2012 Petit LeMans And Dragon Run, Post 5

I rolled into Fontana on Sunday, October 21, around noon: early enough to make some Dragon passes.  Drove right past FVR to the Deal's Gap Motorcycle Resort for lunch and some ambience.  The weather was gorgeous: sunny, low 70's, with a light breeze.  The parking lot at DGMR was a bit more crowded than it had been in March.  As in March, my estimate was 50% cruisers and 50% sportbikes or motards.  The mood was mellow: I had a nice chat with a Ducati rider who was going to find some autumn leaves for his wife before heading back home to Florida.

The Dragon itself seemed more crowded than the parking lot.  Trying as I do to visit twice a year, and with an unexpected half-day in hand, I felt no pressure to tear it up.  Made a low speed pass to the Calderwood Overlook to check road conditions and get into a rhythm.  The downside of slow passes (depending on your vehicle) is that you must unlearn some things when you start to run harder.  In my car, the Dragon is 3rd gear at moderate speeds.  It's 2nd gear, with occasional upshifts, when making fast passes.  The feel and reference points are different.

I saw one l.e.o., on Sunday afternoon.  He was stationary, at the state line, facing north, on the southbound berm.  Nothing sneaky about it.  He was gone when I made my return southbound pass, so he must have been from NC.  In 1.5 days on the Dragon, my radar detector never lit up.  If the l.e.o. I saw was shooting (and he probably was), he was using instant-on laser.  Here are my notes:

Pass 2: (after one warmup pass), blocked by a dense line of 4 cars.
Pass 3: blocked, not badly, by touring bikes; stopped to talk to Killboy's Jack Rose.
Pass 4: badly blocked by a pickup truck and a Toyota.
Pass 5: terribly blocked by leafers in a "new" Thunderbird with Alabama plates; they were clueless, or doing the "I have as much right to this road as you do" thing, or both.  This is when Killboy suggests you use a pull-off to gap yourself, and I would have, had the time for passes been limited.

Speaking of pull-offs, they work fine.  I used them to clear for sportbikes five times on Sunday.  A number of people used them to clear for me.  I always gave a puller-offer a wave (my sunroof was open) on the theory that acknowledged courtesy lubricates traffic.  Jack Rose (and others) told me that the Dragon itself clears out pretty well after 4:00 p.m. on most days.

Was back by 8:30 Monday morning.  The parking lot at DGMR was empty.  It started to show signs of life by 9:30.  Here are my notes:

Pass 1: a very slow Harley tourer cleared for me, otherwise I was alone northbound.
Pass 2: nobody but me southbound, only 4 touring bikes northbound.
Pass 3: used a pull-off to build a gap to a van; caught him again before the Overlook.
Pass 4: stopped to help at an accident site.
Pass 5: blocked by a 20-foot straight truck hauling a forklift; used a pull-off, caught him again.
Pass 6: blocked by a touring bike, used a pull-off to build a gap.
Pass 7: stopped to chat with Kamal, Killboy's photographer, for over half an hour (see below).
Pass 8: best, and fastest, pass of the day; no southbound traffic at around 5:00 p.m.

Viewed from Kamal's spot at "Sunset 2," traffic on the Dragon was light (just as in the Killboy videos from last spring).  But it often comes in clots of 4-6 vehicles.  Using a pull-off to build a gap is the way to go; the trick is to get underway again before somebody else comes through.  (On this visit, I saw one sportbiker cross the double yellow to force a dangerous pass.  I was last in line of a string of 4 cars that he took, and he was beginning corner-entry when he got around the first one.  He appeared in my mirrors quickly, and didn't wait around for me or anyone else to use a pulloff.)