Innholdsfortegnelse for July 2017 i Performance Bikes

HUGE WEIGHT LOSS is the best way to make your bike better. Whatever your skill, whatever you use it for, losing weight will have a pronounced effect on every facet of performance. It’ll go, stop and turn better, be easier to ride, use less fuel. But we’ve said that for years: readers like SP-2 owner Jay Mounteney have practiced what we’ve preached for a while now (see his lightweight Honda on p63). But now the manufacturers are shedding the kilos: Ducati first with the incredible Superleggera (ridden on p21), and BMW with the HP4 Race, coming later this year. Carbon frames, carbon wheels, titanium parts... They’re going all out to make bikes light as well as powerful. Of course, they’re trinkets for the very rich... for now. But the BMW…

McPINT CRASHES OUT Career-threatening crash could see road racing hero out until 2018... at least PB COLUMNIST and TT legend John McGuinness has had to pull out of the TT after a huge accident at the North West 200. The 45-year-old was on a qualifying lap for the NW200’s Superbike race on his Honda Racing Fireblade SP2 when he crashed at Primrose Hill corner. McPint, who was already nursing a broken thumb after a testing crash at Castle Combe, suffered career-threatening injuries in the NW200 crash. A team statement said, “John has a compound fracture to his right lower leg, but it was not possible to plate the leg due to the extent of the injury.” Instead, an external fixator was fitted. “In addition, John suffered four broken vertebrae and…

CHEAP - HANDY - RUBBERY FOLDY FUNZ Made from heat-resistant silicone, these ‘push to fold flat’ sex toys... Er, sorry – filler funnels... are some of the handiest little toolbox gadgets we’ve seen in some time. Suitable for refilling or topping up coolant, engine and gearbox oil, or brake fluid, they’ll prevent you spilling your muck all over your bodywork or engine cases. They’re especially useful for the awkward-angled fillers you’ll find on Ducatis or KTM’s RC8, for example. Whack one in your rucksack and you’ll never have to panic about emergency top-ups again. Price £6.59 Contact www.motogirl.co.uk COCOONING – CARBON - CREATION GIVI 40.5 X-CARBON OK, so Givi may not be the first people you think of when considering a new lid, but the Italian luggage brand makes a…

Don’t give in What am I supposed to do? Last year my Kawasaki ZX-9R was stolen, my Suzuki GSX-R750 was subject to an attempted theft, and this year I wake up to my Honda CBR600F stolen. This time they cut through two disc locks and two chains (along with breaking the steering lock, I presume). 27 years of riding bikes and I am afraid I now have to give up. Happy days to the people who are lucky enough to wake up to a bike in the morning. The thieves have won. I shall still read the mag though... Simon Reid CN: That’s shit Simon, we’re really sorry to hear that. Don’t give up yet: trackers have changed the game for thieves – they’re responsible for a high rate of…

THERE AREN’T many places on a flat-out lap of Donington Park where a bike is upright, so by extension it follows that there aren’t many places where a bike is on full throttle. When you get down to brass tacks, getting the best out of a motorcycle here is about either short bursts of acceleration and deceleration – and the rest is taken with the bike on one of its sides. Using just three gears will get you round the 2.5-mile lap in around 100 seconds, if your name is Michael Rutter. On the day we were testing, conditions were dry but windy, and just about 10 degrees when we datalogged the bikes for this test. We left the tyre pressures on the higher side of what would normally be…

‘He makes me laugh, which is just as well because if I didn’t laugh I’d go nuts. It’s one of the things that keeps us together’ JOHN McGUINNESS is respected for more than ‘just’ his road racing achievements. Although that would be reason enough: 23 wins is tantalisingly close to the record total of his hero, Joey Dunlop. But like Yer Maun, there’s more to him that twisting a throttle tube around the Isle of Man TT. The scruffy little scrote from Morecambe came from nothing, and for a long time was still nothing. But a love of bikes and the road race just a three-hour boat ride from his front door pushed him on, and he emerged as one of the greats. He’s never embraced full superstar status, though:…

‘You can tell there’s a lovely, precise, engaging bike just waiting to be unlocked’ 2003 MV AGUSTA BRUTALE 750 CHRIS NEWBIGGING ONE SUNNY MORNING , I went into the garage to get the GSX-R out and spotted a bit of silver rim peeking from under a cover. I realised my winter once-over plan for the Brutale I bought cheaply had extended into summer with jobs still to do. The usual excuses apply: busy with a six-month-old child, DIY, running a magazine. You know... first world problems. So, in a blatant abuse of my position, I used work time and Whitey’s services to halve the time required to get safety and service jobs done, and finally ride my cut-price exotica. Number one on the list was new rear hub bearings. I…

‘A piece of tarmac must have been thrown up by Seeley’s bike, and went through our rad at 190mph’ 2016 BMW S1000RR ALEC TAGUE IT’S AN UNDERSTATEMENT to say it’s been a busy couple of weeks. After the North West 200, I was up at 4am on Wednesday and 5am Thursday to try and turn everything round for the TT the following Monday. The North West was a great event for us, but we’re a little on the back foot when it comes to TT preparations. The truck got damaged on the ferry out to Belfast, and then as we were packing up to leave the NW200, the Arai Sprinter van reversed into the back door and wrecked that! So, we’ve had to completely empty the truck, get…

‘I planned to keep it stock’ YAMAHA YZF-R1 14B STEPHEN NEWTON I HAVE JUST subscribed to PB to get the latest copy as soon as I can. I enjoy reading the reviews of new and not so new bikes; so much so, I sold my sensible Kawasaki Z800 and got a 2011 Yamaha R1. I first planned to keep it original but, after looking at a few others, I got some Yoshimura R77 end cans which lead to a de-cat pipe, and next week I am getting the ECU remapped. That will then be it as far as modifications go. Well, maybe a set of Robby Moto adjustable yokes, and that’s it. Maybe... Keep up the good work. ‘Easy fix became a full rebuild’ HONDA NSR250 SE MC21 PAUL MONGER…

NOT MANY RIDERS get to win their debut race in the class of kings: not Marc Marquez, not Giacomo Agostini, not Kenny Roberts, not Valentino Rossi. None of these legends even led their first big-bike GP. But Johann Zarco did. On March 26, the Frenchman scorched away from Marquez, Rossi and the rest at Losail, taking more than half a second a lap out of them. Could he do what 500cc rookie Jarno Saarinen did in April 1973 when the Finnish legend made Agostini look like a slow, old man? For a while, Zarco did just that, risking it all on the dewy desert track, front end juddering precariously as he forced his Tech 3 YZR-M1 into the turns. By one-third distance he was 1.6 seconds ahead; a good victory…

‘It goes from sedate to batshit and back again before you know what’s happening’ PERCEPTION IS A funny thing. 18 years down the line, you still see a Hayabusa, and think ‘fast’. And it is. But it’s no longer exceptionally, obscenely fast. It makes 176bhp, does a tested 184mph when the speedoactivated restrictor calls time at 186mph. Any litre bike now offers more power and less weight. They feel explosive, aggressive. Meanwhile, 267kg of Hayabusa does not. By contemporary standards, it actually sounds a bit pony. But it isn’t. After all these years, leaving my 2017 GSX-R in the PB shed and rolling away on this end-of-the-line (probably – it’s not Euro 4 compliant, and it sounds like the last few bikes will be sold without an imminent replacement) ‘Hayabusa…

‘Hopefully, it reflects PB readers’ best ideas. After all, I have stolen them!’ THERE IS A saying that you should always practice what you preach. OK, it is meant to be more about doing good things, but in the case of my garage it applies quite literally. For the last three years, I have been writing PB’s 360-degree garage features and after doing 36 of them I’ve picked up quite a lot of tips, most of which I have incorporated into my own single garage which you now see in front of you. And for me, that has always been what the 360-degree feature has been about – sharing ideas and tips on getting the most from your own garage. Like a knitting circle, but more oily. When we visit…

STABILITY PB found that worn tyres have quite a marked effect on the S1000R’s stability, with a square-off rear causing the front to wag. Reducing the sag on the rear seems to help matters, and for an 85kg rider we found 18mm instead of the recommended 20-24mm works best. EXHAUSTS BMW’s chosen exhaust supplier is Akrapovic,but an HP full titanium system costs an eye-watering £2500. It may be 5.7kgighter than stock, but that’s still quite a sting and there are far cheaper options out there. PB gained only 1.8bhp and 1.3lb.ft in peak values, but the ride was transformed and the midrange vastly improved. SPORT MODEL The standard bike comes with two riding modes (Rain and Road) and a basic traction control system called ASC. The Sport model adds Dynamic…

‘I refitted the pad pin and tightened it. The resistance went, and fluid covered my hand’ 2008 HONDA FIREBLADE CHRIS NEWBIGGING I’M NOT RELIGIOUS, but one Wednesday afternoon in the garage, I had to concede some greater power didn’t want me to be at Anglesey the following day thrashing our RR8 Blade. The invite came on the Monday: want to help out with instruction on a charity trackday? Yes, said Johnny and I. He was going to take his Fireblade, and I’d take ours, with the view to swapping around a bit to help inspire his planned mods and changes in the pursuit of the sort of speed we’d hope it would deliver in the first place. We’ve just fitted the old one with some of Dunlop’s new…

‘It’s possible that fitting a 55-section rear tyre has confused the electronics’ 2017 HONDA FIREBLADE JOHN McAVOY LAST MONTH, Honda’s updated Fireblade got a tepid reception from pretty much everyone on PB. It underperformed on track against its peers and also its predecessor. As well as the stopwatch results being underwhelming, the feedback from myself, Rutter, Chris and Whitey was generally less than complimentary, specifically regarding the bike’s inconsistent throttle behaviour, and the intervention of its electronic rider aids. The laptime results are one thing, but the feedback from people who are always on the money, and whose opinions I genuinely value and respect (but don’t always agree with) was the most striking thing for me, in so much as it was unanimous and consistent. There’s something fishy going on…

LIFE ISN’T FAIR . You make your living riding motorcycles at 200 miles an hour; then tragedy befalls you at 20 miles an hour. No one deserves that, certainly not Nicky Hayden, the good guy of the MotoGP paddock. Think of all those years that the American raced at the sharp end, all those years when Valentino Rossi, Max Biaggi, Casey Stoner, Jorge Lorenzo and Marc Marquez were falling out with each other. Nicky cruised through it all, racing as hard as he knew how, often on below-par machinery, and he never fell out with anyone; at least not once he had got back to his motorhome, taken a few deep breaths and calmed down. Nicky stood out from the rest. He came from a family of five kids which…

2010 MV AGUSTA F4 312RR ALLAN MCKEE I’VE HAD MY F4 312RR for seven years now, and I started to modify it after just a year of ownership. It has a Microtec ECU with custom map, a different steering tube to steepen the rake, different swingarm plates to alter the rate at the rear and I had the exhaust de-catted. It now has a titanium Bodis exhaust, a performance air filter, Öhlins rear shock, Öhlins/ Andreani front cartridges, Pirelli Rosso Corsa tyres with a flatter 50 profile at the rear, an F4 CC seat, a gear position indicator built into the dash, and some paintwork. I’ve not tweaked the map to suit the Bodis yet, so it’s quite rich, but still makes a true 177bhp and monster torque from 6000-11,000rpm.…

2017 DUCATI 1299 SUPERLEGGERA ALAN CATHCART IT’S BECOME A bit of a cliché to call something a mechanical work of art – but if ever a motorcycle deserved that accolade, it’s the Ducati 1299 Superleggera. Dripping in carbon-fibre, replete with titanium, flaunting technological innovation found on nothing else with two wheels and a motor, clothed in bodywork of stunning beauty, this latest testament to Ducati’s ability to combine exquisite looks with stellar performance was launched at the 2016 Milan Show as a limited-edition model of which just 500 examples will be built. And all of them are spoken for, by owners who managed to find the £72k asking price. With the imminent launch of Ducati’s first V4 superbike, this is the last of the line of the Italian firm’s series…

YAMAHA MT-10 SP 154.16bhp • 210.4kg • £13,999 New Yamaha attempts to justify its ‘SP’ tag with semi-active Öhlins suspension, and pretty blue wheels. DUCATI MONSTER 1200S 137.03bhp • 214.4kg • £14,295 Down on power compared to the other two, but undeniably high on style. What more would you expect from Ducati? MICHAEL RUTTER Winner of four TTs, eight Macau GPs and 28 BSB races The UK’s fastest road tester knows what works on track. JOHN McAVOY 44, 6ft 4in, fast road rider Big Johnny Mac is rapid on road and track. When he shuts his eyes, he sees data traces... KTM 1290 SUPER DUKE R 170.89bhp • 215.2kg • £14,749 Massive power for a naked, and more than 100lb.ft of torque. But how controllable is it when ridden on…

I’VE NEVER REALLY seen eye-to-eye with the MT-10, and where the SP left Chris feeling a bit “What’s the point?” at its press launch, the quality suspension elevates it to a more refined, consistent level that – for me – is what is missing from the base model on track. I rode the Monster 1200S at its launch in the middle of winter, and reported that I felt while I didn’t get to thoroughly stretch its legs, I did feel enough to believe it was a class act, and it didn’t disappoint. I could have ridden it on track until the tank ran dry. However, it is the KTM that for me totally nails the supernaked brief. Bespoke, lairy, fun, different and very capable. It’s the sort of bike that…

‘I start dropping my shoulder more into turns, spending less time in corners and apexing later’ 2015 APRILIA TUONO 1100 V4 FACTORY KAR LEE I’M TOO OLD and too busy to ride to foreign trackdays, so these days I opt to ship my bike out to Spain. Donington Park is my nearest drop-off point, where I leave my Tuono 1100 Factory on a stillage and secure it with tie-downs. I also pack tools, spare tyres, warmers, foldable chairs, leathers and lid. The whole lot is covered in blankets before being wrapped in clear film. While the Aprilia is en route to the circuit via articulated lorry, I fly out a week later with my mate Jason, leaving behind cloudy skies and rain for sunshine and lean angles. Hire…

‘Its crisp power delivery is close to the sensation of a finely-tuned two-stroke’ 2017 SUZUKI GSX-R1000R CHRIS NEWBIGGING I’VE FINALLY GOT my own GSX-R that I’ll be keeping for the year. Sadly, it is pre-abused, owing to the short supply of this fancier R-model. So it had already covered 1600 miles, largely in the hands of other media types, before Suzuki were able to let us have it. I’m not sure who it was, but there’s every suggestion they were at the cretinous, abusive end of the journalistic spectrum: corroded brake hose fittings, water pump housing and chain/sprockets suggest it has been exposed to wet and filth and not cleaned. Thanks, bastards. Although such deterioration on a bike registered for just a matter of weeks is pretty poor, no matter…

The last affordable two-stroke sportsbike 250 SMOKERS ARE classics now: prices are up, parts are increasingly scarce, and thrashing the conkers off one invokes a pang of guilt as you realise you’re slowly depleting a finite reserve of bikes and parts. Aprilia’s RS125 is bit different: too new to be a classic, and only five short years out of production (after a 20-year run in various forms) means parts are plentiful new, used and aftermarket, and prices are still sensible. If you want a two-stroke to constantly stretch the wire on, it’s worth a serious look. For all the teenager ‘dus 115mph mate, powabans in every gear’ bullshit, the last time I saw one datalogged by PB tester Bruce Dunn, it did a true 99mph. Ditch the mirrors or fit…