• Hi everyone,

    As you all know, Coffee (Dean) passed away a couple of years ago. I am Dean's ex-wife's husband and happen to have spent my career in tech. Over the years, I occasionally helped Dean with various tech issues.

    When he passed, I worked with his kids to gather the necessary credentials to keep this site running. Since then (and for however long they worked with Coffee), Woodschick and Dirtdame have been maintaining the site and covering the costs. Without their hard work and financial support, CafeHusky would have been lost.

    Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been working to migrate the site to a free cloud compute instance so that Woodschick and Dirtdame no longer have to fund it. At the same time, I’ve updated the site to a current version of XenForo (the discussion software it runs on). The previous version was outdated and no longer supported.

    Unfortunately, the new software version doesn’t support importing the old site’s styles, so for now, you’ll see the XenForo default style. This may change over time.

    Coffee didn’t document the work he did on the site, so I’ve been digging through the old setup to understand how everything was running. There may still be things I’ve missed. One known issue is that email functionality is not yet working on the new site, but I hope to resolve this over time.

    Thanks for your patience and support!

HUSKY LOSES ANOTHER RIDER !

Hey guys! I actually wrote that blurb on digitaloffroad.com. I wasn't bagging on the bike or brand, just posing a question after a few riders have made the choice to move on. As a consumer and a race fan I have to question why these guys are jumping ship. It doesn't look good when multiple riders leave a brand and aren't shy about the reason. No matter if you think it was the bike or not, the riders did. As mentioned above by others, there are definitely success stories this year including FAR's Jason Thomas. But the comment come up in relation to new riders considering the brand. I know for a fact that these other riders issues with the brand weigh in on future riders decisions. That was the point I was trying to make and not at all bashing the bike.

Point taken. Go back and re-read it though... I think if you had added in some of the Husky riders successes this year as a counterpoint, it might have seemed less like a bash.
 
Take it as you wish. Like I said, I'm merely questioning how it looks for the brand to have professional riders dump their provided rides in favor of racing out of their own pocket. Whether I brought it up on a website or not, the same questions are being asked at the track or in bench racing talks. If it was just one rider doing it, it wouldn't be a big deal but there are quite a few. You don't see this type of stuff going on with other manufacturers. If the same thing was going on with KTM, Suzuki, or any other manu than I would have been talking about them but that's not the case. The successes that Husky is experiencing wasn't brought up because it didn't apply to the topic. I've discussed this issue with a few individuals being approached with a husky supported ride and the supposed negatives with the bike are far out-weighting the positives going on. Sadly, that's how it is right now. The same goes for your average off-road fan.

Again, I just wanted to say digitaloffroad or myself are not Husky haters. I hope to have my hands on a TC449 in the near future.
 
Take it as you wish. Like I said, I'm merely questioning how it looks for the brand to have professional riders dump their provided rides in favor of racing out of their own pocket. Whether I brought it up on a website or not, the same questions are being asked at the track or in bench racing talks. If it was just one rider doing it, it wouldn't be a big deal but there are quite a few. You don't see this type of stuff going on with other manufacturers. If the same thing was going on with KTM, Suzuki, or any other manu than I would have been talking about them but that's not the case. The successes that Husky is experiencing wasn't brought up because it didn't apply to the topic. I've discussed this issue with a few individuals being approached with a husky supported ride and the supposed negatives with the bike are far out-weighting the positives going on. Sadly, that's how it is right now. The same goes for your average off-road fan.

Again, I just wanted to say digitaloffroad or myself are not Husky haters. I hope to have my hands on a TC449 in the near future.

Factory supported riders baling from Husky is a fact and the truth hurts I guess. I still have digitaloffroad bookmarked and I'll refrain from making Husky hater comments in the future.
 
Hey guys! I actually wrote that blurb on digitaloffroad.com. I wasn't bagging on the bike or brand, just posing a question after a few riders have made the choice to move on. As a consumer and a race fan I have to question why these guys are jumping ship. It doesn't look good when multiple riders leave a brand and aren't shy about the reason. No matter if you think it was the bike or not, the riders did. As mentioned above by others, there are definitely success stories this year including FAR's Jason Thomas. But the comment come up in relation to new riders considering the brand. I know for a fact that these other riders issues with the brand weigh in on future riders decisions. That was the point I was trying to make and not at all bashing the bike.

You are mixing guys not liking the 449/511 platform, which there are several, with one person (as far as I have heard) not liking the 250/310. That is kind of misleading the 449/511 have had mixed race results but the 250/310 platform has done well with 2 world championships and of course Jason Thomas seem to be doing well. You may like huskys but your logic doesn't hold much water unless you are saying it is the management because that is the only common part.
 
from what i hear, trick parts for the 4 strokes are not making their way over here to america. the N.A. teams are being left to develop their own stuff. anybody hear anything different. ???
 
I know the competition may not be as stiff in Canada as in other parts of the world, but the CDN Husq race team has top 3'ed every class in our National Enduro Championships.

The riders used TXC250, TE310 and TXC511s.
 
Gotta remember, we wouldn't be where we are today without the efforts put forth by Penton/Husqvarna. Plus some others, CZ, Bultaco, etc....

I still like the Euro feel over the Jap Brands!
 
From yesterdays results the switch to Yamaha hasn't done much for Moss.

For part of the race he was up front and in the mix. It sounds like he lost some steam on the last 2 laps and finished 6th. It's his best finish since Florida but not a huge improvement.
 
From an amateur point of view, and believe me; we are just amateurs… here's some of the problem…19 bikes; one Husky.

photo-2.jpg


The grass roots, American race market could use a good; entry level 200 from Husky.
Along with a smoking 250 2 stroke to jump on next!

The youth movement just goes orange… having a 125/144 for the reason of competing against 250 4 strokes isn't going to cut it here.

I feel like racing a Husky is going against the grain...but that's my nature and I like the challenge.
Really not sure where we're going next.

Our Husky Pro team is awesome…Fred has always given Andy advice and motivation.

Andy just put together another good ride at Powerline Park this weekend for the win...all the orange doesn't scare him any...

Again, from the very bottom looking up...
 
....could it be a money thing for some racers???or what I've heard from a Europeon racers stand point..Husky chooses what gear they have to wear?!?..that seems absurd to me...I thought I saw Juha wearing YOKO gear at some point early this year:confused:."Teams" usually want their riders,for the most part ,to wear related product ,don't they? It would curb the cost of supplying multiple team riders...and even though Husky is owned by BMW,they are in no way a LARGE racing effort . I am sure they got to keep costs in check...saving more so they can use that money for R&D.
If I wasn't an ol'fart with a blown out knee and enough aches and pains that keep the pharmaceutical companies in business and WAS actually fast,I'd hit Husky up for a ride "CHEAP" !:banana:

Guscycle:cheers:
 
Its racing, follow all the motorsports silly season and see team shifts, personnel shifts, sponsor shifts etc etc. Hey American Suzuki lost one of the best MX riders in the world, and look at the WEC its a real circus of bike/team swaps. If we are not just focused on "our" brand its very common place, even the dissatisfaction mid season issues, just that alot are on contract for a season and stick with their "bad" seasons. In our low budget offroad/MX sport (in comparison to most motorsports) riders are racing for finish money without much or any salary at all ( that even goes for high level TV friendly world supersport road racing and other venues).
Its also an all new Husky and Husky teams, This bike and the other (4 strokes are still in devel) in world class racing terms the 250/310 platform is amazing, if the time from its inception to world enduro championships is considered. Of course there is always more work to be done (MX level especially). I dont see anything wrong what was printed its probably true if you talk with a bunch of US centric riders in MX or offroad (but not all). If you speak with Euro centric racers these choice of brand questions may arise for FIM MX, but for enduro the answer is in 2010s E1 and 2011s E1 and E2 championships as well as the other teammates succeses. Of course I have alot more of my big mouth stuff to opine about but thats enough for now. Redslush wrote what he has sensed or heard among racers, his and their opinion is welcomed in my world and worthy of discussion (thats why we have these forums). In our moto centric world talk with MX guys and you will really hear how bad and how good all the riders and their machines are, talk about heavy handed opinions (full on brainwashed dedication to brands and riders). Ok have a nice week. R

PS my 1999 TE610 has a racing pedigree that is epic, starting from Martens' MX championship to all those WEC championships, ask any US (especially a SoCal US, east coasters are more in tune with the brand) off roader and most only know that KX500s and Hondas have ever won anything and that the 610 is POS weird beast* from that time frame. (* that's kinda true but shes a cool and good weird beast )
 
Hey guys!

Rob, good off ya to come here and address what you wrote. When I first read it I too thought it was awfully harsh. In fact, I still do. But, I agree with you that there is some truth to it. My guess is it's more with the bike setup/parts/support than it is with the bikes themselves. As someone else pointed out, BMW owns them but it's far from a factory effort.

Here in the southeast we have an up and coming rider switch from Husky to KTM a year ago and he went from finishing around tenth to overalling races. He overalled the Lochloosa Enduro a month or so ago and he overalled the SETRA Harescramble this past weekend. No, I 100% do not think it's that KTM is a better bike. I think it's that KTM has better support and knowledge base so that riders can better setup a bike for their specific preferences.

Rob, consider using less exclamation points....makes you sound gay.
 
I know the competition may not be as stiff in Canada as in other parts of the world, but the CDN Husq race team has top 3'ed every class in our National Enduro Championships.

The riders used TXC250, TE310 and TXC511s.
I understand that Canadian Husky Teams, are hooked up to CH Racing Factory Team for tech info and race parts.
 
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