Slow Motorcycle on a Fast Track: No Shortage of Fun

Last September I had the opportunity to ride a friend’s Kawasaki Ninja 250 on the Thunderbolt road course at New Jersey Motorsports Park. You may wonder why I would choose to ride a bike with around 32 horsepower on a circuit that is made for high horsepower bikes. The answer is that a well-ridden bike is fun no matter its power output.
The video shows the Intermediate (Yellow group) session with Tony’s Track Days. Before anyone asks; the suspension and every other component on the 250R is stock. Thanks Younia, for the ride!

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3 Replies to “Slow Motorcycle on a Fast Track: No Shortage of Fun”

  1. You acquired the details right: us aged farts die out, and fewer more youthful will follow in our western societies, the age pyramid is inverted. Its India and Asia were the development is, and their young riders do not begin their journey with a Ultra Limited.

    1. I’ve owned about 10 bikes over the years, starting with a 1968 Triumph Bonneville back in the day. It is easy to become enthralled with the HP and MPH top end possibilities. I owned a Hayabusa and didn’t enjoy it at all. Too much power and nowhere to use it. However, having migrated from the Harley world a couple of years ago, I decided to start my track riding process on a totally underpowered 28 Hp Honda CBR 250R ( about 10% less HP than a stock Ninja). The goal was to learn and optimize my track riding skills and then move on when I was confident I was getting the most performance out of the bike on the track. After about 6 track days and a couple of one-on-one lessons, I am getting there and will probably bring my 600RR to track days next year. As Ken says, it is a lot of fun going around a track at high revs in every gear and I am not going to move up totally to a larger bike until I get every ounce of performance out of the 250.

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