Winning Tecate on a borrowed (Arizona) Gasser

[AZRickD]

http://gofasters.com/index.php?main_...ub=news&id=451

Colorado's Scott Bright talks Tecate

7. Dec. 2010

Scott Bright & Motocity joins forces and he talks about his ride.

I raced the GasGas 300 at the Tecate Enduro this past weekend. The event was absolutely awesome and was approximately 90 miles long of tough technical desert terrain.

Motocity KTM/GasGas hooked me up with a 2011 GasGas 300 and the bike worked flawlessly. I got the bike from Geoff about 45 minutes before the event started Saturday morning and I put handguards on it. When I threw a leg over ? the first thing to cross my mind was how awesome the seat was. Those frame rail indentions in my cheeks from riding an orange bike for the last 5 years may actually disappear!! I adjusted the handlebars and levers to suit and headed for the start line. The next difference I noticed was that I had to pay more attention to keeping the front wheel on the ground. The front end of this bike is SO light and the torque so strong that she wanted to climb anything and everything. Having been on a 4 Stroke for over a year now ? it took some adjusting to remember how to ride a bike that wants to GO ? NOW! I actually turned the ignition switch to the soft curve to tame it down and it worked even better. The next thing I noticed was the suspension. I have ridden a bike with KTM SXS suspension for the last 3 years, and the Marzocchi/Sachs combo was as good ? if not better than my factory tuned stuff. The shock soaked absolutely everything all day long and never kicked or complained. Once I turned the compression clickers on the forks out a couple clicks, the forks were working in harmony with the shock and the ride was amazing.

The next thing that was VERY APPARENT was the turning capabilities. With my previous bike I would come into a corner and throw the bars to the stops and wait for it to stop pushing through the corner and decide which way it wanted to go ? NOT SO with the Gasser. Using the same technique I would turn the bars a little and lean into the corner and BAM, I was in an all new line I haven?t seen in years. The inside line is something I haven?t seen since I rode a GasGas in 2005, and I realized in Tecate how much I missed it. Every corner on the GasGas is a new experience of choices I never had before. Inside line, A line, B line, C line, outside line ? they were all available as choices on this bike. It took me a while to adjust to all these new options. When I started the event I looked at the steering stops and the range of the steering and noticed that it would not be physically possible to remove the steering stops on this bike like I had on the KTM. There was NO NEED ? the GasGas never touched the stops and turned inside of the KTM?s lines all day long.

The power was impressively smooth. The orange 300 doesn?t like to be revved and is very finicky to jetting. I rode this bike stock and it pulled very smoothly from the bottom with more torque and then screamed like a 250 on top. When riding KTM?s I quit riding the 300 because it really wasn?t a race motor as much as it was a trail riding motor. The 250 was a better choice because of how it revved out. The GasGas 300 revs out like a 250 ? absolutely incredible. There were a few open sections in the race and I kept shifting up when I saw them. When I got to 5th gear with my hair on fire (right ? I?m bald) I shifted to 6th and was immediately revving to warp speed, in total control, no panic necessary. Another startling observation was how light the bike felt. I literally thought I was riding a 50hp mountain bike in the technical stuff. Never out of control, never over-correcting, never man-handling it around, the bike felt like nothing was there.

I would have to say that the GasGas 300 is about 15-25% better of a racing motorcycle than the orange bike in every category. If Motocity wants to sell any more KTM 2 strokes, they better not bring the GasGas?s to the demo. All it takes is a 5 minute ride on both bikes to know which one makes a better race bike. The Gas-Gas provides an answer to the age old question ? can my choice in a motorcycle make me a better rider? If you choose the GasGas the answer is most definitely YES.

Thanks HUGE to Motocity for helping me out with this. No ? I don?t work for the company and I don?t have anything to gain from these notes, but I can tell you that with the direction that GasGas US is headed, I will be there to support the brand in any way possible. If there are G-G dealers in my area, I would be more than happy to provide my testing results to them for whatever setup customization might be necessary for their customers.

I can?t wait to get my 2011 GasGas, it should be here in a few weeks. Racing has gotten exciting again!

Sincerely,

Scott Bright

[AZRickD]

Looks like he got 3rd in the Senior Division.

http://www.enduro360.com/2010/12/07/...ts-and-photos/