Besides letting the gs450's in, what other ideas do people have that could help even out the performance gap between the 'smokes and diesels in f-500? Is there a gap, or is it simply that no diesel guys are trying? I've not seen a single diesel on the grids in f-500 this year.
I'm not sure. AHRMA tried letting in SOHC fours to 550cc ( e.g. CB550 ) and still there are pretty much no takers these days...
I'd rather race with a full grid than get a trophy because so few bikes showed up. What do you think about combining the 350 sportsman classes and F-500 in one class? We race at the same time anyway now right? Could the rules be tweaked to make that a competitive and fun class for 2 strokes and 4 strokes? The winning lap times seem to be pretty close in the 2 classes and us slower guys from each class would have more people to race with. What do you think?
i spoke to mark mitchell at cmp about the 550 honda's, he is for it. gary smith is the only one in wera with a 550 right now. he said he would definietly like to do this.
There has been diesels in form 500 this year, usually most events in the Northern areas. If you up the performance level in Formula500 with bikes like the gs and the cb550 then I think you need to look at the whole structure. I have put a lot of money into my machine to try to make it competitive in this class and because you wish to see bigger grids/other people winning, you forget about the guy's who have religiously entered that class each year, even with the knowledge that the only true hope against the really fast RD's and there riders is mechanical longevity. As far as the GS goes this would definately give the rd's a run for there money, this would be the only machine in this class that could actually lap the smaller 4 strokes as shown at a recent 10 lap event at Nelson. If this is the performance level you require then I feel that there are a few of us out here who are wasting our time. I am in this to do the best I can with what I have, to get a sense of achievement and hopefully a feeling of pride in myself. This would be difficult with everything in your "class" disappearing from your sight. We all know if you have a spread of power from low rpm to your redline then higher HP can easily be achieved with a sacrifice in low rpm tourque. You just have to look at race reps versus the naked versions to see that. I am sorry if this sounds like sour grapes but if you want closer racing then look at the whole picture and not with the exclamation "Oh! look, the RD alway's wins f-500, lets put higher performance four strokes with that group than has been allowed before to make a race". There will alway's be gaps in performance levels on different types of motorcycle depending on there popularity. An rd400 can be improved fairly cheaply by someone who knows what they are doing, engine wise, mainly port work. Some four strokes can be improved easily, note I did not say cheaply, with big bore kits, race cams, large heads for working on, bigger valves, race ignitions etc. Other machines have to have a lot of ingenuity thrown at them. These are some of the items that need to be considered when machines are added to existing groups. The new classes for this year, in my opinion, are very well thought out and do seem to be attracting more attention, especially the higher V groups. In all my comments I am refering to engine performance and I have not taken into account any handling differances. Could alway's buy a GS I suppose
I don't think you up performance level of F500 by letting the GS in. The biggest reason that GS laps a few 4 strokes during a 10 lap race is the rider has 15 years & a few thousand or so laps at Nelson. That GS makes less hp then a F-RD spec RD. I think anything with 4 valve heads should not be allowed, ever tweaks for 4 strokes May bump SR's from 540cc to 605cc 550cc single cams. 500cc twin cam mutis & twins (like the GS-450) Those, on top of the F-RD's & F500 spec RD's, plus your triple 2 strokes should make for a full grid & interesting racing Bob edited because I began to count years & laps, Imagine how many laps Rich Graver must have!!! And people wonder why his GS is so fast... Its only because Rich is riding the shit out of it
The CB550's aren't going to up the performance level, either. They weigh so much more than an RD that they'd probably need to make 80 hp to have a chance.
Allow disc brakes in V-2, that might brake up the 350 honda stranglehold and give V-2 machines a chance, bumping into Form. 500. R.Lucas 345
