96 DAYS SOBER – APRIL MASTER POST – BOTW #5 – MOTO2N | Denver

I’m 96 days sober as of writing this. Very proud of myself. Much thanks to the people who have offered kind words and encouragement! I’m not the type to shy away from telling people about myself, my favorite subject. I also quit smoking weed, so that makes this the sober-est I’ve been in something like 20 years. I feel great. The pitfalls of smoking too much weed could be a whole post unto itself, but it’d be off topic as all hell so let’s not go there. Suffice it to say I don’t think smoking weed is such a great thing anymore after being off of it for 3+ months. MOVING ON… TO THE SCOOTER AND MOTORCYCLE STUFF!

Pueblo Track Day on My Favorite Bike, the Slingshot GSXR

As a proud, card carrying member of the cult of Old Skool Suzuki -all hail the Hammer of Hamamatsu- I own ’91 GSXR750 track-only bike I built up from what I bought as a rolling chassis.

Its seen 3 whole track days since I’ve owned it. Its first outing was during late 2018, and it was a rainy, cold, shitty September day, and the bike chewed its rear wheel bearing up because I’m an idiot and didn’t realize all the parts weren’t where they should be. Its next outing was a windy day on my birthday in 2019. I was hungover, but the bike worked great. Let’s skip over 2020 and 2021 because I was up to no good those years.

I started working on making it run again at 6:15AM a few days ahead of the day I wanted to ride it. It did its usual thing and smoked like a French hooker after being woken up from its 2 year coma.

Front right view of track only GSXR750

I’d treated it to a half a tank of ethanol free 91 octane from Chief Petroleum, and it responded by running about perfectly. So I paid my money and put my name on the list for Easter Sunday’s track day at Pueblo Motorsports Park.

Track day registration from Pueblo Motorsports Park

Here’s a pic from the morning of. I liked the lighting.

Right, exhaist side of track only GSXR750

And here we are at the track. I use the same tools to work on my bikes as I do your bikes. I have what could be described as a weird relationship with my tools, they’re extensions of my body and mind. There’s no “losing the 10mm socket and oopsy” bullshit with me. If I don’t know exactly where any one of my tools is at any given time, my brain does a good old fashioned freak out inside my skull. I can count the number of tools I’ve lost in 10 years of working on bikes professionally on one hand, and I can tell you exactly what happened that led to their loss. And they were all replaced in short order.

The GSXR shot through the van's rear doors with tools visible in the foreground

This was my first time at Pueblo, so I spent a good half of the day getting used to and trying to learn the track, and remember how to ride on a race track, and being somewhat terrified of crashing my beloved GSXR, which is more of a showpiece or collector’s item than it is a performance machine at this point. I’d like to learn how to ride it fast, but I don’t think it’s the bike to learn how to go fast on. I need a practice bike, which brings me to the project I’ve been working on and writing about since getting sober

The 2022 Street, Track Day, and Race Bike, ’06 Kawasaki Ninja 650R

Let’s review all that’s happened with this thing in the past ~90 days or so. We went from this absolute turd of a theft recovery…

Before pic of Ninja 650R

To this right here, which is how it looked a week or two ago…

Middle of project pic of Ninja 650R

So it’s still not quite done, but some things have happened to it since the above picture was taken. If you look closely at the tail end of it, maybe squint a little bit, you will see a license plate mounted to it. THIS BAD BOY IS STREET LEGAL! It has a plate, I have the title in my name, it’s insured (highly recommend Progressive for motorcycle insurance!).

You’ll notice it’s missing a few things. No grips. It has grips now. No lights. It has lights now. Busted crappy stock front brake lines. It has stainless lines from Galfer and fresh brake fluid now and brand new EBC HH pads in the calipers. I’m about to order the rear stainless line for it. I rebuilt the forks. Old shitty tires. There’s a brand new set of Bridgestone S22s sitting in the basement waiting to be installed. I’m going to put some effort into mounting them in such a way so as to not use any wheel weights, which will be pretty damn trick if I can pull it off. I’m shit canning those stupid folding levers and replacing them with the stock levers. I have extra bars for it. I scored a spare set of rearsets for it on eBay to replace the cracked left one and have a spare for the right. Here’s another pic of it to remind you of what it looked like when it was a mock up, before I welded in the new seat section and did the wiring, done and done:

Left side view of custom Ninja 650

There are more things left to do because there’s always more to do with bikes. I’m going to paint the tail section and fork legs Kawasaki green and slap a foam pad on the seat section. I have an aluminum swingarm from a Versys on the way for it, that should be a fun project unto itself. Why does it have a blue fender? I was one color short of RED WHITE AND BLUE ‘cuz ‘MURCA BABY! Kawasaki green because there aint nothin’ more ‘MURCAN than hopping up Japanese motorcycles. That’s why. If you don’t like it because you think all bikes should be flat black, I don’t care. I built it for me and nobody else. It’s a stupid toy to me, and I think it should look the part. My bikes aren’t “my preciouses” or whatever. They’re turds. They’re toys. Even the GSXR, as much as I love it.

I plan on riding this bike on the street and taking it to as many track days as I can this year. Also: racing. The last time I got a race license, I did it through the MRA’s Superstreet program, and I did it too fast, and I spent too much money, and I was a flash in the pan. This time will be different, 10 years later. The following dates and places are absolutes on my calendar, they’re all Saturdays:

June 4, Pikes Peak International Raceway – MRA Superstreet

June 25, High Plains Racewat (North Course) – MRA Superstreet

August 6, Pueblo Motorsports Park – MRA Superstreet

August 27, High Plains Raceway (West Course) – MRA Superstreet

September 24, High Plains Raceway (Full Course) – MRA Superstreet

These dates are non-negotiable, and short of a stampede of wild horses or physical injury I will absolutely be at all of them running the Ninja. If the Ninja blows up and I can’t fix it in time, I’ll buy another bike or run the GSXR. I’m determined not to be a “flash in the pan” this time around, and I’m damn sure I have my shit together enough to pull this off.

To learn more about regional club racing in Colorado, check out the MRA’s website. To learn more about the superstreet class, click here.

To make a short story long, riding sporty bikes with sticky tires is a weird, niche hobby that maybe a couple few thousand people in the entire country are into. But if you’re into it, you tend to be obsessed with it, want to do it when you’re not doing it, will do anything it takes to get back to doing it. A huge goal of mine is to be AND STAY a motorcycle road racer. A huge part of why I started this business was to make enough money to be able to do it, and now I’m doing it. Only took 10 years but hey, anything worth doing is worth doing poorly and coming back to over and over again.

The next track day I’ll be at is on May 21st at Pikes Peak International Raceway. That’s shortly before the first Superstreet round at PPIR (same track), and I plan to get some coaching and direction and soak up as much information as I can while I’m there. Here’s the flyer. I’m already registered.

Flyer for legion track day at PPIR May 21

Fun fact: I bring all my tools and supplies to the track with me, and anyone who needs a tool, or something I have and don’t need, or some help turning wrenches gets what they need at no cost to them. What goes around comes around at the race track, and it’s my favorite place on Earth filled with my favorite types of people.

AHRMA Racing at High Plains Raceway – April 24, 2022 (all of them are BOTW #5 haha!)

I went and saw the thing. Although there wasn’t a “hoard” of two stroke GP bikes to bring that sweet sweet music to my ears, there were plenty of interesting bikes, including a few built and ridden by “industry famous” people whatever in the hell that means. Well known motorcycle people. Racing old bikes. It’s kind of funny when people think people like old bikes because we can’t afford anything else. That’s not the reason we ride old bikes, and it’s kind of like telling me someone knows nothing about motorcycles without actually telling me, like in those memes the kids are into these days.

Here’s the photo dump:

Bruce Sass's Yamaha Bruce Sass's other bikes Honda NSF250R TZ250 TZ125 Ancient Indian road racers Sidehack racer Pierobon Ducati Other side Kawasaki KZ Kawasaki Big Horn in roadrace trim Yamaha FZR 400/600 Ancient Indian roadracers

Fun game… how many of these bikes can YOU identify? Most of them look nothing like the stock bikes. Many are purpose built race machines, production and bespoke. The variety that vintage road racing offers trips my triggers 100%. In a word, it’s awesome. Long live AHRMA!