deej wrote:my posts are all meant in good fun banter too,its niot about stirring it up its a bit of fun thats all
its discussions like this which are enjoyable
Agreed, the trouble with online forums is that it can be all too easy to get the wrong end of the stick as you're not face to face with the person you're having the discussion with.
i can take the critisicm quite happily but as mike points out to si how can you really compare if you've never ridden or owned a duke/sp1 or even a aprillia. we all like our own bikes and different marques,i like most sports bikes but do have a soft spot for ducatis,hate gsxr's tho would never but another one,lol. im wondering what your views would be if you didnt have a vtr so out of curiosity can i ask what other bikes you have ridden/owned to base your judgements on?all friendly of course. ive had a nc30/nc35/99 r6/748/00 mille/03 cbr6rr/916/gsxr1000k3/06 r6/06 zx10/04 blade,best not forget the cg125 and ccmr30s too lol,so have tried a few different marques and styles to base my own choices upon
As I mentioned before I considered your comment about the SP only winning once as being a tad unfair & that was what I thought we were debating there. However if the discussion is about how various bikes compare then that's a different matter & can throw up all sorts of connotations. We'd be here all year!!!
But it is a fair point that if someone hasn't ridden a particular bike they won't be able to make a full & fair judgement.
My personal dislike (not hatred I may add) of Ducatis comes mainly from an engineering point of view, I just don't see the quality that everyone raves about that warrants such a premium price tag. IMO the Honda is superior. Besides, Ducatis just don't do it for me in the looks department, I don't think they're the drop dead gorgeous bikes that people seem to see in them. But that's my personal taste & it would be a very boring world if everyone liked the same thing.
Also many people buy Italian (whether it be bikes, cars, clothes, etc) purely because of the name or to make a fashion statement, irrespective of whether it's any good. I wouldn't be too surprised if such people would quite happily pay silly money for a cardboard box if it was painted red & had a Ducati/Ferrari/Alfa/Armani/Gucci/etc badge on it.
Now I'm not saying that you fall into this category (in fact I doubt it given the amount of bikes you've had), but with that in mind would any Ducatis/MV Agusta's/Benellis etc been so sought after if they'd got an MZ badge on the tank? I'm not convinced that they would.
See my post to your thread 'what do you ride' in reply to what I've had/got/would like.
results speak for themselves i agree but some bikes work well in some classes and not others. i cant remember what year it was at the TT but didnt honda wheel some real trick wsb out for the great joey dunlop to win on ? everyone does it for what ever reason,the japs all do it for the suzuka 8hr much to the annoynace of the likes of phase one,hey age ?
the 1980's/early 90s 500cc thing is again my personal opinion,think it was better racing for a lot of reasons,more personalities,bigger grids,closer racing.its a shame motogp moved upto 1000cc as that was wsbk was all about, the 800's is a funny choice as it doesnt represent a single bike on the market which is good as its what prototype motogp is all about.
anyway back to the original post,when you going to buy one then si, 848 perhaps or woud it have to be a 1098 ?
To be honest, the racing is nothing more than entertainment to me, & I'm not really that bothered who wins the race or even the championship. But it does get on my pip when teams/manufacturers appear to get the rules changed to suit themselves, & the Italians have been pretty good at this over the years in many sports, not just bike racing. All that happens when one team/manufacturer dominates so much is that the racing/entertainment becomes boring, examples of which are Foggy/Ducati, Schumacher/Ferrari, Doohan/Honda. Up until last year F1 was a boring procession, everyone pretty much knew that Schu would be on pole & would win the race, even if his team mate had managed to get in front, he'd be ordered out of the way. Add to that the rule book for Ferrari would be relatively vague, but for every other team/driver it would have to be to the letter with big fines for any misdemeanour, assisted by Herr Max Mosely & Bernie Ecclestone's obvious Ferrari bias.
Because of the unfair advantage that twins/Ducati had over il4s in WSB in the 90's I have to admit that it was somewhat satisfying when Honda played them at their own game, developed the SP1, & beat Ducati, not only in its first race, but also the championship in it's first season.
I considered it a good move when the rules were changed to allow everyone to race on an equal capacity footing, but unfortunately it all appears to be happening again now that twins are being allowed to run up to 200cc more than il4s. Forgive my cynical outlook, but isn't the head of WSB an Italian?
IMO there should be a max capacity & a manufacturer can run whatever combination of cylinders they choose so long as it doesn't exceed the max.
Anyway, no offence taken or made & on with the banter
I knew the Yanks had bought Ducati and I had some vague thought that it was HD, thats about the time they both began to use Japanese electrics, but I hadn't heard they had gone back into Italian ownership.
