth Racing has fought back hard to come 2nd at the Casey Fields 6 hour on the weekend.

The day started badly; With our usual choice of tyres unavailable, the team was forced to kit out BY-06 with an untested set of tyres. They lasted for a little over 150 minutes, or 3 riders, before the left hand tyre scrubbed to the canvas and consequently blew. With the help of Narre Warren South School, located down the pit lane from us at the time, we were able to replace the destroyed set with a pair of Primo Comets, albeit at the cost of 2 minutes in the pits fitting them.

Lap times consistently dropped, with the Primos working fine. Progress was soon halted however, when a huge gust of wind blew our vehicle and it's occupant, Marcus Sloane, over on turn 6. Marcus stayed out for awhile longer, before pitting.

Now sitting in 4th behind Ex Pats, Trisled and the very quick Zebra, it was time for the latest member of Bendigo Youth Racing, Kim Chapman, to have a crack. Kim stayed out for 45minutes, inching us closer to 3rd with some smooth, consistent riding.

The state of our front tyres after 2 and a half hours

Rowan soon hopped in, setting consistent 2'50s for quite awhile. After an hour, we now sat in 2nd position, and were pulling up to 10 seconds per lap on the super consistent Ex Pats. Eventually though, the attempt at a consistent run was thwarted, when a vehicle within the top 10 rolled BY-06 in what looked to be quite deliberate. The team in question was penalised, as was our rider for his understandable reaction to being rolled over at 50km/h.

By the time our final rider, Callam Ridge, jumped into BY-06 we were just under 2 laps down on the Ex Pats. In the final 8 laps alone we chipped 2minutes and 4 seconds out of the Ex Pats advantage. Eventually though time ran out and the flag fell on the Ex Pats.

Bendigo Youth Racing would like to congratulate the Ex Pats for their 1st place. They showed great speed and consistency on the day.

Bendigo Youth Racing would like to thank Narre Warren South School for the tyres, Chris Crowe for transporting the vehicle and Flora Hill Secondary College for the use of their trailer, which doubled as a pit area! And of course, thanx to all the team members and parents for coming down and cheering us on all day.

About Casey-Fields:

The Casey Fields precinct is a major undertaking between the Victorian State Government and the City of Casey. The area will be developed over an eight year period, with football, rugby, soccer, tennis, athletics and netball all accommodated alongside cycling. The construction of the cycling circuit has been brought forward and can now be enjoyed by HPV teams and cyclists alike.

BYR's Casey Fields team

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