ON A HIGHWIRE IN A HURRICANE: A LAP AROUND THE AMA PRO SACRAMENTO MILE WITH HAMMERIN’ HANK WILES

Sacramento, Calif…When the AMA Pro Sacramento Mile presented by Miller Lite and brought to you by Greg Padilla Bail Bonds and SDI Insulation thunders into action on Saturday, July 27 at Cal Expo, it will showcase the phenomenal skills of the greatest Grand National Championship racers in the world.

 There is no forecasting who will emerge victorious in the 48th running of the AMA Pro Sacramento Mile.  So far in the first four races of the season there have been four different winners: Mike Rush, Sammy Halbert, Brandon Robinson, and Brad Baker. One thing is for certain, though – every rider in the field will be going for it full bore in front of a packed house.  Henry Wiles, widely considered one of the most talented and determined riders in AMA Pro Flat Track today, recently provided insight into what it is like to take his Ramspur Winery - Lloyd Brothers Motorsports Ducati for a lap around the famed Sacramento Mile.

 “The Sacramento track is unique compared to some of the other miles that we race. It is a track that requires a lot of concentration to turn fast laps. It is more of a paperclip shape than an oval – it has pretty long straights and narrow corners which makes it a real drafting type track. By the main event it develops a narrow, tacky blue groove in the corners, lined on the outside with what feels like banana peels. You don’t want to slip off the groove here.

As I come down the front straight at about 130 mph and approach turn one, I gently ease up out of my tuck and begin bending the motorcycle into the corner, gently rolling back from full throttle.  I feel the weight begin to transfer more to the front wheel, which helps me slow and steer the motorcycle into the turn.  There are no front brakes here so it is important that I time the speed of closing the throttle so that the bike rolls into the corner as straight as possible. If I chop the throttle closed too quickly it will create too much engine braking which makes the back wheel skid sideways too far and might make me blow it off the groove. You kind of have to be patient as you roll the bike through the turn and get it pointed in the other direction before you can begin to roll the throttle back open.  I have to maintain the fine line between moving forward with traction and spinning the tire up too quickly and losing forward momentum.  If I spin it up, my drive down the long straight is ruined. My run down the straight is all about how well I can get off the corner. Once I am straight up and down on the fat part of the tire, I can roll the throttle wide open again and rocket down the straight, take a few quick breaths and make a possible draft pass before running it into the next turn.

If you think it sounds easy, it isn’t!  The best way I can describe it is that it would be like foot racing on high wires between buildings in a hurricane while your competition is trying to run across the same high wire at the same time.  We can go four wide on the rooftops, but by the time we get to the next wire, we better have sorted out how we are going to get in line and run across the wire without slipping or knocking each other off. If you have ever seen the weathermen getting blown around in the hurricane winds, that is what it feels like when we sit up out of our tucked position at the end of the straights.”

And that is only one lap!

The action will be fast and furious when Henry Wiles and the entire field of the best professional flat track racers in the world tackle the 25 lap Main event at the AMA Pro Sacramento Mile presented by Miller Lite and brought to you by Greg Padilla Bail Bonds and SDI Insulation.

For more information and to order tickets, go to www.sacramentomile.com

Ticket Prices:                                                          Advance       Youth      Child

Standing Room Only                                                $25              $15           $10

GA Bleacher Seats                                          $30              $15           $10

Grandstand Reserved                                               $52              $32           $27

Box Seats                                                     $67              $47          $42

Turf Club                                                      $87              $67                    $62   

Motion Pro Legends Club                                $77              $57          $52

Day of Event Ticket Sales Increase $10

Tickets include FREE entry to the California State Fair on Race Day.

Jay Jenkins

Enjoying 2 and 4 wheel racing since late 80's. When not computing, I'm scuba diving, photoging, or listening to the blues

Read More on Motorcycle Racing
Volume 2013, Issue 7, Posted 10:11 AM, 07.25.2013