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just James
5/8/2013 9:23pm
5/8/2013 9:23pm
Edited Date/Time
5/10/2013 12:47am
Over the years I have noticed quite a few riders particularly on 450's, who seem to be intimidated by the bike's power. These guys wind the motor right against the rev limiter most of the time, kind of using it as a power limiter. To their girlfriends, and some other people, I'm sure it sounds like they are using all of the power that the bike has to give. In reality, they are keeping the motor beyond the point of max power, and are actually getting zero power when the limiter kicks in. And yes, I know that Barcia is famous for this. It has sort of become a trademark of his, But believe me, Barcia knows exactly where the power is, and when he really needs it the revs come down just enough to get off of the limiter for maximum thrust.
Very, very few people need faster 450s, if anything, taking away some power would probably make them faster around the track.
The Shop
Guess I shouldn't post at the end of a long day when I am too tired to make sense.
Does it help when a rider is in the air? Nope. Does it help ANY time? Hell no. So if these riders are not hitting the limiter while accelerating then it is not slowing them down. Right?
You also have to keep in mind, to make any decent power out of a modern, racing four stroke they have to rev, which is why they rev so much higher than 2 strokes. So if a rider just happens to bump the rev limiter while accelerating it's because he's trying to use all the power available.
i think its funny when i go to some track and there are all these guys with 250f's/450's with exhaust/mods/all this other crap
dont get me wrong its their money they do whatever they want, but a pro/amateur could destroy anybody locally to anybody on a stock 85
anybody remember that article i think it was ryan hughes or some other pro kept going to a smaller and smaller bike, and i think it finally ended on a drz110 or something where the test rider could finally beat him simply bc the suspension was holding the pro back
its easier to slow down a 250 2T/450F than it is to make a hot rod 125/250F and it'll last alot longer too.
I bought a 450 last year, and not only do I go faster on it (and it shows in my results), but I am actually almost always in the lower RPM range when I'm riding it. I can stay way down in the revs, and still go as fast as I want. The only time it ever gets really high in the revs is under hard acceleration all the way to top speed (which does happen fairly often in hare and hound races).
So do I use all the power of my 450? Probably not...but I'm cool with that...because I can go as fast as I want to go without working the motor too hard. And that's a win/win as far as I'm concerned.
I like that I can clear anything on the track--can't help it that I can't clear 'em all on the pinger.
A lot of the time I race a 125, but this point also applies to a 250F, any small bore in general... On a small bore bike, sometimes you're using every last bit of the power to get over a jump. In that case, the bike is revving out to peak horsepower when you are coming off the face of a jump that comes right after a corner, etc. So there's no room to grab another gear. Whenyou're pre-loading the bike and revving it out to get over a a big double you need a little bit of rev in the air to keep the front end from dropping. It really comes from how you gear the bike and how aggressively you ride it. I think some of the 125 riders will agree, and guys like Justin Barcia do it on the 250F for the same reason.
It's not quite a panic-rev, but maybe a desperation rev or something... You are strangling that small-bore and desperately trying to maintain the correct bike attitude coming over the jumps.
I realize I didn't explain that very well, but hopefully it makes sense to some of you guys who have ridden a small bore at the Intermediate or Pro level.
This doesn't happen on the 450F because you can gear it faster, or use the next gear and still torque the bike over the jumps.
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