You Know You’re A RoadRacer’s Girlfriend/Fiancé/Wife When…

1. You can change out a shock in a racebike.
2. You have picked up their leathers and team shirts from their sponsors, and are now wanting custom leathers of your own.
3. You know what DZUS clips are.
4. You know the AMA rules and guidelines for each class and regularly monitor any last minute supplemental regulations.
5. You actually have been an umbrella girl even though you swore you’d never do it.
6. You look down at your filthy, greasy hands and understandably think to yourself, “well at least it’s not anti-seize”.
7. You find yourself thinking of ways to reduce the weight on everything by removing redundant or useless parts, or replacing them with lighter materials, even if it is just your toaster.
8. You can put on and take off tire warmers faster than you can tie your shoe.
9. You know the difference between tensile strength and tear, or bend, strength.
10. You can work a pop rivet gun and can think of a thousand uses for it
11. You know the difference between VP-U4.2 and-VP 113 fuels. But you also know the benefit of using Sunoco 260GTX Racing Gasoline (98 octane unleaded) is that the fuel performance is equal across the board, less cost (but still higher than street gas), and results in less wear on the engine.
12. You have used a stop watch for an alarm clock.
13. You have used a stopwatch to time him taking a shower, mowing the lawn or when changing his oil so he will be more competitive, ergo FASTER. Plus you appreciate the value of 1/10th of a second.
14. Being passed on the inside or outside, rev limiters, redlining, and keeping your line can be applied to any situation in life.
15. You have a ton of credentials from past races since you figured you weren’t going to attend enough to justify buying a ”hard card”. Ooops.
16. You are worse than a soccermom for performance expectations.
17. You know post-race sex is beyond what most human beings can comprehend.
18. You have actually raced shopping carts at the grocery store. Furthermore, the staff at the Daytona Target is actually used to it.
19. When a car comes over into your lane on the highway you react by sticking a knee or an elbow out, even when driving your car.
20. You know the sound of his bike and can tell when he passes, even from the race trailer.
21. You know something is wrong if he takes more than 2 seconds over his average to come into sight when you’re timing laps.
22. If he’s not bleeding or damaged, you’re more pissed about the damage to the bike that you now have to repair.
23. You know that trackfood can be a Godsend, and your demise.
24. You believe that if you double the racetime (doubleheaders), you should double the purse.
25. You think that Barber has the best bathrooms of any track out there. Willow is definitely the worst, although you have seen the port-a-potty in pitlane filled to just under an inch of the seat with urine. Those boys stay hydrated!
26. You know male racers can be cattier than an Orange County sorority house during PMS week.
27. You feel that carbon fiber, duct tape and zipties are the best inventions on the planet
28. Gorilla tape makes excellent fairing repair material as well. Really.
29. You can put up a pop-up tent in less than 60 seconds, and break it down even faster
30. You are on a first name basis with some of the AMA officials
31. You have parted out a brand new streetbike for use on the racebike. Even worse you have actually traded parts off of it with other teams for parts you, or they, don’t have.
32. You think Moe Burgers are tasty.
33. You can live off of coffee, Energy Drinks, and Powerbars and think nothing of it.
34. You can change a rear sprocket, and you’re not too bad at changing front tires either.
35. You have ziptied on bodywork.
36. You can work a pitboard and run split-times simultaneously
37. You’ve mistakenly ruined a windscreen using brake cleaner. And you will never do it again.
38. You have done doughnuts in the parking lot on the pitbike. Especially after a good rain.
39. Blisters are a given at any race event, and Gel Soles don’t work.
40. You don’t even get mad anymore when you step barefoot on metal shavings in the garage. It’s probably from your bike anyway.
41. You’ve stopped riding on the street and leave your race plastics on in the event a track day comes up.
42. You check the average temperature forecast for the track the week before each race. Then brainstorm for alternate ways to reduce engine temperature.
43. You own workboots. And your own Mechanix gloves.
44. You have ridden the racebike back to the garage after a race and could not help but be a throttle jockey the whole way.  And prayed to God you didn’t drop it.

45. You have slept in a race trailer for 3 days straight across the US, without a shower, or a decent meal. And would do it again.
46. You have bought silicone tubing from the aquarium section at a 24 hour Wal-Mart so you could make in-helmet drinking straws. 
47. You have burned your hand endless times on a brake rotor.  But still feel you can do a faster job without gloves.
48. You f*cking HATE carting around a generator on the grid for the tire warmers
49. ”Safety Cars” are bullshit. Bring on the bikes.
50. The first racelap and last 2 minutes of a race seem to be the most unnerving.  In fact you REALLY wish you had not drank that case of Monster before all of this started. 

51. And last but not least…you have chosen Pirelli race compounds over Tiffanys for your birthday!

All in all, it’s worth it!