The one bright spot might be that the world renowned Peoria TT sits just above the horizon, and it appears that tuning genius Kenny Tolbert and the ever improving 40-year-old rider on his team (who is, by the way, a seven-time Champion) are ready to win their 14th Peoria TT.
"I got an average start in the main event, I think I was in second or third behind J.R. Schnabel early and following him, and about lap seven, we got a red flag for a couple of guys going down.
"On the restart, Schnabel maintained his position, (Jared) Mees ran up the inside of me going into turn one, and kind of had me pinned to the outside, so I just rolled around the outside and was able to get around Schnabel through the tight left leading into the right-hander. So I had the lead and was running pretty comfortable out front for a couple of laps. I got the halfway flag coming out of that same tight left, and Schnabel had basically hit my rear wheel. I don't believe it was intentional, it was one of those racing things, but, when he hit the tire, it just put enough torque on it that the chain just came right off.
"I was pretty much done. I stopped to try and put the chain back on, but it packed about four layers of it up around the countershaft, so it was a futile effort. It was pretty tight, my race was done.
"So it was over. Last place. First to last in one corner.
"It has been tough. When things have been good, we're on our game, something happens. We'll continue to work hard, and we're gonna get a win here pretty soon. All this hard work's not going to go for nothing, that's for darn sure."