Tony Read


Been awhile, but I was able to make it back to the track for the Barber Vintage Festival this year.  Luckily, my friend Tom Sharp let me ride his Trackmaster framed Triumph 750 in the Sportsman 750 class. 
He's had issues with it over the years with some serious vibrations.  As in, the handlebars feel like tree trunks vibrations.  Tried several different tricks to see if it would at least lessen the amount and nothing ever seemed to work.  The bike will hold a line well enough, it just beats you to death.  Well he tried some other new things and put a motor in with some nicely domed high compression pistons and said, let's see what it'll do this time.  Still vibrates.  But, I did manage to beat my fastest time around the track by 2 seconds by the end of the weekend. 
Race one I ended up 5th but managed to beat my fastest time.  With a mechanical rev limiter in the shape of severe vibrations, plus the amount of arm pump it took to wrangle the beastly Trackmaster, I felt pretty good about that.  Not to mention the fact that it had been 2 years since I've been on a 750 or at Barber.
Race two, I got a better start and was 4th.  For the first half of the race I was right on the asses of 1st through 3rd.  We got into some lapped traffic from the class ahead of us and I lost touch of the dice for the podium.  I was eventually awarded the 3rd place after the race because my buddy, Jerrett Martin, was nice enough to forget to switch his transponder over from his other race bike. 

Knocked another second off my fast lap in that race and managed to stay a little more consistent.  This winter I should be able to finally finish my Triumph after a long time without it.  Trying to get some free time away from work to do that and try a few Mid South Cross Country races as well on my woods bike.  I also have a vintage Cross Country bike, MR250 Elsinore, I'm halfway finished with that will get some action next year.  Should be a fun year in 2014.  Thanks again for the support!
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