Here's the cause of my problem which brought my weekend to a screeching halt (almost literally) in the first final Sunday. Very few of us suffered through offensive heat Friday to get some practise time in, but the bike ran like a top and I was getting up to speed.
Saturday went well, won the heat races for both classes and was on the pole for both finals. Cut to the sighting lap for the first race and my son claims the PA announcer reports my bike is smoking, but Tyler says the smoke is from the left side of the engine, not exhaust. I'm an engine guy and always take a look on the start line but for whatever reason did not this time. There had to be oil and I didn't see it, nor did the marshalls, but Tyler was on his feet thinking this wasn't good.
I was in second position and in T8 had to countersteer wide but still thought the tires hadn't built up proper heat. It wasn't lack of heat.
The oil cooler split and was pumping oil back on the engine, through the gas tank tunnel and under the seat onto the left side of the rear tire. Two corners later in the esses the rear kicked out and hooked up again for a classic highside. I luckily stayed on it and avoided more disaster. I still didn't realise it was an oil issue and throttled towards the next lefthander....
In all the violence my front caliper pistons retracted and I arrived at the next corner pumping like mad to find brakes but not in time and went off track. Again I kept it upright but actually the lack of brakes saved my ass again because there was a sure crash in my future had I been able to slow enough to tip it into the lefthander.
Talking to Rob (Voxonda) I think there is a solution to bleed off some of the oil volume at the filter adaptor which should reduce the pressure in the cooler. I don't need this kind of excitement again.
It might have been a different outcome, but as they say "that's racing." It's easier cleaning 1,5 litres of oil off the bike (there is no engine damage either) than to repair crash damage. I should have some video on the weekend.