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Goodbye Yamaha – Hello KTM

May 30

Just gotta dedicate this post to the last couple years of good riding on what I thought was an awesome bike, my 2008 YZ450F.

IMG 0978

Things I loved:

  • Looks: the white, black and red looked really good I thought… although the 2009 with the black wheels looked even better.
  • Factory Connection suspension: before I even rode this bike, I sent the suspension off to Factory Connection and had them re-do the springs/valving for off-road/trail riding. It ended up matching my style of riding perfectly and felt like a cadillac through all the little technical chop. It was a little soft on the whoops and any type of significant jump, but I don’t do that very much anyway.
  • Coming off my CRF450X, this bike felt a lot smaller and lighter with a lower center of gravity, seemed like it was a lot easier to recover if I lost my balance or got crossed up in ruts and roots.
  • Power was plenty for me and easy to manage.
  • Reliable, I never had any type of serious problem with this bike, just regular maintenance and TLC.

Things I didn’t like:

  • Kicking it, I was spoiled that my first real bike had e-start. Fortunately, I learned how to hold my mouth just right in about any situation and could usually start it in just a couple of kicks. Cold= choke, 3 squirts, don’t touch the throttle, kick. Hot= half squirt, barely pull on hot start, kick. After wreck= hop on right foot while spinning counter-clockwise, hot start full open, kick 4 or 5 times… etc.
  • No kickstand, took me a little while to remember to turn off my gas every time I laid he bike down. Made it a lot harder to ride with the kids and jump off to help them when they tip it over.

I hope the gentleman who bought it off KSL will enjoy it as much as I did!

New (to me) bike: 2009 KTM 450 XCF. Thanks to my buddy Zac for giving me a deal I couldn’t pass up. He took really good care of this bike and it has quite a bit less hours than my Yamaha was getting on it. So far, I’ve ridden it in Moab, Cherry Creek, California, and a couple of trails up by Dayton, ID. I love it! It’s already a lot more scratched and probably feels a lot more abused than when Zac had it, but I think this is the start of my favorite bike relationship. Hopefully, I’ll be able to stay injury free and find time to get it out regularly.

Fb

 

Posted by on May 30, 2011 in fun

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