New Bike GSXR K5, from old Fazer

Just got my new bike, GSXR 1000 K6 Blue.

I'm not an confident high speed cornering rider, previous was a FZS
600 with a fair amount of mileage mixed commuting and touring and
knackered suspension. Recently I had the money, good insurance quote
for 28 years old "and no girlfriend".Not much use for reviewing it
from a performance standpoint so posting this as a point of view :-?
how it felt to go from a fairly slow 600 to an K5/R1 liter type bike.
Suprisingly few reports of this happening.

Picked it up from the dealer, £5999 and tried to start it without
realising the clutch has to be pulled in. Managed a nice tight "feet
up" turn in the road, mainly because the power is always pulsing
through so easily, adjusted the mirrors, shifted around the seat.
Stopped after a mile, had a fag, feeling slightly unreal, as if I had
bought one of those flying bikes from Star Wars. Especially how easy
it felt to ride from my viewpoint. No buyers remorse I usually get
with big ticket items.

So far so good, first hour hopping around the gear box in low revs the
exhaust sounds amazingly sexy/fruity, still scared, go and fill up
with fuel. Next a bit more confidence and some speed on the motorway
on the way back from buying it, the steering is so precise and
different to what I'm used to perhaps in part to the damper. Waited
for big gaps to appear then tried out different gears and throttle
without other traffic. The seating is fine for me @ 6ft3 , really
comfortable although my head seems a bit far forward when ducking down
pretending to be a racer which is somehow wrong to do on this bike.
Tyres were not new but plently of tread. Very stange to hear this
exhaust and know the power available yet see diesel astras pulling
away at the lights, somehow I don't care and have nothing to prove,
just smiling.


Going fast i came to a corner and it actually requires you to
positively/confidently steer/countersteer and keep the speed up, I
guess you only learn that once it was slightly unnerving, it feels to
me like "going round without it being a corner" or probably "on rails"
as the magazines review said. It's odd having to be so confident in my
actions. Also the suspension is perfect it tries to push down into the
road instead of bouncing me up, my old rear shock probably went a long
time ago. The speedo is very optimistic judging from traffic and
testing behind a speed limited 56 lorry and 75mph is about 85.

Brakes seem great to me and coming up to an amber only slightly too
fast, stopped in half the distance I was used to, so ended up distant
from the line. Biggest danger so far is slow seems relaxed and twice
the speed feels even more relaxed, and I'm a "****" obviously.
Filtering is just as easy as before. The huge range of power available
just makes it so easy to glide along/

I tried out 3rd and some revs which gave me a huge grin, instead of
opening the throttle until the revs reach the powerband, I have to
learn what revs I want and throttle position and then go for it,
otherwise ended up doing stupid speeds because as I nervously applied
the throttle with the high gearing it was calmly accelerating away
instead of the big grin rush of straight line speed. I think it does
90 in first.


So hopefully I won't die, have had to buy leathers to go on a track
day costing me even more money than I thought. For me it's as if a
childhood dream has come true plus the bike looks great compared to
photos and the stupidity and huge power it represents and contains
make me happy. Turning the key and seeing the dial sweep and hearing
the fuel pump? still makes me smile a month later.

One thing I won't be doing is fitting a louder exhaust because being
apart from being woken up by the twat with a golf gti and no exhaust
every morning, it sounds great and I don't need any more power.

 

Give it time.

 

Speak for yourself, I don't give a **** if he dies.

 

Though he does have very good taste in bikes.

--

 

Quite a nice, honest write up too.

 

and TBF I'm sitting here waiting to bid on the Salvage

 

When I was searching through Ebay, MCN, autotrader et all for K5/6
there were several cheap ones which turned out to be accident damaged
or Cat D/C? repairs and streetfighter conversions. Honestly didn't
occour to me they were probably the result of the rider. Just thought
a popular bike so lots of second hand sales.

Bid on a K6 with 20K (mine has 4K) and a couple of dents to the tank
for £5,100 (winner was £5,200), the others were >£6,500 with ohlins
shocks, TRE etc and very low mileage, assuming they were raced I
didn't go for it but probably one of them was a good deal.