Graves Motorsports

[burns]

Graves Motorsports Yamaha Truck Stranded On I-5
May 17, 2006

Copyright 2006, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.

The Graves Motorsports Yamaha semi-truck is currently parked on the side of northbound Interstate 5 just past the Fort Tejon rest stop with California Highway Patrol cars in attendance. From the appearance of the trailer, it looks like it caught fire in the area of the left wheel well.

The back of the trailer was open when Roadracingworld.com's Chris Ulrich drove past it just before 8:30 a.m., en-route to Infineon Raceway.

It's unknown at this time whether or not the incident will delay the arrival of the Graves Motorsports machines at Infineon Raceway for this weekend's AMA Nationals.

that sucks....

[Nash]

Should have bought a Honda!

[dumwinnie]

they did (honda brakes. couldn't handle the stress of a handfull of yamahas riding their ass and caught fire)

Im sure one of them has a honda lawnmower..or hey maybe there wives drive a civic :lol:

[burns]

The Graves Motorsports Yamaha road race transporter is expected to arrive at Infineon Raceway Thursday night after a seven-hour drive from Southern California turned into a 36-hour ordeal.

The tractor-trailer rig was going up the steep, mountainous “Grapevine” section of Interstate 5, just north of the Graves raceshop in Van Nuys, California, when the brakes on the rear axles of the trailer began to drag until they overheated and caught on fire.

Evidently, it was quite a blaze, according to Yamaha Team Manager Tom Halverson, and Graves Motorsports Yamaha driver Rob Reveles was unable to extinguish the flames with the fire extinguisher carried on board the truck. A California Highway Patrol officer was behind the track when it caught fire, however, and had a fire truck dispatched to the scene before the Graves truck had even stopped rolling.

In addition to damage to the trailer's tires and brakes, the fire destroyed the air bag suspension system. And because race transporters are relatively unique in the trucking world, replacement air bags had to be shipped in overnight and installed Thursday.

At 3:30 p.m. local time, the Graves truck was preparing to leave a truck repair shop and start driving north to Infineon Raceway, where it is expected to arrive Thursday evening.

Luckily for the Graves Motorsports Yamaha team, AMA Superstock practice doesn’t start until noon on Friday, giving the team time to set up its garage area and get its bikes through technical inspection.

During the ordeal, the Graves Motorsports Yamaha Supermoto race transporter was on standby to shuttle the road race team's bikes and tools from the damaged rig to Infineon Raceway.

[SUM650]

Souds like the Graves team really has there stuff together.

[mandingo]

could you imagine if for some reason they couldn't put the fire out in time??? :eek:

[dumwinnie]

potential of millions in losses (and a few jobs, to boot)

how much race fuel does that thing haul? BOOM!

[burns]

They might get their fuel from the track.