It's hard to believe all dirt bike shootouts are unbiased and not swayed by brand preference, preconceived ideas from the testers or advertising cash. What if the bikes were disguised in some way to be unrecognisable? Lets say 250MX shootout with big 4, Husky, KTM and 2 wildcards that could be exotics or older versions of any bike. Has this been done before? I'd like to see it.
Not that I have ever seen. I don't put a lot into mag shoot outs myself but a blind test would be cool.
Yeah ....a Pepsi challenge would be hard to pull off ...but would be interesting...would be cool to see an average joe rider shoot out..all japan and euro bikes lined up for a multiple discipline challenge,they would have to run a gauntlet of challenges...moto,enduro,short trials challenge,desert baja,enduro cross,hill climb....all unbiased riders on any bikes....see what gets the vote for best bike for any and all conditions......never mind it's the wr300. Might be biased
I love the old mags with massive details and setup info. They weighed them, dyno'ed them, raced them and took lap times. Like the news, it is now all just a continuous homogenized ad. Forums exactly like this one are the best source of info now IMHO.
MotoCross.it and X-offroad.it, are 2 Italian magazines that hook up GET systems and print scientific lap/power/accelerations(G), gear position, rpm, suspension data for each track sector etc etc when they run tests. Instead of the how I feel and how it looks data we get over here in the US (I dont speak for Aus, UK, Fra etc etc). http://www.getdata.it/prodotti.php?idprodotto=239&idcategoria=36&lang=eng&idfamiglia=1 These are F1/superbike/MotoGp spec devices for real time and post op data aquisition. GIVE ME SCIENCE -SCIENCE. Which bike(machine) gets around the track faster better etc etc . As I printed before, crew chiefs at the highest level of motorsports have shown their drivers/riders that when they feeeel the machine is faster they may be completly wrong by the data down load, in the post test turn around, where they may be a second a lap faster with the "slow" machine. note M40+ with beacon input for what I believe is real time info as the machine is out on the course.
You wanna talk added pressure for pilots........they can be called out all day long. Hey Antonio what gear were you in coming into the whoops?-"5 gear pinned of course"- BS wrong 4th gear at 9500 rpm then at the 3rd whoop (GPS data) into 5th (gear position data) with drop to 9200(rpm data) then up to 10k(rpm data) at the 9th whoop(GPS) and at rev limiter(RPMdata) 20 feet(GPS) past the last whoop, oh and you had 10% wheel spin when you shifted.......oh yea how fast for that entire evolution all collected from GPS data.
The sportbike magazines do street reviews for feel and then take bikes to the track where it's all about lap times. Never understood why it wasn't like that for dirt bike mags. I really want to get a lap timer
In most every test I've read that had a shootout with the winner determined by the fastest lap times, the was the smallest 2T. I recall the Kawi kdx200 winning a few, and the TM125e won quite a few others.
Just remember. Cole Trickle was 6 seconds slower when he ran as fast as he could. When he backed it down to save the tires, he was faster.
