Nicholas Bailey (Rider)

This is a photo booth 'passport' type pic of me, I got it taken for my Ski pass for a skiing/snowboarding trip in Feb 03, bearing in mind I was about to go on holiday I should have looked a lot happier!!! :oD

Profile:-

	DOB: 19 July 1974
	Height: 5'10"
	Weight: <coughs> ... trying to summin about that ... but currently fluctuating around the 13st mark. I was at nearly 14 and am trying to get down to mid-low 12s to get me a bit more competitive against the <=10stone race whippets!! ~12st will be ok for me as I would look like a 'Skelitor' at 10 stone!!
	Marital Status: Single, therefore luckily no kids to Orphan
	Lives: near Portsmouth, Hampshire
	Hobbies: Riding Motorbikes, Racing Motorbikes, oh and Fixing Motorbikes ... can't say a lot else Hobby wise really grabs me at the moment, just as well really as it takes ALL my funds!!!
	Occupation: Notice I put Hobbies before Occupation!! ... well I have to admit that is the way it is with me, I work to live not live to work! On leaving Uni for my first proper job I joined a military research company as a scientist, no not the type that injects fluffy bunnies with deadly viruses (although the company does have a bio-chemical department) but the sort that develops computer systems (for military use). I have stayed with the company since then for some 8 odd years now. My current project is developing an artificial intelligence based system for the Royal Navy, I know it is a cliché, but I really can't tell you any more than that!! No I am not James bond, just don't go there I have heard all that tosh already!!! ;o)

Biking History:-

Well I straddled my first bike when I was about 12. I road round a mates field all, and every! weekend on some old bit of junk (CB125J) my uncle Mark had given me as a birthday/Christmas/birthday (yes he counted it as a few gifts ... ) present. Probably the koolest gift I ever had mind and started my passion for bikes. At 16 I wanted a bike for the road, my parents said if I got a bike I would be kicked out of the house. However I had saved years of my paper round money, with a view to buying a bike. I had saved enough that I could buy, tax, MOT and insure the bike all out of my own pocket, therefore didn't rely on them at all financially for it, so called their bluff and bought a 1986 TS50X (this was in 1990). As I had dreamed of having a bike on the road for so long and worked so hard for it I cherished that thing!

When I was 18 I built a Honda MBX80. When I say built, it was from a box of bits. The previous owner (a mate) had continually blown the thing up and decided to strip the whole thing down including the chassis??... hummm ... strip and put into boxed he did do well, but re-assembly .... never got round to that bit did you Jamie!!! Still, due to this it only cost me £60. I spent many an hour in my dads garage rebuilding this thing, the only bit I had to splash out on was a new 'bottom end' from a breakers, the rest just took time/TLC. Took it for an MOT, it passed with flying colours, neat! Sold the TS50X and rode the MBX on L's for a couple of years.

All this time I dreamed of having a 'proper' bike, stopping at and drooling down shop windows looking at the then newly released Fireblade with passion. But still being a student that simply wasn't going to happen, so I kept dreaming and drooling!! At 20 I decided it was about time I did my test, I wasn't in the position to get a bike, but thought I would get the test out of the way before any new nasty laws came in that made getting a license more difficult (and expensive) and at least if I had a license then come the time when I got a 'proper' bike it is one less thing to worry about.

About 2 months after passing my test, my license was burning a hole in my pocket ... coincidently my Uni roommates brother was flogging his ZZR600, it had done a few miles, but it was only 4 years old and he was letting it go for 2 grand. I had to have it, ok so not a Fireblade, but my first 'proper' bike, and in 'the book' it was the fastest (straight-line) 600 with a healthy (for thetime) 100 neddies under the tank standard. I was now about to get my first taste of the exhilarating performance I had read so much about. My mates brother lived in Essex and my parents lived in Cambridge, so my first ride on the thing was round the M25!!! I kept it to 70 mainly out of respect for the bike and the law (didn't want to get nabbed on my first day!!). On the odd occasion I would drop back to ~50 then pin the throttle open (in top or 5th) to see how it went ... I was so disappointed! it didn't rip my arms off, I was thinking to myself what a crock this 'power' thing is, it wasn't pulling any harder than my MBX used to (at lower speeds obviously). When I got to within 20 miles of home I got off the boring motorway and took to my well trodden 'back-road' route. I can still remember what happened next so vividly, even though it was almost a decade ago!! ...

Now although I had tried a bit of a top gear roll-on between 50-70 I hadn't used any of the revs, never really going over 7k, however I thought that was still fair swinging (redline was at 14k odd) and should be producing a good portion of the total power available. However now with a clear road and away from the polices eye I decided to 'see what she has really got' i.e. take it all the way to the redline! Selected 2nd as I didn't want to flip it, still with respect of the power and that it may bukerroo me?? ... I leant right forward and pinned the throttle open ... 4k ... 5k ... 6k ... 7k ... ok so it was pulling but nuffin spectacular ... 8k .... 8.5k .... ohhhhh F***!!! ..... things went blurred at 9k and I hooked another gear real quick as the revs raced to ~12k I totally had tunnel vision, bricked it and shut the throttle ... WOW!!! At that point I realised what all the hype was about and said (well shouted) to myself in my lid "how the hell am I ever going to tame this thing???? 'kin hell it is a beast!!!". ... Amazing, from that day on I was addicted!!!

Rode the ZZR for about 2 years then had to sell it as I was moving, bought myself a CB100N as it was cheap to run etc. Although obviously totally gutless compared I really enjoyed not riding by the seat of my pants and looking out for the police every time I went out. This little bike did me proud for the next couple of years, then my uncle gave me a GT185 that needed restoration, I got it roadworth and I sold the CB and rode the GT. Another year or so passed and my 25th birthday came round. I had been saving as hard as I could (and it was hard to do!) since I sold the ZZR and had accumulated a reasonable sum, being 25 and with a few years NCD now, I realised that the insurance might be within reach too.

I totally wanted a R1 now, the Fireblade with its model developments had since been 'tamed down' and lost its 'edge', and therefore for me its place in the reckoning. But my piggy bank simply wouldn't stretch far enough for an R1! So after speaking to my good mate Graham, he convinced me that I should lower my sights and be looking at its baby brother, as it was an animal in its own right, namely the recently newly released Yamaha R6. At the time I saw it as a step down from the R1, but funds were funds! I loved the blue they did the R1 in and therefore if I was to have an R6 it would have to be a blue one!!! As the R6 was so new out and the blue was the most popular colour, they were like 'rocking horse sh**' to get hold of, but I found a little family dealer that had one. I went along and took his demo out for a ride. Now I hadn't been on a 'proper' bike for a few years now, so I was respectful of it so treated it pretty gentle; However after about 3 minutes of riding the R6 I turned back and said 'Where do I sign?’ The bike sold itself, extremely agile, blisteringly fast, but you need to keep it in the sweat spot to really go, just like the 2-stroke mentality I so loved, GREAT!!!!!!

Treasured this bike, it looked so good, I had owned it from new and again, it had taken every penny I had. I had effectively been saving cumulatively for over 10 years for it by now too (some of the money was essentially back from the sale of the TS50X, through the ZZR etc to that day, (that portion of the money was all banked and re-cycled)). This thing did scare me to ride though, just like the ZZR did!! What a beast!!!

I secretly thought I was getting pretty quick on the roadnow, but had no real frame of reference, so wasn't sure. I had never really though about racing, in fact when I spectated at my first race meet (coincidently a BEMSEE meet) in 2000 I though 'these guys are bonkers, there is no way I could/would do that!'. I had however done a trackday on an old RD250B I had restored (using the term 'restore' loosely) and had great fun. So took the R6 along to a trackday to see how I got on, the track was calling ... and here the Miers racing story began see homepage ...