#WSBK Testing at Philip Island Circuit

Check out my latest write up on the World Superbikes testing at the Philip Island Circuit in Australia ahead of the start of the season this coming weekend. 

Toprak Razgatlioglu was top of the charts at the end of Day 1 of testing but finished down in 7th at the end of day two whilst Jonathan Rea end the second day of testing at the top.

This season is set to be an exciting one!

The Pit Crew Online 2020 WSBK Philip Island Testing

A grand day out at the Bike Show

What a great day out! What’s not to love – bikes. Classic bikes, new bikes, old British bikes, gorgeous looking bikes, a few ‘Um… really … I’m not sure about that….’ bikes; racing bikes and that’s before we’ve even got on to the clothing, accessories; coffee stands and of course the  Thunderdrome where there is actual bike racing going on!

This year’s London bike show was held at the Excel in Docklands. For me, this is a bit of a faff to get to by train (I had to catch a train to Euston, then the underground to somewhere or other then the docklands light railway) but you can get to it by car/bike. Normally there are a few of us that go every year to the show and so afterwards we like to find a pub to get something to eat/drink hence we go by train and this year was no exception.

If you’re like me, you walk into the Excel and you’re like ‘Whoa, bikes, lots of bikes :-) :-) :-)’ and I’m back to being a little kid in a sweet shop with my eyes going everywhere looking at all the lovely things on offer!

In the Thunderdrome there are free races at regular times during the day with, among a few others, Peter Hickman, John McGuiness, Michael Rutter and James Hillier. Always worth a watch, it doesn’t seem to matter where or on what machine one is racing, but when that visor goes down the red mist descends and the competitiveness that lays in all of us, comes out and one must win. The races are all in the nature of good fun of course and you can see they are having fun racing each other.

This year on display as a celebration to Britain’s most famous motorcycle rider, Barry Sheene, were nine of his racing bikes (including two of his winning bikes) which were flown in from Australia. This was an amazing sight to see and really good to be able to see the bikes ‘up close and personal’.

On the Suzuki stand I did spy former triple BSB Champion, John Reynolds with some of his racing bikes. I thought it was really good to be able to chat to John about his bikes and his racing career which is far more interesting than just seeing pictures and written text, makes it more real.



Most of the main manufacturers were there there including, Kawasaki, Yamaha, Suzuki and BMW along with a few of the smaller ones such as CCM, MV Agusta and Royal Enfield. 

It’s good to be able to wonder round the bikes and sit on them (well, most of them). It’s especially good if your looking to buy a new bike as you can get a real feel for the bike and talk to the people on the stand about stats etc and any mods that are available. They also seem to have a selection of branded clothing available to buy – well, it would be rude not too :-)

I did happen to find myself sitting on the new Ducati V4 Streetfighter. OMG I want one!!! It was in the only colour a Ducati should be in – red! If you look at the stats for this, I think it’s safe to say this is going to be a very fast bike :-) :-) :-) 

My only small criticism would be that the first essential change you need to make to the bike would be a tail tidy. To be honest, I would not leave the showroom without one on it!

A friend I was with took a shine to the new Triumph Rocket. This is apparently all new, not a carry over from the previous model and has an incredible 2.5 litre engine. A match for the Diavel perhaps? 

Twenty three times Isle of Man TT winner, John McGuiness, could be found in between races propping up the bar at his own pub giving you a chance to have a chat with the man himself over a pint or two.

Inspiration could be found for those of us seeking adventure on a bike in the Adventure Zone with various companies offering information on tours available in various parts of the world as well as books for sale; Bonhams brought with them a selection of rare and exotic bikes from the Giancarlo Morbidelli collection which were fascinating to look at and a real privilege to be able to see and the National Motorcycle Museum brought a host of exotic bikes so we could have the pleasure of looking at them.



Besides bikes, bikes and some more bikes, there were also clothing manufacturers at the show offering for purchase a selection of their goodies. You could fully kit yourself out to ride a bike by coming to the bike show from base layers, protective trousers and jackets to boots, gloves and helmets. 




That of course is just the start, you can then go on to kit out your bike with accessories such as luggage systems, sat navs, go pros and then you can kit your garage out too with paddock stands and lifts, tools, cleaning products….. honestly, the list is endless. Just make sure you bring plenty of pennies with you (or your other half’s credit card :-) )


All in all a great day out, well worth a visit and I’ll be back again next year.

BK

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My Z900 - Part 2 - Mods

Following on from Part 1, as you know I truly love my Z but I couldn’t resist changing a few bits, although it was the performance edition and came with a few extras such as rear seat cowl, front screen, tail tidy and an Akrapovic exhaust end can.

As standard, the Z does not have any sort of stone radiator guard which I personally think is something of an oversight. So before I had even picked the bike up I ordered one from eBay. This was fitted straight away and not only serves a very good practical purpose, but looks rather nice too with a nice small discreet Z900 logo on it.

When I took the demo Z for a test ride it had a small screen on it and I did notice a bit of wind hitting me on the chest but the Z I was buying had a slightly larger screen and, I’ve got to say, this made all the difference, I don’t feel the wind buffeting now. So if you have a Z900 I would heartily recommend this as an upgrade as it is it very small and discreet but makes a bigger difference than you would think just by looking at it.

I added R&G crash bungs (which go on all my bikes!). I think these are quite discreet but will save the day if you drop it in the garage or at low speed. 

The other half can confirm this as thankfully it was one of his own bikes that he dropped in the garage. I hope he’s not reading this as we’re not supposed to talk about it! 

Heel guards, these came from eBay and were only cheap but look so much better than the standard ones. I did try the usual suppliers first but nobody seems to make them for the Z900.

As I don’t take pillion (I tried this once with the other half, but it made the bike so heavy (too many pies!) I won’t be doing that again) I have a seat cowl. I took off the rear foot pegs and added an Evotech bracket for the exhaust and a blanking plate for the other side. 

This, in my opinion, really enhances the streetfighter look.

Onto the exhaust, now this was a bit of saga. Unbeknown to me, when you buy a new bike the exhaust has to conform to EU standards and therefore it still has a CAT in it which makes it too quiet, well for me anyway! 

Even though I had the Akrapovic end can, as this is a factory accessory it was not much louder than the standard exhaust so although it was a really nice looking quality product, it now lives in the shed.

So here started my journey to finding my new exhaust that had to fit certain criteria:

1. Loud;

2. Looked good on my bike;

3. Not too expensive.

Never before have I paid sooo much attention to other people’s exhaust pipes! Everywhere I went I checked out exhausts and where possible asked them very nicely to start their bikes so I could hear the exhaust.

The NEC bike show was approaching and I did a bit of research beforehand (this mainly consisted of which exhausts looked the nicest) and went to the bike show with a couple of mates. I dragged them round virtually every exhaust manufacturers stand and came home with lots of brochures.

Still I didn’t know what to do as although they look great, some were very expensive and you can’t actually hear any of them at the show. Doing some more research on the internet, I came across Delkevic which is a British company. The exhausts look really nice and they looked really good value. In the end I thought ‘Oh well, let's try it.’ and ordered one.

My friends said how pleased they were that they had spent the whole day at the Bike Show looking at and researching exhausts instead of looking at new bikes which was their whole reason for going and that their time was completely wasted :-)

I went for a complete Delkevic system with a carbon stubby end can. The cat has now gone and the exhaust looks absolutely awesome and sounds even better. It is loud and every so often is it pops and bangs and spits the odd flame. Love it.

The only change that gets made now is to put on the original pillion seat when we go touring so I can fit my microscopic tail pack on the back. This is in fact a tank bag but is at least some sort of token effort to carry the smallest amount of luggage I can get away with. 

I still firmly believe it upsets the look of the bike but I do accept that I have to carry something for long trips. Got away with it for Belgium last year ….. waiting to see if I can get away with it for this year’s European trips. 

Really do hope the other half is not reading this.

BK

Delkevic

Evotech-Performance

Rg-Racing

My Z900 - Part 1

I love my Z.

When I did my CBT the bike I used was a Yamaha YBR 125. Before I did my CBT I had never ridden a bike before and did not even know what each lever did. It was such an easy bike to ride and I felt so comfortable on it that by lunchtime I was out on the road with the instructor. After my CBT I brought a YBR to practice on. After a few weeks of practising on my own I then started having lessons with Steve at Beacon Motorcycle Training in order to get my big bike licence.

The bike I rode during my lessons with Steve was a Kawasaki ER6 which, again, was such an easy bike to ride and I was happy on this. It was light enough for me to easily get it off the side stand and I did enjoy riding it.

When I passed my test I wasn’t sure whether to buy a ER6 as that was what I was used to but after looking around I ended up buying a Honda Hornet 600. For me, it was a perfect first big bike and I enjoyed riding it, it had plenty of grunt for me whilst I was a new rider and did everything I wanted it to do. As my instructor, Steve, said, he taught me how to pass the test, I now had to learn how to ride. This I have since realised is very true.

After a couple of happy years on the Hornet I decided I wanted a bigger engined bike.

Here was where the difficulty lay. I found that bigger bikes were a lot heavier than my Hornet which, for me, I was not comfortable with. I do have difficulty getting bigger bikes off the side stand and some I cannot even get the bike upright. Being able to do this easily for me is my main priority. I sat on a lot of bikes and took a few out for a test ride but still I couldn’t find ‘the one’.

I had been looking at a Triumph Street Triple and we were out for a ride one day and came across a Triumph garage. I was looking at the demo Street Triple and was just going to ask if I could take it for a test ride when another customer beat me to it and went off on the demo bike. I asked if I could have a test ride when the bike came back and the salesman said to come back in a couple of hours.

So off we rode and we stopped at On Yer Bike, Aylesbury for a cuppa before heading back to the Triumph garage. Whilst there it always seems obligatory to have a look around the new and used bikes to see which bikes we can drool over.

I was in the showroom looking at the Kawasakis and Tony wheeled out the Z650 for me to have a look at. Tony asked me what sort of riding I liked and I replied I’ve got a Hornet 600 and I like lots of overtaking. At which point Tony said ‘Ahh, okay then’ wheeled the Z650 back and wheeled out the Z900 that was sitting in the showroom all shiny and winking at me.

It was light enough for me to get it off the stand easily and I felt really comfortable on it and I really liked the look of it. I took it for a test ride (uh oh said the other half).

OMG it was awesome, it was so easy to ride, it’s light and nimble, it’s comfortable, the riding position is perfect, I loved it. On my way back on the test ride I was even overtaking, I was that happy and confident on it.

I got back to On Yer Bike with a huge smile on my face and bought it the one in the showroom. 

My Z is the performance edition which came with a few extras namely an akroprovkic end can, seat cowl, tail tidy and screen. In part 2 next week I will tell you about the modifications I made to my Z even though it was a new bike! I thought buying a new bike would mean that I wouldn’t need to make any but it seems I was wrong.

I absolutely love riding my Z. I have had it just over two years now and have done some 12,500 miles, been on a few long weekends away in this country and to France, Germany and Belgium it is sooooo comfortable for long rides. 

Proof you don’t need a bike designed for touring for long trips, buy the bike that you want because you love it and make it work for you.

BK

Beacon Motorcycle Training

On Yer Bike Aylesbury

Thank you for reading my post, I hope you enjoyed it. If you would like to subscribe by email, please enter your email on the right.

If you would like to share my blog that would be great - thank you.