Nitron Shock

Our Nitron shock arrived last week and as usual it looks the dogs danglies. We will get this slotted into the frame this week along with the ZX6R forks to get some measurements together of how the bike needs sit.

Frame Check

I took a ride up to Malton with Rob last week to visit John Warringtons Motorcycles to get the frame checked out that Kawasaki Cottingham had donated to the cause. The good news was the frame was straight and is good to go. The next job will be to remove the heavy steel subframe and make a bespoke aluminium one to go in its place in an effort to shed some weight.

Our Plans For 2011

As you will hopefully know last year we won the ThundersportGB GP2 Championship and this will once again be our main focus for 2011. We did feel though that we had come to the end of the road with the development of the old bike and so have decided that a new project was the order of the day. The choice of bike was quite a simple one as the new bikes on the block for this class are the 650cc twins. Our selection came down to a Kawasaki Versys/ER6, so therefore we went ahead and purchased a 2010 Versys as these have a far superior swing arm than the ER6 as you can see on the picture. Thanks to Ian Popplewell of Kawasaki Cottingham for the frame.
The Versys engine is in a slightly lower state of tune than the ER6 mainly through a lower compression ratio and different cams but as we will be tuning the engine this will not be an issue. Also going on to the bike will be a new Nitron race shock, ZX6R forks with radial brakes and Brembo master cylinder connected by Goodridge brake lines. In order to keep the tuned engine cool a larger radiator will be needed and the ZX6 radiator like the one we used on the ZXR last year as supplied by Delkevic looks like a good place to start. This will be connected by Samco silicone hoses from Racebikebitz. A wider rear wheel needs to be added as well to accommodate the Dunlop slicks that we will be using again this year. When finished, the racing machine will look nothing like the bike that we started with and should push out the 80rwhp that is allowed within the class rules.

Other races I will be competing in this year as long as budgets allow will be Oliver’s Mount Road Races in Scarborough, Aberdare Park Road Races in South Wales and possibly a one ride in a 250GP race at Assen, Holland in September

Season Preparation

As is usual at this time of year, Christmas comes and goes, then before you know it we are heading towards the start of a new season and all the ensuring panic that goes with it to get ready. We have been very lucky in that the majority of our sponsors from last year have chosen to stick with us for this season and in addition we have a few new ones come onboard for the journey. With the current climate of the country I know this is not easy for people to commit to so I would like to take this opportunity from the outset to say a massive thank you to all our sponsors and supporters as without them we would not be able to compete and go racing.