definition of sweet

to overtake heaps of bigger bore bikes, including R6s, GSXR750, GSXR1000,
Firestorms, what have you, on a bloody CBR250RR on a Phillip Island ride
day.

It was the slow group, but well that's where they said my 250 belonged.

Got down to 2:05s, possibly lower.

A fantastic day, in spite of the 36c(?) degrees at the track.

Now need a better bike as I got confirmation that the suspension really
isn't suited - at _all_ - for my 85ish KGs; way too soft and mushy, I was
probably starting to push its capabilities a fair bit now. $1200 for a
rebuild goes much better towards a 2001 R6 or GSXR600.

Cheers,
Jørgen
// no longer intact kneesliders ...or footpegs, for that matter.

 

Congrats J[funny O]rgen.
If you really did 2:05 that's SENSATIONAL for a 4 stroke 250.

I overtook a Ducati 851 (916s weren't invented then) around the outside
through Southern Loop on my first ride-day at PI and I crowed about it for
[checks watch] 9-years-and-counting!!
Isn't it heaven?
I just love the kink, the hayshed, Lukey Heights, MG......
How'd you go through the last double-corner before the straight?
I ALWAYS forgot to short-shift and ran out of revs coming on to the
straight.
It wasn't so bad on the Trump where I just hit the rev-limiter and
pop-pop-popped but I'm sure I saw 12000 on the 9000-redlined XJ900!!
(It still made the trip back to Queensland the next day without complaint
though!)

 

Finally, a legitimate challenger to Rossi.

Kimbo

 

Finally, a legitimate challenger to Doug Polen.

Kimbo

 

Bitter: Watching Jeanette ride away to work with the new bike, leaving me with the car.

Sweet: Seeing her arse mounted on a Fireblade.

;-)

 

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

 

Yep, I reckon it's pretty definite. Someone I chatted to was doing timings
for friends and she offered do a few timings for me. She had me in at
2:10... 2:15s - a 2:30 (yellow flag), this in my third session. However they
weren't my best laps I think, and some had a bit of traffic I needed to get
around.

Towards the end of the day one of her friends - or her partner I think -
came up and said I was smoking the bigger bikes and he was impressed with
the 250 being able to do that. Some discussion re the 2:10 ensued between
the two; he had me at at least a 2:05 because that's what he had timed his
mate on the the track at - I had gotten up ahead of him and he had not been
able to close the distance. Another dude (a German on a very sweet
black/silver R6'03 in green/medium group) had also been watching and checked
me at the 2:05s. So I'll just put 2:05 on paper for this one.

In the very last session I was going to take it slow [half the group had
pissed off by now, it was very hot and exhausting] but I felt like I really
had the flow with me and just ended up going way fast being more relaxed ..
but unfortunately no timings for that one. That's where I felt I could have
been even faster, but that could be wishful dehydrated thinking so not going
to put too much into that thought.

NFS!!! I think I'll remember this as the best day I ever had on my 250.

I had a sweet spot for Honda corner. Was able to set up for and enter that
at seemingly much higher speeds than the other guys. The same for #10 I
think.

One of my favourite moments was a high powered & expensive bike I had been
closing in on for about a lap that I was able to overtake in #11. He pissed
by me again on Gardner straight with a speed that made my indicated 190 seem
like standing still, but then he must have lost all the confidence of that
straight run coming into turn one - probably braking related. With my
clearly inferiour suspension etc I braked way later (all I really needed to
do was untuck - my body as air brake is quite good) and carried about 20-30
Ks more cornering speed ... so he was behind me coming into turn 2 and
didn't see him again.

As bad as my suspension is, the GPR70 tyres were really phenomenal. Pretty
expensive in that it seems that I'll only be able to do one more track day
on them having just used them for 2 track days and one GOR ride so far, but
boy do they stick to the road. I guess the confidence they gave me helped me
a fair bit yesterday. I also knew the track was hot and that I could push it
harder than last time. After I started to scrape off pegs I asked one of the
quick R6 riders on how to do the hanging off thing and he taught me how to
do it on the bike parked. After that, getting the knee down and feeling my
way throught the corners it was a much better riding experience altogether.

Hehe... Happened __quite__ a bit to me too! Gave me the feeling of being
stuck in traffic or something, all I could do was to keep the high revs
constant and wait for turn exit...

I found how to do it properly though. It all depended on my ability to
downshit properly for the tight right hander (#10), then remembering to
upshift once before the penultimate turn (#11), and as soon as I got some
clearance upshift again towards a wide corner entry and then an early but
strategic upshift before setting up for the turn (#11). I could then just
floor it and come out of it at 18000 RPMs well in time for upshifts.

Cool. My rev limiter is supposedly at 19K rpm but I tried to avoid hitting
that - not much there anyway, except for overrev out of the last two
corners. Had already done some dehydration based errors like downshifting
out of lukey instead of upshifting so probably good to keep just a little
bit of reserve on tap.

Now I look forward to getting an R6 so that I can ride in the medium groups
with the better guys. I expect to be properly humiliated and put back into
my place then. Until then, I'm one happy chappy 250 rider.

Cheers,
Jørgen

 

Bah. All this talk of Phillip Island... You're trying to make me regret
selling the R6, aren't ya!!?


--
Cheers,
Jules

 

$1200 for a suspension rebuild?!!!? You must have the world's only BabyBlade
fitted with 8 forklegs and 5 rear shocks...

 

This was a rough quote by a representative of
http://www.suspensionsrus.com.au/ who attended the event.

Have you got any better suggestions? I'm all ears - I've basically decided
I'm not going on the track again with the present shocks.

I'm 85-ish KGs (plus gear), the current shocks quite "there's nothing there"
kind of mushy.

j

 

That's about what I was quoted to set up the TRX by the mob out at Wallacia
about 2 years ago

JL

 

Hang on Dale.... if you were watching Kitty ride away from you, you
*wouldn't* see kitty arse with the rear seat cowl on - the Helmet
mebbe...

Johno

 

This reminds me of one of my fav movie quotes: "I hate to say goodbye, but I
love to watch you leave".

I'll leave which film as a challenge to the audience.

Cheers,
j

 

I'm sorry, I forgot to add the disclaimer.

"Mellowed out riders who've transitioned from high performance, ultra agile
sportsbikes to more comfortable, docile vehicles may not want to read this."


Cheers,
Jørgen
// noting that you should have sold the R6 a bit later, to me.

 

Actually after seeing the gut on dale I don't think he can even see his
helmet.
(I'm in big trouble now with a very angry cat I reckon)

 

This reminds me of one of my fav movie quotes: "I hate to say goodbye, but I

Google tells me it is faceoff. ive got the vcd here somewhere too i think.
there's also a reggae song called "never ready" that has that line in it too

Mike.S

 

Yep! It was Travolta.

Loved that one.

Cheers,
j

 

I rather the movie line "My face is leaving in 5 minutes.....be on it!!"

cant remember the movie...really bad teen flick I think


MH

 

Well, springs (~$150), Gold Valves (~$120) and tailored shim stacks ($bugger
all) cost a pair of mates (R1 and TL-R), from memory, ~$350 each (makes
sense; shim stacks, new oil and about an hour's labour would come out to
$90-ish). This was through Terry Hay.

Similarly, for R1's, EC M/C Wreckers used to to stock rear shocks rebuilt to
"Formula Xtreme spec" (cringe), with a new spring, valving and lenghtened
damper rod (more rear ride height), for $400 exchange, meaning getting the
work done yourself would probably not come out to much more than $350,
again.

That's ~$700, leaving almost $500 still unaccounted for. Hell, even if I
remember wrong, and those forks cost $450 to do, and ECMCW sold those shocks
for $400 thanks to some volume deal, and it indeed cost $450 to get a shock
done yourself (that, I'm pretty sure, it wouldn't; I remember that much from
the time I did the rounds on the phone on that very subject), that still
leaves a gap of $300 to what you guys were quoted...

As for Jorgen's quandary, I might be onto something... watch this space.

 

OK, Terry Hays Shock treatment was indeed the guy I was thinking of, and the
quote was 7-800 for goldvalving, springs and setting up the front. Redoing the
rear shock was about $4-500. At the time I decided the back was OK and the front
was where the attention was needed. didn't quite get around to getting it done
though. Gold valves at the time were circa 250 though.

Rubbery logic I think - $400 gets you a rebuilt shock to an arbitary spec,
besides which you really should look at getting the right spring rate for your
weight if you're going to do the thing properly. The extra effort (5 mins
looking up a table probably, but you'll be charged an hour for it) will cost
more not less than a production line of rebuilt shocks will. Either way 4or500
will get you the rebuilt shock and inserted.

<shrug> YMMV.

JL