F450 racing?????????????????

Anyone in East coast racing an F450? These bikes look super fun but haven't seemed to catch on yet.

Comments?

http://www.autoblog.com/2008/02/29/roland-sands-450-super-single-race-bike-available-now/

also 450moto.com

 

bummer, looked fun

 

Guess that makes for an easy podium?:wow:

 

I built one and ran four rounds. No one else showed up. The only multibike grid was at last year's GNF. I'd love to run it, or even let someone else ride mine if people would show up. Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be the case.

 

theyre super cool bikes but too expensive when you can get an SV for less...........



i still think a true Stock 600 class would be cool..........bone stock bikes with street tires

but i understand the point that it would be a class that limits the riders to just that class

 

I'd be interested in it, but for me, the costs/hassle of getting the bike are not worth it. Easier to just pick up a 125 GP bike and call it a day.

 

It may be more viable as used 450 dirt bikes get cheaper. I'm sure an East coast distributor for parts would make a diff. as well. Given time, enough guys on the west coast could get into and the set up costs could come down. Seems price is the killer. If you get get one going for $5k it would be a no brainer but $10k for an out of the ordinary bike scares a lot of people.

For all those people who wanted to race TZ's but didn't want to spend all day tuning!!!!

Sadly, The OEM could bang these out dirt cheap if there was a street version and race version ala Aprilia Cup 250's

 

Really sad,

We had looked seriously at Super Singles at the beginning of the year and I am going to be a bit candid about what I felt.

The bikes are friggin' expensive. We all know that - no matter how many times someone tries to justify the expense. Who wants to pay that much money for a converted dirtbike? We built ourselves a pretty bitchin' SV650 for a fraction of what it would have cost to build a 450 SS.

But thats not what I wanted to focus on.

Call me out on it if you like but these are racebikes and if you are going to promote a racebike......................you need to race them!!

Here is what I would have done if I were either Gavin or Roland:

Pick 6 upcoming young riders (shameless plug for my kid)
Have them all show up with 6 built bikes at various trackdays and race events.
Send them all out together in a conga line and have them start to nuke everyone on the track.
Repeat, repeat, repeat!!
Have these kids promote with you at the track

Its 6 bikes and some great kids / teenagers, whatever.
The point is the continous track presence and the continuous thunder of these bikes coming around in succession.................they sound great!!

We saw these bikes trickle in from time to time. Gavin would show up with a few, Roland would show up with a few. They all seemed to be more interested in testing than actually promoting the bikes. Testing is important too but should be handled in a different way. They should be PROMOTING the bikes, not merely showing up. Not one person from Rolands crew came around to talk to us about the bikes even though the 13 and up crowd would be a serious target. Its failing because they have not promoted it properly. And even though Gavins crew knew we were on the fence about getting one, my son wasn't offered 1 lap around the track to try out one of 3 or 4 bikes that they had there.........fail!

Take my idea Gavin or Roland or anyone else for that matter. Call or email me and I will offer my kid up as one of those 6 riders. Promote the shit out of this on the track like I said or your ideas for the series is going the way of the dodo bird.

Mongo's post is proof positive of that

It should have been the Rookie Cup backup plan!

 

BINGO!

Roland, If your reading this.. PM me for my shipping address

This could have been a big time marketing gold mine for one of the OEM's as well.

 

I wanted to build one but didn't want to put money into building something for a class that only 1 or 2 people showed up for. I was really hoping it'd catch on faster. Honestly, I didn't want to risk the class being a flop so I held off until other people did the hard work figuring out the best setup and filled the grid. I think the problem is most people who thought about it did the same thing and that's a shame because it seems like some guys are starting to figure out some of the problems like front end chatter, swingarm angle, etc. So in a way I guess people like me are to blame.

 

No your not!!
It should have been so compelling that you really didn't give a shit!!

Picture standing by the hotpit wall as 6 of these thunderous little bastards go screaming by lap after lap passing all manner of 600's 750's whatever. You can't beat that.....................you can't!!

This is where they have failed to get you to open your wallet.

 

If they even just went so far as to make a "kit"

Everything you need for the conversion in one box for one price delivered to your door.

It would have gone along way to helping people make a buying decision

 

I think something like a moriwaki 450 would go over way better, as it would eliminate the need to start from scratch with all the chassis numbers. Although it wouldn't be cheap either, a no shit gp chassis would showcase the 450 single engine they want to use (because so many brands make one) without having to work around handling issues. A MonoGP class without people having to hack up good 250 GP bikes!

 

whats the address to fantasyland where you live? i gotta move there.

 

Call me ignorant, but I didn't understand the class in the 1st place. There was already a class for super fast singles and it was/is Clubman.

And if I was going to build a dirbike into a super single and spend a ton of money, I'd run the KTM690 or CR500. Go big or go home.

 

That would be ideal.. gives them some use for the soon to be obsolete 250 frames !!!!! now back to that cost issue. Slam the 450 in the 250 frame and keep it about $6000... and you couldn't build them fast enough

 

You're right, and if I thought for a second they'd handle so awesome that they'd make up for the 25hp advantage my SV has and I'd go faster on the 450 then I'd do it in a heartbeat! I may not be their target market though. Now the same concept with an Aprilia 550 twin, however, I can see in my future...

 

for some of us size is not an issue

the idea is readily available ans similar between OEM's, kind of like moto-cross is now.. you don't see a lot of CR500's on tv these days

 

http://www.450gp.com/EN/kits.html

-jim