June’s heatwave has seen temperatures topping 30C in many parts of the country. This has caused some roads to melt. With the Met Office predicting that temperatures for July and August could be hotter than average more roads could find that more road surfaces are getting soft and sticky.

Most roads will not begin to soften until they hit a temperature of around 50C. However, even a sunny day in the 20Cs can be enough to generate 50C on the ground as the dark asphalt road surface absorbs a lot of heat and this builds up during the day with the hottest period between noon and 5pm. With temperatures regularly reaching the high 20Cs, the bitumen in some road surfaces may soften and rise to the top. This makes the road surface sticky and more susceptible to pressure loads from heavy vehicles resulting in surface ridging and rutting.

The response from local highway authorities is to send out the gritters to spread granite dust to absorb the soft bitumen and so stabilise the road surface and make it less sticky.

“Drivers may be bemused to see the gritters out in the summer when they are usually spreading grit and salt during the winter”, said Howard Robinson, chief executive of the Road Surface Treatments Association. “However, this is effective standard practice for keeping a road surface safe during extreme prolonged hot temperatures.”

He continued: "Asphalt is a bit like chocolate - it melts and softens when it's hot and goes hard and brittle when it's cold - it doesn't maintain the same strength all year round.”

Following a heatwave in 1995, the road industry introduced a new asphalt specification introducing the use of polymer modified binders in hot rolled asphalt (HRA). These polymers raise the asphalt road surface softening point to around 80C which prevents it from softening under extreme hot weather. Other asphalt products such as thin surface course systems also normally contain polymer modified binders.

However, such modified asphalts tend to be more expensive and are generally only used on heavily-trafficked roads. Robinson estimates that less than 5% of all the UK’s road surfaces contain polymer modified asphalt. On the other hand most surface dressings which are used to seal road surfaces and restore skid resistance nowadays predominantly contain polymer modified binders which will resist softening during periods of hot weather.

“Localised melting of some roads is not surprising during this heatwave but they can be quickly treated and revert back to normal once temperatures decline,” said Robinson.

SOLID RACE FOR SCOTT WHO FINISHES IN THE POINTS WITH FOURTEENTH PLACE, JUST BEHIND HIS TEAMMATE

Both of the Aprilia machines finished in the points in a spectacular race on the Dutch Assen track, the eighth round of the MotoGP Championship It was a race that, as the practice and qualifying days had foreshadowed, was characterised by a spectacular balance, so much that Espargaró and Redding missed the top ten even though they finished only 16 seconds behind the winner, Marquez.

For Aleix it was a disappointment explained by the conservative choice of putting a hard rear tyre on for the race. Off the line well from the third row – earned thanks to a brilliant qualifying session – Aleix was eighth at the end of the first lap, but then he lost five positions due to contact with Zarco. Clawing his way back up to thirteenth place was made difficult by the poor grip conditions his tyres provided throughout the race and he finished in that position, 15.986 seconds behind the leader.

Scott rode his best race yet astride the RS-GP on the historic Dutch track. Starting from the sixth row, Scott was seventeenth at the end of the first lap. Finding a good pace, he moved up through the pack until catching up, and on one occasion overtaking, his teammate. The fourteenth place finish, 16 seconds behind the winner, is a good result that shows the progress the English rider has made in the last two races.

ALEIX ESPARGARO'
"I am not happy. Unfortunately, I made the wrong choice for the rear tyre. My Aprilia worked extremely well throughout the weekend on the soft, even if we were at the limit with wear. Precisely for this reason and after the wear problems at Mugello and the crash in Barcelona, I opted for the hard, thinking that it would be a safer choice. In reality, I did not have grip from the start, so all I could do was simply try to finish the race. A pity because we really worked well in all the sessions and then the worst came right at the decisive moment, where the points are earned."

SCOTT REDDING
"I am happy especially with the consistency I was able to maintain in the race. We made the right tyre choice. After warm up, I considered the hard option on the rear, thinking about duration, but after lapping well with the soft in practice, it was smart to ride the race with that one as well. I had fun, staying close to Pol and Aleix and managing to fend on Pedrosa's attacks. We worked well, calmly and without pressure and the results are clear. It is a small step forward. Now we need to continue in this direction."

This year sees the long-awaited re-launch of the VMCCs Festival of 1000 Bikes at Mallory Park on the 7th/8th July this Year, and with over 75% of available entries already sold there is still time to be part of the action during this fabulous weekend event.

With the support of Footman James Insurance Brokers, Bonhams Auctioneers, Mortons Motorcycle Media, Ricoh, the National Motorcycle Museum it promises to be a weekend to remember.

As in past festival years the event gives enthusiasts the opportunity to ride their own machines in multiple track sessions over the weekend. Catering for all classes of machines from the earliest Veterans through to the machines of the super bike era this is a truly inclusive event which reflects the wide range of interests within the VMCC. With lesser noise restrictions on Sunday the Festival will again allow for riders to display their racing machinery in special track sessions running throughout the day.

It was generally recognised that the VMCC Festival event had the best line up of “Past Masters” and famous machines assembled in the UK for many Years. With the assistance from Stuart Hicken of Mallory Park, The Sammy Miller Museum and the National Motorcycle Museum there will be some great riders and machines to mingle with throughout the weekend.

From the Sammy Miller Museum there will be the 498cc 8-cylinder Moto Guzzi V8 GP racer. It may not have won a race but it remains one of the technological wonders of 1950s Grand Prix racing. Sammy also brings to the festival the multi winning World Championship Gilera 500cc with its 4 cylinder, double overhead cam engine and 4 speed gearbox as raced by the stars of yesteryear such as Geoff Duke and Bob McIntyre who was the first to achieve the 100mph lap of the IOM over 8 laps on a machine such as this one.

With Stuart Hicken’s knowledge and expertise of the motor racing sport and riders, the VMCC list of Stars attending the festival already include John McGuinness, Ian Hutchinson, Trever Nation, John “Moon-eyes” Cooper, Paul Smart, Rex Butcher, Ron Chandler, Tommy Robb, Chris Vincent, Ivan Rhodes and Colin Seeley.

2019 is H-C Travel's Silver Jubilee year - we've been organising tours around the world since 1994!

To celebrate, let us take you to the very soul of American music and along some of the twistiest roads in the world. We've a very special 15 day motorcycle adventure for you 'LIVE' In The Deep South from Nashville to New Orleans.  

We’ll ride America’s most famous stretch of road – the Tail of the Dragon – so good we ride it twice... Along the way is some impressive scenery – the Great Smoky Mountains, Cumberland Falls State Park and the mighty Mississippi River and Delta.

We'll be submersed in blues, country, jazz, bluegrass, R’n’B, rock and roll, rockabilly and all shades in between.

Your guide, Marc Sloan, is looking forward to taking you on this ride down musical memory lane. Here's a quick video intro from Marc

"Father and son on the Isle of Lewis, cliff beach"

- Christopher Mayers