The Latebraker.com blog

I’ve been enjoying learning more about Photoshop CS5 and Lightroom. Through the process of learning, I’ve been experimenting with various photos, using different techniques and effects to create artistic renderings that are unique and visually interesting.

Here are a few that I’ve created recently. As always, click on any of them to enlarge:

Last weekend was Round Five of the Masters of the Mountains championship at Miller Motorsports Park. We were FINALLY on the west track configuration, after having every other round on the east track so far this season (except for round two, which was the perimeter configuration with WERA).

Although I had an incredibly busy week at work, and had little time to even think about racing, let alone prepare for it, I decided to take the Ducati down to the track, as I had to trailer up my Ruckus scooter for photography at the track anyway. Sure, I had pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I was done with racing forever at the last round, but I thought that perhaps being on the west track might reinvigorate my desire to race and win, which had been seriously lacking. I’ve had really good success and lap times on the west track in the past, so I thought maybe I’d suddenly remember how to go fast!

I did a few practice sessions on Saturday, tinkered with suspension settings, and pushed as hard as I could. Unfortunately, the lap times were pathetic compared to my previous best from back in 2008. It didn’t take me long to figure out that the burning desire I used to have wasn’t coming back this particular weekend, if ever. It probably wasn’t helped by the fact that two of my great friends in our racing club both suffered broken collarbones in crashes. Whether it’s changing priorities, fear of the consequences of crashing, just a bike setup issue, or whatever – I’m just not feeling it. Maybe it’ll come back in the future, I just don’t know. Oh well, I was more than happy to focus on the photography instead.

I find the west track to be much more challenging for photography than the east. It’s more of a high-speed, flowing layout, and most of the places a photographer can safely stand, are quite far from the track for safety reasons. As has been the case the last few rounds, we had very warm weather and virtually no clouds – fairly harsh light conditions. I tried some new spots I hadn’t used before, some of which worked great, others not so much. We’re back on the west next round, so I’ll take what I learned and hopefully do even better.

Here are some of my favorites from the weekend:

I went along with Mrs Whip tonight on the dog walk. Since it’s been in the mid-to-upper 90′s lately, she likes to take them to a nearby pond along the river so they can go for a swim. Other than getting attacked by mosquitoes, I enjoyed going along to shoot some pics of them playing in the water.

Joy waiting patiently for someone to throw her bumper

Joy can really jump!

Old man Divot still likes fetching the ball

I liked the splash in this one

A funny thing happened to me on the way to my last race weekend…

On Thursday evening, as I was unloading my trailer at the track, a racing buddy of mine, Dan “Shorty” Short, drove up and mentioned that he was getting married in the Clubhouse facility at the track, on Saturday at 11 AM. I’d seen it mentioned on Facebook, but wasn’t sure I could make it because of the practice and race schedule over the weekend. He asked if it would be possible for me and/or my other racer/photographer buddy Stephen Clark to stop by and maybe take a few wedding photos. I told him I could probably do that, wanting to help him out if I could.

I’d never shot photos at a wedding before, so I was a little nervous about it. It’s not one of those things you can do over. Get it right, or it’s lost forever. Seemed like a big responsibility for a guy with no experience, that didn’t really bring along the right equipment, and certainly didn’t bring the right attire! Shorts, golf shirts and sandals were all I brought with me to the track, as it was pushing 100 degrees all weekend.

On Saturday morning I rode a few practice sessions on my Ducati, keeping an eye on the clock so I wouldn’t be late for the wedding. I took a quick shower and changed into my finest cargo shorts and least-wrinkled golf shirt , put on my sandals, grabbed my camera with 70-200 zoom lens and flash, hopped on the scooter and zipped over to the Clubhouse. The Clubhouse is a nice facility at the track, with a big banquet hall, a restaurant, and a private club – all with great views of the track. The banquet facility poses interesting challenges for a photographer. It has lots of nice natural light streaming in through the windows, but huge black and white photos on the walls of famous race car drivers from history.

I saw a bunch of people going in, most wearing the type of clothing you’d expect at a wedding – men in suits, women in pretty dresses. I ride up on a scooter in my paddock wear, feeling like a complete slob. Still, everyone there including bride and groom couldn’t have been more gracious and appreciative.

I figured I’d just shoot some pics of the ceremony and get back over to the paddock and track for my usual job. I wasn’t completely sure whether to use flash, or just crank up the ISO a bit to avoid red eyes. I also wanted to disrupt the event with flashes as a little as possible. I ultimately wound up using very little flash.

The ceremony was nice, and fairly brief. I shot a bunch of photos from different angles, and some of the happy, newly married couple being embraced by family and friends. Next would be the reception, and that’s when I made my getaway. When I got back over to the paddock to my RV and had a bite of lunch, I found that I’d left the greeting card I bought for the couple in my RV. So, I grabbed my camera and a couple of big lenses, thinking I’d shoot some candid shots around the paddock at lunchtime after I dropped off the card.

I zipped up to the Clubhouse on the scooter, and when I got there, several people including the groom said, “Oh, we’re so glad you came back! We just need a few more photos. We wound up taking hundreds of posed photos of the bride and groom, the wedding party, the groom’s family, the bride’s family, etc. Fortunately, there was a nice lady there, a friend of the bride and groom’s apparently, who gathered people for the photos, and posed them, while I just took the shots. It took a while, but everyone seemed to have a good time, and the photos turned out decent.

Overall, I wound up being pretty pleased with how the photos turned out, especially for my first try at this sort of thing. I really tried to capture the emotion of the event, rather than just documenting the proceedings. Most importantly, the bride and groom seemed pleased with my work, so that’s what really matters I guess. Here are a few of the shots that I took that day:

The wedding ceremony

The happy couple

The groom serenades the bride at the end of the reception

Moments like these would make wedding photography really enjoyable

The groom shares one more surprise with the bride (a painting)

I wound up being very glad they asked me to take some pics!

You can see a full gallery of the wedding photos here: http://www.latebraker.com/galleries/Short_Wedding/.

After deciding not to race the last two rounds in May and June, I thought it might be kind of fun to go racing again this past weekend, for round four of our 2010 season.

I figured that because I was out of practice, I’d even head down to Miller a day early to take advantage of the Friday open trackday. Once again we were on the East track, as we have kind of an odd schedule this year that has us racing on the east course far more frequently than on the other three configurations. I really like the east, but do seem to go comparatively faster on the west for whatever reason. Oh well, this was a chance to get faster on the east!

The weather was hot and dry all three days. I selected the appropriate tires for the event, and signed up for the two twins classes I normally contest on my Ducati 848 (Twins GTO and SuperTwins). I have a friend that was thinking about buying my Honda CBR1000RR so I brought it along for him to test ride, but I didn’t plan to race it.

It felt good to be out on the track. Still, while I knew I’d be a little rusty, it was worse that I thought! My lap times on Friday were pretty awful. In the first session I felt so sluggish that I really just wanted to go home. I just didn’t feel into it. The second session was a lot better, but I still wasn’t feeling very comfortable or confident. I did all the usual things to try to go faster – take better lines, brake later, get on the gas harder at corner exit, carry more corner speed, and so on. I got a little faster, but still was several seconds off my best pace. Several seconds is an eternity in racing!

In the early afternoon sessions I was having some issues with my front brake binding up a bit, and that just made my comfort level drop even further. I was getting passed by guys that I would normally be passing, which was irritating for a competitive sort like me. This can’t happen. Unacceptable. I must go get them, and pass them.

But I didn’t.

I didn’t even try.

Oddly (shockingly!), I didn’t even feel like I wanted or needed to. It just suddenly wasn’t even important to me. Going faster on the track, improving my lap times, pushing myself to keep improving, and beating others out on the track just didn’t seem to be a priority for me any longer, whatsoever. Very odd. I had never had this feeling before, and I felt disloyal to the whole spirit of racing for even thinking such thoughts.

Was this just a temporary phenomenon, brought on by my rustiness, or being distracted by my recent career excitement? I wasn’t sure at that point, but I decided to not bother with the last couple of sessions of the afternoon. I just wasn’t into it at all. I got on the scooter and rode into town (about 7 miles) to buy my buddy a greeting card for his wedding.

Saturday I spent the first couple of sessions on the Honda, just to make sure it was in good shape for possible sale. It was! What a great, fun bike. So easy to go fast on. It made me kind of wish my friend wanted to buy the Ducati instead of the Honda (although I do love the Duc)!

I did one practice session on the 848, and it was okay, but I still couldn’t seem to go anywhere near as fast as I’d hoped. The bike didn’t seem to be turning particularly well, the gearing felt off, although the brakes were much better than Friday. I wanted to make some changes to the gearing and geometry of the bike, but had told my friend I’d take photos at his wedding, so off I went.

Sunday, race day, arrived, and I had just three brief practice sessions in the morning to try to get things back on track. I decided that I was going to try to be as aggressive as possible. If my racing career was coming to an end, I was going to try to go out in style, not with a whimper. In the first session I pushed hard, but the lap times still were very mediocre. I decided to change the ride height in the rear to help the bike turn more quickly. I added about 5mm, and went back out. BIG difference! Much better. I cut over a second from my best time of the weekend to that point (but was still off my best ever for that track by nearly four seconds!).

The first race of the day was Twins GTO, and I was in position three on the front row. If my riding was rusty, my start technique was far, far worse! Usually my starts are excellent, but this was about the worst one ever. The clutch acted really grabby, and the bike lurched forward inconsistently. When I shifted into second, I hit neutral instead, causing even more bikes to go by me. I was so frazzled at that point that I made the mistake of downshifting into turn one – into first gear! Now I had to go really slow as more bikes went by before I could shift again. Off the leaders went, leaving me in the dust. I was disgusted, especially with my son there watching this embarrassing performance from his dad. All I could do now was try to ride my very best to reel the leaders back in. There were four or five of them out ahead of me, and I still hoped to try to get on the podium.

I pushed and pushed to my comfortable limit, lap after lap. And lap after lap, the leaders got further and further away. I couldn’t match their times. I found out later that they were running times that would have required me to be at, or just a little better than, my best east track laps ever, which I hadn’t done for a couple of years. I finished in fourth place, as one of the guys ahead of me ran way off the track into the dirt before rejoining the race, and another guy was racing a bike that wasn’t legal for the class.

Remarkably, my best times in the race, in the previous practice session before the race, and the one before that, were all within seven-one-hundredth of a second of each other. I may be sluggish, but man am I consistent!

I decided not to race SuperTwins, as it was the last race of a long day, and I needed to get home to prepare for a busy work week. I also didn’t expect any miracle improvement to occur that would reignite my racing fire, so I figured why bother?

As I circled the track for my cool-down lap after the race, I wondered if that was my last race ever. I think there’s a good chance it was. I’ve always said that, as much as I love racing, I only want to do it if I can keep improving and stay competitive. In order to do that, the desire for it has to burn within me, as it did the first couple of years that I raced. It just isn’t anymore. I’m okay with that, actually.

I’ve had a great time racing. I won a bunch of races, had some incredible battles with guys who have become great friends. I even won a championship. But I never expected to do it forever. I’ve had other passions in the past (like golf) which took over my life and free time to an extent – and they were awesome. But then I moved on to something else. Right now my passions really seem to be more about the new business we’ve started, and my photography. And I’m quite content with that!

Okay, I won’t say never again. The next round is on the west track. I may bring the bike along just to practice. Probably won’t do any racing, though. I can see myself keeping the Ducati as a fun track bike, and doing track days for fun with my buddies. But I’m feeling quite comfortable with the idea of not racing anymore. And I couldn’t be more grateful for the incredible, thrilling experiences I’ve enjoyed racing motorcycles, and for staying safe through the process.

I hope this isn’t a sign that I’m… maturing! Wouldn’t want that!

Round four of our club racing series was this past weekend at Miller. It was quite warm – 90 plus, and bright and sunny all weekend.

As always, I had a great time hanging out with my many good friends at the track, and had the added bonus of having my eldest son around for the weekend as well.

I wound up taking a couple thousand pics through the weekend (about average for me for a race weekend), and I continue to try to find new locations, angles and techniques, to try and keep the photos fresh and interesting for the racers. They’ve been very complimentary, so it seems they’re pleased with my work, which always makes me very happy!

One very unexpected photo assignment popped up through the weekend. It turned out one of my racer pals was getting married in the Clubhouse facility at the track, and at the last minute he asked me if I would take his wedding photos! I told him I definitely wasn’t a wedding photographer, and had never shot one before, but he didn’t seem to mind. I felt a little odd at a wedding wearing shorts, sandals and a golf shirt, with most others there in actual wedding attire, but it was all I had with me!

I may do a blog post with more about the wedding photo gig soon, but first I have to process all the shots and get them to the happy couple.

It was pretty hot out around the track. For quite a few of the shots I was sitting on the ground on very hot gravel. Sometimes we have to suffer for our art, I guess!

Here are some of the shots from on and around the track over the weekend:

As I’ve said many times, I feel really blessed to live in Idaho. Among many other reasons, it’s a great place to own a motorcycle! There are thousands of miles of spectacularly scenic roads, and from where I live near Boise, I don’t have to travel very far to see some beautiful vistas.

It had been a couple of years since I’d made the trip out to Stanley, Idaho. This weekend I decided to escape the heat we’re experiencing in the valley lately (around 100 degrees), and ride my bike up into the mountains for some cool air, great views, and fragrant surroundings. While Stanley isn’t that far away, I always find myself stopping many times along the way (and way back) to take in the beauty, and snap some photos.

This was my first trip of this length on the Hypermotard. The bike is an absolute blast around town, small enough to flick around and do my hooligan wheelies from time to time, but big enough to be stable. Because of the tiny fuel tank, however, I did some checking on the internet to see how many miles I’d have between gas stations. It barely gets 100 miles to a tank, so I didn’t want to find myself stranded. Fortunately, there were several options during the trip for fuel.

I decided to leave pretty early in the morning to avoid traffic, and the afternoon heat! I left my house around 7:30 AM, wearing riding gear light enough to deal with the heat I knew would show up later in the day. I had a very perforated leather jacket, under which I just wore a golf shirt, along with a pair of jeans, boots, well-ventilated Shoei helmet, and gloves. As I rode up my street in the early morning light, I found it was pretty cool! I wondered what it would be like as I climbed in elevation. Where I live is about 2500 feet above sea level, but Stanley is about 6600 feet.

The sun was just starting to creep over the top of the mountains as I rode between Banks and Garden Valley

I soon found out that it would get pretty cold! By the time I got to Garden Valley (less than an hour from my house), I was shivering! While riding up through the canyons, more often than not I was in the shade, as the sun hadn’t quite climbed high enough to get over the mountains. As I rode along the canyons between Garden Valley and Lowman (which are spectacularly beautiful), I was wondering if I should have worn more layers! I’d wanted to travel light, however, and didn’t really feel like messing with a tank bag or backpack. I just hoped it would warm up soon.

The frequent photo stops helped me keep a little warmer, and allowed my frozen fingers to thaw out a bit to press the shutter. At times I was so cold that my fingers were completely numb, and I shivered so much a couple of times that it actually made the bike shake from side to side!

The Payette River, as it winds along the road between Banks and Garden Valley

Climbing toward Lowman

The roads were remarkably free of traffic, nice and clean, and although I was a bit concerned about wildlife darting out in front of me, all I saw were occasional whistle pigs (ground squirrels) running across the road. Slowly but surely, the sun was rising, and the temperature climbed a bit along with it.

As you get closer to Lowman, there are some deep canyons along the highway

A panorama of a bend in the river just below the road

The Hyper proved itself to be an exceptionally pleasant touring bike! The wind blast wasn’t too bad (I kept it under 80 MPH ), and the DP Performance seat I’ve got on it is much better than the stock plank. The upright riding position made things much more comfortable on my back and wrists than on the trips I’d taken previously on my Honda CBR954RR and Triumph Sprint ST. I wound up being on the bike for around 5 1/2 hours (with a bunch of brief stops along the way), and never really got fatigued.

A roadside viewpoint at Grandjean, Idaho

You can see why I wanted to stop so frequently

I was laying on the ground alongside the highway to shoot these flowers

It would have been easy to make many more stops than I did, as I kept wanting to take more photos of the spectacular beauty along the way. There’s just no way for the camera to take it all in, especially with my little point-and-shoot. I’m sure the cars and motorcycles that went by were wondering what the goofy guy on the side of the road was doing taking pictures of his motorcycle, but I’m used to that by now .

A view of the Sawtooth Mountains approaching Stanley

I love those crooked-rail fences

As I approached Garden Valley on the way home, I couldn’t believe how warm it had become! Remembering my shivering from the morning, I didn’t think I’d be anything but cold on this trip. Nope. It was getting hot! When I finally got home around 1 PM, it was well into the 90′s.

Brief stop along the river on the way home

All in all, a really pleasant ride, and yet another reminder of how naturally beautiful this state of ours is. Makes me want to get a real touring bike, so that instead of turning around in Stanley, I could just keep going, and going…

One of my favorite photo projects over the past year, was putting together a very special book of photos last winter.

I had the great pleasure of working for a very fine construction company for 17 years, with some absolutely amazing people. As a special Christmas gift for the CEO of the company, we decided to put together a “coffee table” book of photos of major projects the company had built throughout the 27 years or so of the company’s history.

Putting the book together was a really wonderful experience. The book also featured photos from company events like picnics and Christmas parties. The title of the book was Interior Systems Inc. – A History of Outstanding People and Projects. The pictures of the projects were impressive, as the company has built many of the area’s biggest and most spectacular projects. But I think my favorite part of the book was the section which showed pictures of the smiling faces of the great team of people I was blessed to work with for those 17 years.

Although I made a career change recently, I’ll always be grateful for the experience I had there, and especially for the outstanding people I worked with along the way. I will always respect and admire them for their hard work and dedication, which was a continual source of inspiration for me.

This past weekend was the third round of the Masters of the Mountains club racing series at Miller.

I had planned to do quite a bit of racing myself over the weekend, as after taking last month off to focus on my photography, I was really ready to get back out on the track on the bikes myself. My son Taylor was planning on coming out to the track to watch me, which would have made it especially fun. I was planning to run two classes on the Ducati – Super Twins and Twins GTO, and two on the Honda – Formula 40 and Amateur GTO.

Unfortunately, the week prior to the race weekend wound up being exceptionally hectic, with lots of new career developments including launching a new business. This meant I had absolutely zero time to focus on racing, or even load my trailer(!), so I had to keep my priorities straight, meaning racing had to take a back seat. I definitely hope to be out on the track again next month; hopefully my work schedule will allow it!

Still, I knew I wanted to travel down to Utah to take the photos for my racing friends and the club. It wound up being a beautiful weekend, with lots of sunshine and highs near 90 each day. It was pretty windy, which made keeping the big lenses still while shooting a real challenge, especially with the 600. I also hated the blowing dust on my gear, particularly when changing lenses out at the edge of the track as I moved between locations.

There seemed to be quite a few less racers than we normally like to see out on the grids, but those that were there really seemed to have a great time. Too many crashes this weekend, however! Thankfully, the injuries to racers, and damage to bikes, didn’t appear to be too serious.

We were on the east track once again. One of the challenges I’ve faced as a photographer out there, is continuing to try and find new locations, angles and techniques, to keep the photos fresh and interesting. It’s not easy, as access around the track is pretty limited. This particular weekend I found a couple of new spots that the club allowed me to shoot from, which helped me to create some fresh new images that the racers really seemed to like.

We also had some out-of-town visitors racing with us – the USGPRU kids (and grown-ups) were there on their two-stroke machines, which is always fun.

Here are some of my favorites from the weekend:

Wow!

I knew last weekend would be fun, and it didn’t disappoint! The World Superbike (WSBK) show came to the USA, to Miller Motorsports Park, which is always my favorite weekend of the year for motorcycle racing and photography. It was combined with some support races being put on by the Utah Sportbike Association – the “Lucas Oil Superbike Challenge,” featuring some of the top privateer racers from around the USA, and many of the guys I regularly race with at Miller in the Masters of the Mountains series, all competing for some very nice prize money.

The weather was quite nice, and got better each day through the three day weekend. The main races were on Monday (Memorial Day). It is always so much fun to watch the WSBK guys race on our home track. These guys are just SO much better than the rest of us, it’s absolutely amazing. It’s like they’re from another planet or something. Even when they haven’t ever been to the track before, they learn it so quickly, and are able to do lap times that are WAY faster than even the fastest guys in our club.

As a photographer, it’s great fun because all the bikes and gear look so clean and bright, with fancy paint schemes and sponsor logos. The racers always tend to look fast in the photos – because they are fast!

All the practice sessions, qualifying, and races through the weekend sure kept me busy with the camera. I always find myself taking thousands and thousands of photos. It means lots of time spent sorting, and trying to find the best ones – but it’s nice to have lots to choose from. I know these guys won’t be back for another year, so I try to take advantage of the opportunity while I can.

Here are some of my favorites from the weekend:

There were 2010 American flags in the infield, to commemorate Memorial Day

The scenery around Miller in May is always breathtaking

The umbrella girls on the grid, a motorcycle racing tradition

The first lap of WSBK race one, through "The Attitudes"

Jason DiSalvo told me he was going to drag elbow through some of the corners, so I told him I'd be sure to get a picture of it! My buddy Tyler did a great job painting his new helmet.

Troy Corser did some magnificent stand-up wheelies

Max Biaggi flying through "Witchcraft" - one of the fastest turns on the circuit

Noriyuki Haga through Witchcraft

First lap of the World Supersport Race, into Blackrock Hairpin

Haga chases Haslam and Camier through the "Release" corner

Carlos Checa had a nice lead in both races - too bad his Ducati wasn't able to finish either one

James Toseland on the Yamaha R1 in "Release"

Leon Haslam on the gas next to Roger Hayden

The End