It's the noise regulations that made Suzuki limit the throttle blades opening to 68% for the US market only. There's an earlier episode where Brock removes this limitation only, not messing up with anything else. The gain is around 25-28 rwhp.
Great point, ones tied into the other as well. Reducing noise means reducing throttle, means reducing emissions. I've seen some of the before and after emissions data from just a flash and it's quite a large gap. Bikes are just making so much power and regulations are getting pretty tight they have to neuter the crap out of them just to have is squeak by. It's a very tough balance to produce a bike that meets emissions but can perform without them and is a fine line with CARB and the EPA. Electronics are a wonderful thing, that's for damn sure.
That along with putting the CAT in the exhaust can. It makes it so easy to get big HP. It’s been going on for a while now, even the 2011 ZX10 gained 20+HP just from an ECU reflash and slip-on. The noise/emissions tests are done at 1/2 of max HP RPM. So rather than making a weaker motor, they just limit the throttle output up top and lower the max HP RPM (thereby lowering the test RPM...allowing it to pass). Then reflash the ECU to remove the limit on the throttle bodies, slap on a slip-on to remove the CAT and boom...20+HP.
All this makes me wonder if they will ever just start selling track only bikes. Can you imagine picking up a new bike that doesn't need to pass any government scrutiny. The manufacturer could make a deal with an exhaust supplier, etc, and be tuned unrestricted from the gate. The savings of stuff you are just going to take off and throw away would make it interesting.
These 3 are high end race bikes where the Honda is a cheaper than basic edition track bike,closer to what @Bruce described
Ok I knew about the ape and bmw, but what I was eluding to was a bike priced a lot lower lol! Not so high end but something the fast club racer would want and could afford.
For racing or track safety, the Honda still needs a belly pan. Not sure about the Duc. Either way, buyin' any of these track bikes still leads to buyin' other stuff. I'd go for the Honda...<$25K. You couldn't build a competitive SS class weapon for that money and get all that comes on the SP2.
Holy Crap! Not too many minutes into it and I'm thinkin', man, that thing is stupid strong, front wheel in the air at the slightest provocation. I mean, it just lofts for no apparent reason other than power, in any gear! When he comes out of the Craig and it's like he can't get it to come down no matter how many gears he goes through, I'm wonderin' how hard it was to ride. Uh, and yeah, that's unbelievably sick speeds for a course like that. WTF is wrong with them guys?