Woody's Blog

What I've been doing lately...

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 06:28:00 +0000

Oh, hello there! Wow, blog, I almost forgot you were here, it's been a while!

lol I've been pretty busy the last few months and updating this thing hasn't been as high on the priority list as it probably should be. Just wanted to make a post about what I was so busy with this summer, so here goes!

I bought a car

(2012 Fiat 500 Abarth)

I had a birthday celebration and cooked chicken marsala and tiramisu for my whole family

The cake should give you an idea where I was going from there..... Paris!

...where I did some reading

From Paris, I went to Italy for the whole month of July!

Went to a Blink182 concert in Lucca:

In Lucca, I rented a Ducati and rode into Tuscany...

and stayed in a big house in the hills of Tuscany for my actual birthday:

After Tuscany, I went to the MotoGP race at Mugello, which was a dream come true...

...however, missing the actual race because my train broke down was less of a dream come true!

Not one to be defeated, I went wine tasting in Tuscany, from Firenze!

After that, I went to Napoli...

and then the unbelievably incredible Island of Capri!

Sadly, July came to an end and I had to return home....
....where I went to the Ducati Panigale Launch in New Orleans, hosted by TTRNO:

Then Daytona to do the Fiat Abarth Track Experience (which was AWESOME)

Then to Miami for the AMA Races (however, I stayed in Key Largo)

Then back to NOLA for the Superbike races

My sister had a baby:

And now I just got back home from the Vintage Festival at Barber Motorsports Park

So, ummm yeah that's about all I can think of (or at least have pictures to prove happened lol). It's been a crazy few months but I think I'm finally settling down for the rest of the year. Still not sure if I'm happy about that or not...

As one parting note, just to give an idea how much I've been gone lately, here is a pic of the hotel keys I've collected. Keep in mind that these are from around March of this year up until now, I don't travel for work, and only one card is from the 6 weeks I spent in Europe. This is why I'm broke... lol.

I must say though, Hilton Honors is the greatest program in the world!

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Fri, 16 Mar 2012 04:23:00 +0000

The Daily Photographicalness is coming along pretty well. Here is a slideshow, you can click on it to view the pictures on flickr.com in full size.

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 21:09:00 +0000

Photography has been an interest of mine for only three or four weeks, now, but it has really become a big part of my life. I need practice like crazy; fortunately, I was asked to shoot a Valentine's Banquet for a small church, last night. To be clear, this is a tiny country church and if I hadn't taken the photos, they probably would have had an old man with a poloroid camera do it. Point is, there definitely wasn't a lot of pressure....

I arrived at the church to find that they wanted the photos taken in a small nook/hallway attached to the room where the event was taking place. This meant constant fluorescent lighting, which isn't generally great for photography. The background they made for the photos consisted of foil paper and hearts; the foil making flash lighting pretty tricky.

This was my first time photographing people so I was still a bit nervous, but the people actually made it a fun time. The youth and the seniors had a ton of fun with it, goofing around and doing funny poses. The relaxed atmosphere helped me out a lot. I'm mostly happy with the photos, though I definitely have a lot to learn about portrait photography. Overall, I'm calling this one a success.

My nook for the evening:

One shot from the night that I really liked:

Trying out a Vlog

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 18:41:00 +0000

Daily Photographicalness

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 08:07:00 +0000

Well, it looks like I have a new hobby/obsession.... I bought a Canon T2i DSLR camera and it didn't take long before I wound up spending a fortune on lenses and some lighting equipment. In order to get some practice, I'm doing a ONE YEAR photo project. One picture every day for an entire year. Yeah, it's pretty crazy, right? I'm on day 10 now and it's already hard some days to come up with an idea.

I'm updating my photos on facebook, flickr, and pinterest. Check out a slideshow of what I've done so far:

Let's build!

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 07:21:00 +0000

In the near future, I will be building my motorcycle shop! WoodyRacing's new digs will be located way out in the boonies (Snell/Causeyville area, about 20min south of Meridian, MS). I've got some big plans for this shop, including a motorcycle dyno! I've always enjoyed dyno tuning and I was pretty good at it a couple years ago, so I'm pretty excited to get started. Because this new venture is so far away from town, I will offer free pick-up/delivery with most services. I will be specializing in motorcycle repair, performance work, and would like to dabble in vintage restoration. I'm hoping to begin within 2 months and be finished by May.

Below: The land I will be building on

The bike that never ends...

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 05:31:00 +0000

Sometimes I think there are some motorcycles out in the world that just don't want to be fixed. They have one minor issue that is relatively simple to fix and as soon as that problem is taken care of a dozen completely unrelated issues crop up to take its place. A friend of mine has a Honda 600RR that fits perfectly into that category. It was due for a service, including valve check so we tore into it and the valves were all within spec so it seemed like an easy job. There were two items I suggested replacing but included the caveat that you can USUALLY reuse them without issue: the valve cover gasket and the exhaust gaskets.

Well as you can probably guess, we put it back together and cranked it up only to discover the header wasn't sealing well so we took it back apart and replaced the exhaust gaskets. Again, we reassembled the bike and got to test riding this time before an oil leak developed around the valve cover gasket. We could have probably put a bit more silicone on the gasket and made it work but my friend and I agreed it was best to go ahead and replace the gasket with a new one and be done with it. I should have known from the beginning to not ignore my instincts, if it had been a customer, I would have pushed for the new gaskets more strongly but because it was a friend, I didn't insist very strongly.

Lesson learned, for sure.

Been a while!

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 06:16:00 +0000

I've been a little slow updating Woody-Racing.com lately, so here goes...

I am still accepting clients, so anyone near Meridian needing a good motorcycle mechanic, don't hesitate to contact me.

The only major bit of news I have is that I will be spending the entire month of July 2012 in Italy. I've got an apartment rented in Bologna for the whole month and am in the process of figuring out how to get a motorcycle to Italy so I'll have something to ride. I'm very excited about getting to spend some time in such a beautiful and iconic country. In preparation for my trip, I have been doing a good bit of Italian (or semi-Italian) cooking and am learning to speak Italian via Rosetta Stone (highly recommend, this software works spectacularly well!).

I have finally sorted out my SV650's electrical gremlins and am doing some preventative maintenance so I will be back out riding again as soon as I have time (that's usually the tricky part lol).

Progress is slow on the XS650 rebuild, primarily because my dad is only wanting to buy some parts at a time to distribute the cost over time. I have gotten the frame powdercoated and will be working on getting the rolling chassis together shortly.

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Sun, 13 Mar 2011 07:25:00 +0000

Well it has been a crazy couple of weeks here at Woody Racing International Headquarters lol. My friend, Brice, bought a house down the road from my apartment and let me move my tools and lift into his garage, so I suddenly have a good place to work on motorcycles! In the short time since we moved my stuff into his garage, I've had a couple new projects come up. I've got a KX125 to rebuild, a little Chinese cruiser that needs carbs rebuilt, I removed the engine from my Ducati 800SS race bike, and I started restoring a 1976 Yamaha XS650 that belongs to my dad. It's been sitting in the back of his shop for YEARS so it's covered in rust and needs to be completely rebuilt from the ground up. Should be fun...

Now that it is riding season, I've found that I have a LOT of stuff that I need to get done ASAP and there just never seems to be enough hours in the day.

For my Meridian, MS area folks, I'm hoping to get a bike night going pretty soon, but I've still got to work out the minor details (you know, like where we're going to do it and when.... okay so I've done NOTHING on that project yet).

On top of all this, I've got a lot of personal stuff going on that has been driving me nuts. I may or may not be moving to Hattiesburg in a few months, totally depending on some other circumstances that I have no control over. So that's just awesome.

Here's hoping I can get some of these bike projects done and work out my other issues pretty quickly...

some pics:

-woody

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 10:00:00 +0000

Since getting my GoPro camera in the mail and playing with it a bit, I've begun to feel very "Directorial." Because the main reason I got the GoPro was to create content for my websites, that is next on the agenda. My next project, or at least the one at the top of my priority list, will be a promo video for MSRiders. I won't give away too much, but so far the script includes a couple gorgeous girls and some on-track video from Barber Motorsports Park. There will probably be a clip or two for Woody-Racing.com thrown into the mix while filming...

I've gotten my YouTube Channel set up, so check that out!

My first onboard video!

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 05:18:00 +0000

Recorded with a GoPro Motorsport Hero HD. I just got this sweet camera in the mail a few days ago, but I've been playing with it nonstop ever since! I've found a few camera angles I like and a few that didn't work quite as well as I wanted... I've got a lot more ideas left so this should keep me entertained for a while! lol Well anyway, check out the video and feel free to comment and let me know what you think!

My Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 11:15:00 +0000

My old Ducati Monster on the bench at Wyotech:

That is one of the few bikes that I really regret selling. I'd just about kill for another one just like it!

-woody

My Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Tue, 08 Feb 2011 08:13:00 +0000

Help! I've got HTML tags burned into my brain! lol I've spent the last week or so buried in web design. It all started with MSRiders needing a new banner photoshopped, which morphed into creating a "home page" for it. While working on that, I realized that woody-racing.com hadn't been updated in over a year, so I decided to rebuild it. Then while working on it, I decided it was time I fix up my dad's business website (southerngasket.com). So far, MSRiders is the only project I've "finished," the other two are still works in progress, but oh well.

I should mention, I am NOT at all trained in web design. I bought a book (Build Your Own Web Site the Right Way) one night a few years ago and built the original woody-racing.com that night. Since then, I've just casually played around with websites. Hint: if anybody wants to see the original site I designed that first night, click here, I'm actually really surprised, it wasn't that bad!

Next on the agenda is to learn javascript, might need a weekend for that one...

-woody

My Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Woody) — Tue, 08 Feb 2011 03:12:00 +0000

Hey folks! My name is Jonathan Woodall, but most people call me Woody. I originally created this website for my racing efforts but I've since branched out quite a bit and am involved in a lot of other things, as well. I own a few other websites, (most are more interesting lol) so don't forget to click the links to the right and check them out!

My biggest long-term project is MSRiders.org, a forum for motorcycle riders in Mississippi. We've grown a bit and are planning a big year in 2011 so stop by the forum and see what we're up to.

I'm also an expert licensed WERA racer and will be doing select races in the Southeast Region in 2011 on a 2007 Ducati 800SS. In addition to racing, I'll be doing as many trackdays as possible with Sportbiketracktime.com.

-woody

My Blog