Indholdsfortegnelse for July 2019 i Fast Bikes

If you’re a big fan of the GP paddock and want to get involved in one of the fan grandstands, you wouldn’t go far wrong with venturing into the orange corner. With bikes in all three classes there will be absolutely no shortage of cheering to be done, and you could even get on the Aperol Spritz for the ultimate orange experience. If it sounds like some of you, the KTM Fan Package includes your entry ticket, KTM grandstand seating, a KTM bag, T-shirt, cap, lanyard and earplugs. Oh, and if you want to make the road trip to KTM’s home race in Austria, there is even dedicated KTM parking, which is pretty cool. Fancy it? Well, the packages are available at these rounds, with more details at www.KTM.com: Round…

It’s 1992. China and Israel have just established diplomatic relations, Wembley Stadium is holding a tribute concert in honour of the recently passed away Freddie Mercury, and Wayne Rainey is about to win the 500cc Motorcycle World Championship. It was to be a memorable year for a handful of reasons, but for those with a propensity to get helmeted and leather clad, the introduction of the very first Honda CBR900RR FireBlade likely outshone any diplomatic, musical or sporting revelations. And for good reason. With all that power (122bhp) and such little weight (185kg), the Blade was said to be a real widow-maker. Ok, hang on a minute. Widow-maker? Even before I swung a leg over the original Blade, I was a little bit sceptical as to the accuracy of that…

Things are starting to get really saucy now. John McGuinness has won the 2015 Senior TT and to celebrate, Honda have decided to release a ‘TT Special Edition’ Fireblade SP for 2016. There was only 50 made and 30 of them were used as travelling marshal’s bikes for the 2016 Isle of Man TT. Special edition ‘SP’ Fireblades and extra-special edition ‘SP2’ Fireblades were most likely an attempt for Honda to spark a bit of excitement back into Fireblade ownership, as by 2016 there hadn’t been a significant upgrade to the model for seven years, since the 2008 Blade hit the showrooms. But what a Blade it was, with reasonable power for a bike back then, sublime handling, decent looks and typical Honda reliability – I had the pleasure of…

It’s not every day you get to jet off to Spain and bang in the laps on a Honda CBR1000RR SP. It’s even rarer to get the gig of taking the Japanese brand’s BSB Superstock SP2 for a spin. And as for spanking the same team’s £100,000, slick-shod, 215bhp superbike on a track all to yourself, well, that’s pie in the sky stuff. But that’s exactly the agenda we were invited to indulge in around a sun-kissed Monteblanco race track… just days before the BSB season got under way in earnest. As Carl was busy at that time, arranging his stamp collection, and Boothy was tied up on a food awareness course, it was left to me to take up this opportunity to grasp just how spectacular and different this…

Remember the Millennium Bug? Well, at the same time as that no-show, Honda delivered on its promise to topple the racing scene with a v-twin to rival Ducati. It was called the VTR1000 SP1 and it claimed to make around 130bhp from its 90-degreeVee configuration powerhouse. In the year 2000, at the hands of Colin Edwards, the SP1 stole the World Superbike and cemented its place in history as an iconic race replica. Production bikes were expensive but desirable, which is why you’d be looking to spend anywhere between £4-8,000 if you fancied taking ownership of one nowadays. They’re not the fastest, they’re not the best handling, but they’re pretty damned different and lovely to look at. Don’t even get us started on the booming soundtrack.…

COMPOUNDS… WHAT’S BEST FOR ME? For a trackday, the real trick is to not over-complicate things too much. To me, a trackday is about having fun on your bike, with that fun being as safe and as cost-effective as possible. I’ve heard quite a few myths that surround tyres and compounds, but contrary to what you might hear down the pub, you really don’t need to be taking different compounds for different times. Racing, yes you could use a different compound through the day, but to have fun on a trackday needn’t mean five sets of tyres! Let’s take Pirelli as an example, who have a range of compound choices: the ‘softest’ rear tyre they do is an SC0. The SC0 isn’t trackday material. These contain WSBK and BSB spec…

Nick Moult Aprilia RSV4 Quick blast to Mallory to watch a bit of trackday action. Peter Reed Honda FireBlade Went for a nice ride to the beach at West Bay on the Blade with my lad on his ZXR 400. Just spoiled by great roads being overcrowded, with those silly tin boxes on wheels guided by some myopic drivers. But the beach was great. Colin McFadyen Yamaha MT-10 Me on my MT and my brother on the SX. 300 miles in the north of Scotland. That picture is overlooking Etive Mor. Paul Traylen Aprilia RSV4 Bouley bay hillclimb in Jersey! Where else? Mark Stafford KTM 690 Duke Been anywhere and everywhere with my KTM. Suns out, bikes out. Tom Dewaele Kawasaki Ninja 650 Been…

FB: What is the purpose of brake fluid? TM: To stop you! Brake fluid is what transfers the action from your brake lever to the discs via fluid pressure. When you pull the brake lever, you’re moving a piston in the brake master cylinder. This pushes the brake fluid all the way down towards the wheels, and at the wheels are calipers. These calipers also have pistons that the fluid now presses on and squeezes the brake pads tight against the brake discs. FB: What is it made from? TM: All DOT fluids (with the exception of DOT 5) are made up of a poly-glycol base. Glycol-based fluids consist of a mixture of ingredients with as many as 10 separate substances making up the final product. These substances can be…

Nearly everyone has a milestone they need to look forward to throughout the year. For most, it’s probably Christmas, or a birthday. For others it might be some sort of religious day, or an anniversary. For Boothy, it’s dinner time. For me though, nothing can beat the absolutely glorious feeling of picking up a brand new bike ready for a summer of serious spank-age. And the best part is? I already have a proper soft spot for the Kwak. Having spent the majority of last year razzing round on its little bro, the Ninja 400, when the Green corner released the ’19 middleweight it seemed like the perfect next step… and it was a bloody good choice. Having done a shed load of miles on one of these things for…

It’s like nothing else in the world – you can’t really describe the feeling of holding a 200bhp motorbike flat out past houses, lampposts and hedges. Because we only get to do it once a year, it takes me a few nights of practice before my eyes and brain get up to speed, and training your mind to ignore the faces sticking out the hedges takes some doing, but by practice week I’ve usually got my eye in. A six-lap Superbike or Senior TT race takes nearly two hours and, other than a couple of 30sec pitstops, there’s no respite, so to say its hard work is an understatement. But to finish a race round there is the most rewarding feeling in the entire world.…

Finally, the 2019 BSB season is under way! I know it didn’t start any later than planned but to me it feels like it did after our pre-season no-bike plight. Anyone reading my columns knows the deal as I’ve bleated on about it but it really was a situation I had never been in before. The first time I hit the track with the rest of my BSB competitors was free practice 1, round 1 at Silverstone. The rest of the guys had a test there just one week earlier so undoubtedly we would be in at the deep end. Just before I started my first flying lap, Josh Brookes (one of the title favourites on one of the best reputed bikes) came through and I just figured I may…

Firstly, Triumph looked at the outgoing model and decided that, really, 2.3 litres just wasn’t enough. Who can argue with that? It means that the new machine is powered by an utterly massive 2.5-litre engine, with a claimed power figure of 170bhp – making it the most powerful Triumph ever to leave the factory. Oh, and the most interesting part? It will make an absolutely whopping 163ft-lb of torque, which is not only a new record for Triumph, but also for production bikes as well. Utter madness. It’s not just the engine that’s been pimped up either, as Triumph have gifted the Rocket III with a whole host of other goodies as well. New Brembo Stylema brakes should offer a beefy amount of stopping power while new Monoshock suspension and…

We loved Yamaha’s YZF-R125 on the launch earlier this year – there’s only so much you can expect from 125cc, and it delivered. But if it wasn’t sporty enough before, it’s just taken a step up. Yep, we’ve all seen an abundance of Repsol-rep CBR125s, but now it’s Yamaha who’ve gifted their littlest sports bike with ‘factory’ treatment, meaning you can now pick up a Monster Energy Rep that matches the MotoGP bikes muscled around by Rossi and Viñales. The YZF-R125 Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP Edition is expected to hit showrooms by the end of May 2019 priced at £4699, which is £200 more than the standard model. Better than spanking your money on fake Monster stickers though……

WHAT TO LOOK FOR: The original Blade is now very much viewed as a collector’s item, so you need to decide on what you want to do with yours. If it is a showpiece, always buy as good an example as you can afford because original fairings, exhaust cans, screens, etcetera are costly nightmares to locate. If you just want to ride it, then concentrate more on the mechanicals. The Blade’s engine is strong, but the reg/rec fails and so do generators, while the forks’ lowers corrode, the swingarm linkages seize solid and a few engines suffer cam chain tensioner issues. This is an old bike now, so you have to expect head bearings and swingarm bearings to need replacing, and if it has been stood still for a long…

A lot had happened in the space of four years. The 929 was increased to 954cc in 2002, but it wasn’t until 2004 that Honda decided it needed a full ‘litre’ Fireblade to hand it to the likes of the R1 and Gixer brigade (or at least try and hand it to them, anyway). Honda’s trump card was their bonkersly successful MotoGP pairing of the RC211V and Valentino Rossi, which they (apparently) took as much inspiration as possible from when developing the new, 1000cc, under-seat exhausted CBR1000RR Fireblade. You could tell just by looking at that the 2004 Blade that it meant business. In fact even now, 15 years later, the first ‘under-seat’ Blade has stood the test of time in the aesthetics department. It still looks great. Staring you…

You’ve probably seen Xavi racking up the podiums on the World Superbike scene, but for 2019 the Spaniard has signed to join the Honda BSB squad. We fired a few questions his way… Why switch to BSB? It is a big change for me, but I’ve been trying to get to BSB for a long time; it’s the best national championship in the world. I had a good time in World Superbikes, but it was not possible to get in a factory team, so I took the decision to move to Honda and take a different direction. What’s the biggest challenge? Of course, I have to learn a lot of new tracks, but we have plans to do tests on most tracks before races so I can try and find…

When they told me that the new Bridgestone Battlax Hypersport S22 tyres were being launched on track at Jerez I thought, ‘Wow, Bridgestone must have a lot of confidence on their new hypersport tyres’. I was right, they did. It wasn’t long before we were being told how innovative and ground-breaking the new tyres are. The S22 supersedes the S21, but Bridgestone were quick to tell us that the ’22 isn’t just a tweaked ’21, it’s a brand new tyre, which has been improved in every way – from outright grip in the dry, to stability in the wet; and all without slashing the wear life of the tyres. In fact, they are claiming the new tyres can muster 15% higher corner speed in the dry, and 5% faster lap…

I love motorbikes. I’m lucky enough to work with them all day, every day, and I wouldn’t change it for the world. Over the years, I’ve had quite a few projects like this RS250 restoration and I have learnt what to look for in a project bike, what works well and what doesn’t. I’ll admit that I do have a soft spot for old two-strokes, but the thing that drew me to this 1997 Aprilia RS250 was actually the fact that everything on it was original. It was in a pretty ropey condition when I got it – everything was rough, but it was all there, all original and I knew that everything could be cleaned, re-plated and re-painted, so it didn’t matter to me what condition it was in.…

KIDDIMOTO Hi guys! Following on from Cassandra’s appearance in issue 316, then Lucie’s in 326, I couldn’t let you miss out on the newest (and final!) addition to the family, so please meet one-year-old Jamie-Sue. However, I thought I’d try and really do the ultimate kiddimoto by getting all three of them on the Falco this time, though getting a photo of them all looking at once took as much patience as it must do for your photographers waiting for you to get your knees down! My Falco’s still wonderful, my favourite changes being a good suspension fettle and the brakes with a 16/19rcs master cylinder and RSV Factory calipers – well worth the few hundred quid. Still waiting for your article on the Falco mind. Wanna try mine? Come…

WHAT IS IT? A tool to aid and speed up the bleeding of your bike’s brakes. HOW DOES IT WORK? Unless you’re riding speedway, brakes on a bike are up there with wings on a plane. They’re pretty damn important and, just like every mechanical system, they’re susceptible to fatigue. The more obvious points of wear are the discs and pads, but it’s worth remembering that it’s good old brake fluid that’s powering your endos (assuming your bike’s not fitted with cables and drums… like those in museums). Through active use, brake fluid heats up, cools down and is susceptible to dilution from condensation caused by the process. Most fluids are hygroscopic, which means they actually draw moisture into their mix, which exaggerates the dilution process and lowers the fluid’s…

Okay, we aren’t far from the midsummer break for the TT, but already so far things have been pretty damn tasty. And in all fairness, it’s all whipping up to be a pretty stonking year if I do say so myself... but who are the real winners and losers from the first couple of rounds? I mean, it’s been a bit of a rollercoaster to say the least. I’m writing this just before the circus hits Donington Park, yet even so in my eyes the real winners have to be the trio of Redding, Brookes and Bridewell. That V4R is brand spanking new, and it’s shown that even with the Motec system it’s competitive right from the very off, which gives it the upper hand on the new S1000RR (the…

The Isle of Man TT. Where on earth do we start? I mean, it’s incredibly difficult to find any combination of those 26 letters on offer in the English language that could ever describe the feeling of being there; the sheer excitement that arises by sitting inches from some of the world’s best riders at their absolute limit, nailing some of the trickest machinery that money can’t even buy is like nothing else (legally) available. In a world of health and safety obsessed lunacy, it’s the last real hub of extremity, world renowned for the bravery needed to take it on, and the buzz that surrounds the place in the process. Don’t worry if you haven’t been before though; just get there once and you’ll be hooked for life. If…

If, like me, you like a nice refreshing pint of Okells, you’ll not be stuck for somewhere to go on the Isle of Man. In fact, the great thing about the TT course is that it is lined with pubs. Heaven, right? If you are in the paddock, or up at the grandstand, then The Trackside is where you need to be. From here you can see the bikes firing down towards St Ninian’s on the first lap and heading back up the return road after the race. If you are planning a TT Course pub crawl, make sure you get to The Railway in Union Mills, The Crosby in Crosby, The Mitre in Kirk Michael, the Raven at Ballaugh Bridge, The Sulby on Sulby Straight, the Ginger Hall near…

SENIOR TT: The Senior last year was a classic and there’s absolutely no way to rule out Harrison and Hickman in 2019 after their blistering pace. Dunlop will be looking to get back to his winning ways here though, and with Hutchy and McGuinness both back to fitness, it’s going to be great to see what these two legends can do against the new guard. SUPERBIKE TT: With the first Superbike race so early on in the race week, there could be some real surprises. With Hicky and Dunlop both running the new S1000RRs, if there’s any inclement weather during practice week or hitches along the way, expect them to be playing catch-up at this point. This could open up the door to the likes of Harrison, who now has…

Remember all the misery last August? Sitting in the pissing rain waiting for absolutely no racing whatsoever? Well finally, there’s confirmation that change is on the way. Okay, it’s not that MotoGP is heading to Oulton or Cadwell, but at least Silverstone is getting a full resurface… whoop whoop! There’s been months of speculation around the situation, and it’s finally been announced that the work will start on June 10, with a full resurface taking place over the course of the month by a different company. The biggest job is to improve the drainage, alongside slightly different gradients which will all be done with some proper trick high-tech machinery, which will be finished in July. Funnily enough, the very first race at the circuit will be Formula One in mid-July…

Fancy yourself a new Aprilia? Well there’s not been a better time, with a host of new deals announced across the range. If range toppers are your tonic, Aprilia are offering their £21,499 RSV4 1100 Factory on a 4.9% PCP finance plan, which requires a 20% deposit. If PCP deals aren’t your thing and you fancy a naked, the Italians are offering the new Tuono V4 1100RR and Tuono V4 1100 Factory which will come equipped with a free Akrapovič slip-on exhaust – as will the faired RSV4 1000 RR. Aprilia are also offering a whole host of deals on their smaller capacity bikes, from the Shiver 900 and Dorsoduro 900s to the little Tuono 125 and everything in between, meaning there is (probably) something for everyone. For more info,…

Whether you are a fan of the Fireblade or not, there is no denying that Honda’s flagship superbike has been a benchmark in the sportsbike class for over 25 years. Since its initial development in the late 80s and its launch in 1992, the ’Blade has gone on to win the hearts and minds of motorcyclists the world over, as well as Isle of Man TT races, British Superbike Championships, World Superbike Championships and Le Mans 24 Hour races. In the early to mid-nineties the ’Blade seemed untouchable, but in a world with Yamaha YZF-R1s, Suzuki GSX-R1000s, Kawasaki ZX-10Rs, and later on, BMW S1000RRs, Aprilia RSV4s and Ducati Panigale V4s, The Big H have had their work well and truly cut out to keep their Blade as sharp as the…

The 90s were great, but for the sake of our timeline-centric test, let’s take the advice of Jarvis Cocker and all meet up in the year 2000. That’s right, whilst we were all worried about whether or not the ‘Millennium Bug’ was going to mean we all had to buy new microwaves, Honda had been busy developing an all-new FireBlade. In all fairness, though, they had to do something, after Yamaha’s introduction of the all-conquering YZF-R1 two years earlier. There had been tweaks and improvements here and there for the Blade during the 90s, but the Millennium Blade had upgrades and full re-designs in almost every area. The chassis was made lighter and engine and fuel tank shuffled around to aid mass centralisation. It was kitted out with a pair…

If you were lucky enough to read any of our big naked bike shoot-out last year (issue 347), you’ll know just how much love we have for the Aprilia Tuono. Since 2002, Aprilia have set the bar in the super naked sector, despite their current model not having had a proper design overhaul since way back in 2012, when it received a sexy new V4 motor and Aprilia’s APRC (Aprilia Performance Ride Control). In 2015 it was given another 79cc and now, for 2019, Aprilia have gone all techno on us and splashed out on some fancy Öhlins electronic suspension for their chart topping Tuono, the Tuono V4 1100 Factory. They’ve opted to treat the ‘Factory’ to the most advanced semi-active electronic suspension system on the market, the Öhlins EC…

Who here is as stiff as a plank on a bike? Yep? Well listen up. If you can move your weight around the bike properly it will handle better, feel more stable and you’ll fatigue less. These tips should help put an easy process in place for getting your weight where it needs to be. Like anything in life, if you’re unsure about something you’re doing, not doing or being advised to do, then look at the pros. Watch MotoGP, WSBK, BSB or any of the support classes, and other than down a long straight, a pro racer’s backside is never in the middle of the seat. They move around the bike in a controlled manner and contribute towards a much better handling bike. Are they doing it for better…

Cadwell was cold, but it was also a laugh. The highlight was watching Carl pass Boothy on the test day ‘by accident’ when his bike jumped out of gear into Park, nearly skittling them both. I’m not sure who was the most surprised, but it made for great viewing. Apparently my constant jettisons off of the Suzuki’s seat were also entertaining. I had a couple of guys drop by the awning and tell me how impressed they were after landing my arse on the tank after one big moment. I’ve still got a lot to learn about thous, and throttle application’s right up the top of the list. Still, it’s awesome having so much power on tap, and now I’ve got the bike handling half decent I’m hoping to step…

QI got off the ferry in Dover with my helmet and gloves in a cargo net, knowing I was going to have to get my passport out and show my face at passport control, when a ferry worker told me I needed to put my helmet on. I told him that as I was on private land I was not going to. He shrugged, and about 30 seconds later a little Mercedes van pulled up and two ‘police officers’ got out. I say ‘police officers’. They had police helmets on and jackets that said Police, but the van had ‘Port of Dover Police’, which to my way of thinking says jumped up security guard, but rather than cause a delay I put my lid on as the ‘police’ approached me.…

So the CB1000R Neo Café Racer has been returned to Honda. A 10-month stay with Fast Bikes saw this new incarnation of the CB pass through two keepers, but ridden by us all with a genuine appreciation for the capabilities of this bike, despite having to do a lot of head scratching on where to place it. It’s had quite a journey; well, a few actually. Martin was the first keeper, racking up as many miles as he could, as quickly as he could to get it through the 600-mile first service and way beyond completing 3,500 of the total 5,200 completed in 10 months. With a late arrival of the Honda, Martin timed his departure from FB towers beautifully with the end of the summer, thus I got the…

It’s 2019. We’ve just left the first European round of the MotoGP season. Marc Marquez has just taken the top step of the podium and leads the Championship. Someone asked me “Is MotoGP becoming a bit predictable?” Yeah, in one sense it’s becoming predictable – it’s becoming predictable in its unpredictability. My pre-season tips are looking predictably worse with every round (top tip: always gamble responsibly – and if I tip something, you shouldn’t). So with summer just around the corner, what weren’t we expecting this season? We may have expected Marquez to be leading the championship, but after round four at Jerez his lead was a solitary single point. The man in second? Alex Rins. On a Suzuki. No one was tipping that. Marquez is actually looking better than…

WATERWORKS/TOWER BENDS/ GOOSENECK This whole section here is incredible, although it’s not quite as accessible or well-equipped for spectating as some of the other spots. Just before the Mountain section is Waterworks; an incredibly fast and blind double right-hander which is a real sight to behold – even though you’ll have to do some serious walking to get anywhere near. If you keep on going though, you’ll find yourself at Tower Bends, which offers another savagely fast set of turns between stone walls, although to get there you’ll have to park up at the Gooseneck, or sneak through from the back of Ramsay. If that isn’t your style, the Gooseneck is just up the road and is another epic place to watch from, being an incredibly tight right-hander that needs…

Since my last FB column, we’ve had a couple of rounds of the British Superstock 1000 Championship – the first one was at Silverstone, and the second at Oulton Park. I’d been mega excited to get the season under way but the first two rounds haven’t gone exactly as we’d planned. The Kawasaki ZX-10RR is mega fast but as it’s a new bike, it’s talking a little bit of time to get everything set up exactly how we want it. I qualified down in 22nd at Silverstone, and then I crashed on lap two of the two-part ‘100 mile’ race, which was an absolute disaster. In fact I took two other riders out when I crashed so it was a proper disaster – I’ve never done that before, so I…