Well I had my first track session on Monday night with the Grom.
Found myself at the local Karting track,
Swindon Karting the other week poking around about mini motos (but that's another story). The track has recently changed ownership and the guys who run the place now are well into their bikes and are trying to get the interest back up in the area. One of the things they are running is a pit bike night on a Monday so I took the Grom up for them to look over and I got the ok to bring it on.
So I rock up, full leathers, and head out onto the track. Took it fairly easily at the beginning learning the circuit, trying to workout where I should be and what gear works best. But as the night went on I got quicker, smoother, and more into it. So much so by the end I was getting my toes down on most corners and dragging a knee at the top corner with the rear sliding around on the original plastic tyres. I even hit 38mph on the main straight before squealing the front tyre under braking into the hairpin.
I spent most of the lap in first gear but short shifting into 2nd before attacking the top corner would see me briefly in 3rd on the main straight. But with time, practice, and if I wasn't so worried about dropping it I think I could go faster and re-examine the gear selection. Overall the Grom is a great little track bike, turns well but needs more grippy tyres. However compared to a pit bike I don't think its as quick, but that could be due to the rider more than the machine...
Unfortunately I didn't really get any pictures of it. But some of the other riders there on pit bikes who were somewhat confused when they came up behind a bike with a number plate, indicators, and headlight were filming. I spent a lot of the first hour or so moving out of their way but as my confidence grew I was happy to act as traffic for them and they were very polite with me on the corners. So here is a little video of an incident, both riders are ok, small fracture on a hand and the exacerbation of an old leg injury, but that isn't going to stop them. At the end there is a white Grom taking avoiding action, blink and you'll miss it.
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10152743064526221
And apologies, no idea how to embed a Facebook video.