Walton - We're Finally at the End of the Line

Jason Hughes and Rod Runzer celebrate their rider, Teddy Maier's third place overall finish in the MX2 Championship.





Wow, we finally made it. Walton is in the books and the team had a pretty good season for a first year effort. Though things didn't go as well as the season opening 1-2 finish, Teddy still kept the team on the box with a second overall finish for the day and third overall for the season. Pretty amazing considering he didn't even race the Regina round and was nursing a hurt ankle through most of the season. The guy is definitely a champion, hopefully next year the cards will fall his way and he'll take the title.

Nick's bizzare season of bad luck continued with a flat front tire in the first moto and getting stuck after colliding with a downed rider in the second moto that knocked his gas cap off, dousing him with gas. I've never seen such horrible luck with a rider before. Everyone knows he's capable of winning, hopefully he can't get the hex off of him for next season and show everyone he belongs on top of the box.

If it wasn't for his opening round dnf, Brock would have been solidly in the top 10 for the season. After starting off slow he turned it on in the last half of the season, putting in a bunch of great rides. I'm sure with his first full season under his belt this year, he'll be fired up coming into the Canadian Arenacross series where he's always a threat. He's also racing the Montreal Supercross so he'll no doubt be looking for his first podium in the all Canadian MX2 class.

Well, everyone is back home in their respective provinces and states now. The team is extremely happy with their first season and can't wait for next year, look for things to be bigger and better. A huge thanks to everyone who helped the team out this year, you guys made this all possible. Hit them up at the links on the right and support the people who support us and are helping keep Canadian Motocross going.

Stay tuned for more news as things happen at Team Monster Energy/Thor/Leading Edge Kawasaki!

James Lissimore photos:


Your 2008 Leading Edge Kawasaki team.

Walton - We're Finally at the End of the Line

Jason Hughes and Rod Runzer celebrate their rider, Teddy Maier's third place overall finish in the MX2 Championship.





Wow, we finally made it. Walton is in the books and the team had a pretty good season for a first year effort. Though things didn't go as well as the season opening 1-2 finish, Teddy still kept the team on the box with a second overall finish for the day and third overall for the season. Pretty amazing considering he didn't even race the Regina round and was nursing a hurt ankle through most of the season. The guy is definitely a champion, hopefully next year the cards will fall his way and he'll take the title.

Nick's bizzare season of bad luck continued with a flat front tire in the first moto and getting stuck after colliding with a downed rider in the second moto that knocked his gas cap off, dousing him with gas. I've never seen such horrible luck with a rider before. Everyone knows he's capable of winning, hopefully he can't get the hex off of him for next season and show everyone he belongs on top of the box.

If it wasn't for his opening round dnf, Brock would have been solidly in the top 10 for the season. After starting off slow he turned it on in the last half of the season, putting in a bunch of great rides. I'm sure with his first full season under his belt this year, he'll be fired up coming into the Canadian Arenacross series where he's always a threat. He's also racing the Montreal Supercross so he'll no doubt be looking for his first podium in the all Canadian MX2 class.

Well, everyone is back home in their respective provinces and states now. The team is extremely happy with their first season and can't wait for next year, look for things to be bigger and better. A huge thanks to everyone who helped the team out this year, you guys made this all possible. Hit them up at the links on the right and support the people who support us and are helping keep Canadian Motocross going.

Stay tuned for more news as things happen at Team Monster Energy/Thor/Leading Edge Kawasaki!

James Lissimore photos:


Your 2008 Leading Edge Kawasaki team.

Free Mod for 2008/2007 Kawasaki ZX6R

ZX-6R Free Horsepower!
By Kevin Duke

Pity the poor sportbike engineers who must find a way to create 599cc engines that produce 100 horsepower at the rear wheel while meeting every-stricter exhaust emissions regulations. And while spent exhaust gases must be cleaner than ever, noise emissions must also be kept in check, although that standard hasn’t been revised in decades.

Duke learns that meeting EPA regulations hampers racetrack performance.

Nowhere is that more apparent than Kawasaki’s ZX-6R. Since its 2005 iteration, the ZX’s ECU includes programming which closes a valve in the exhaust at high revs, restricting its top-end power and reducing its overrev zone past the engine’s power peak. (European ZX’s aren’t afflicted, as they have different sound-level regulations across the Pond.) This combines to make the stock Ninja feel less exciting, and its rapid power loss once past the engine’s peak forces some extra gearshifts, especially when riding in the power-hungry environment of a racetrack. Our ZX test unit was the least powerful 600 on the dyno, spinning up just 97.7 hp at its peak.





But why is the Kawi saddled with this limitation while the other OEMs don’t seem to suffer from similar programming? That’s been difficult to identify, but Kawi reps assure us their bikes adhere to the obfuscatory EPA noise regulations guidelines that are self-regulated by the OEMs.

“All Kawasaki street motorcycles, including the Kawasaki Ninja ZX-6R, sold in the United States have been designed to meet all current U.S. emissions and noise regulations for street-legal motorcycles,” is Team Green’s official statement on the subject. Since the sportbikes from other OEMs aren’t similarly affected, the implication is they aren’t meeting the same requirements.

Glenn Hansen, Suzuki’s communications manager, explained to us that the ECUs on Suzuki products bound for America are different than their Euro counterparts, and he added that all their bikes meet current regulations. He pointed out that using dual mufflers on Suzuki’s GSX-R1000 was partially the result of meeting noise edicts.

Lucky for ZX trackday riders (off-road-use only, doncha know? Nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more…), the party-pooping programming can quickly be defeated. Simply unplug the cap of the four-pin electrical connection under the seat and bridge the black/yellow wires to the green/dark green wires across from each other in the connector. This defaults the ECU to European spec and lets the engine breathe at high rpm by keeping the exhaust “power” valve open.

When we performed this trick on our ZX, we found a 5-hp increase (102.8 hp) in peak power, making it competitive with its rivals, but the biggest improvement was in the overrev zone above 13,000 rpm where the stock ECU programming strangles the Ninja. There is nearly a 10-hp gap at 14,000 rpm, with the stock bike wheezing out 93.4 ponies to the modified ECU’s 102.7.

It should be noted that the Ninja doesn’t feel particularly down on power during street rides, as it’s only when screaming up near maximum revs that this shortcoming becomes apparent. But it’s too bad that the stock bike needs an excuse, because in race trim the ZX-6Rs are formidable foes in the Supersport and Formula Xtreme race classes.


In stock form, the ZX-6R runs out of breath at high revs, but the ECU jumper mod lets it run like it should. In modified form, it posted a 5-horse boost in horsepower and a much more usable overrev zone.

Full article is here :
http://www.motorcycle.com/shoot-outs/2008-supersport-shootout-cbr600rr-vs-daytona-675-vs-zx6r-vs-r6-vs-gsxr600-82371.html

Sand Del Lee

Brock Hoyer fails on this attempt to rail a berm.



It's always nice when the weatherman is wrong....
Despite calls for thundershowers all day, Sunday ended up being a great day at Sand Del Lee and the boys at MX101 did a great job of scraping off the mud from Saturday's rain. Sand always makes things easier when it comes to dealing with the wet stuff. Teddy proved that it doesn't matter if it's sand or hardpack, wet or dry, he's going to be on the podium no matter what. It's really too bad that he got hurt and missed Regina because with his consistency he'd be right there for the title when the series heads to Walton next weekend for the last round. As it was, his third overall bumped him from 5th up to 3rd in the points standings.

Brock was on fire as well. In the first moto he got a great start and ran up near the front all moto, engaged in a three way battle for the 5th spot between Joey Leadbeater and Kaven Benoit. Unfortunately near the end of the race, Brock crashed into a bail and had to settle for 7th place, still his best moto finish of the year. His 8th overall was another step up the chain and it's great to see him showing improvement every weekend. Hopefully next weekend he can keep it going, you can definitely see he's got a top 5 in him.

Now we're off to Walton where the rig is already parked in preparation for the Walton Trans-Can Amatuer National Championships. Greg Small is flying the Leading Edge banner in the Intermediate classes so look for him on the number 317 KX250F.

James Lissimore Photos:


Brock was on it all day.


Teddy was solid as usual. If he gets a start he'll win another one of these.

Moncton

Nick Evennou


Well, the team made it's way to Moncton last weekend for the Riverglade round and despite looking like it was going to be a mud race the track ended up being perfect.
The riders were all out early to film the Team promo video with Destroyer Films so everyone was well rested for the weekend and eager to get out there. Nick was especially excited since he won here last year and was hoping to repeat again. Too bad, his strange luck continued as he was shocked by his bike in moto 2. Can't say I've ever heard of someone being electrocuted by their own motorcycle but with the way Nick's season has been going it doesn't seem as suprising.

Teddy was solid again and despite tweaking his hurt ankle again still rode to strong 4-4 moto finishes and would have had third in the first moto but a lapper cut him off and stopped him dead, allowing Mason Phillips to get back around him with 2 laps to go. It's too bad that Teddy missed Regina because he'd have been right there for the championship with the recent troubles that Eric Nye and Aron Harvey have suffered. I guess that's racing.

Brock was his usual consistent self, finishing 10th overall. He's been working hard all week to try and bridge that next gap and crack the top 5. He rode at Sand Del Lee two years ago on a 450 so his familiarity with the track should help him with that goal. Also, Leading Edge supported Intermediate rider, Greg Small, son of the teams truck driver qualified for his first national at Riverglade and even managed to score 2 points in the second moto with a 19th. Way to go Greg, it only gets easier from here!

Nick and Brock have both stayed out in New Brunswick all week to practice so they'll be making the drive to Sand Del Lee on Friday. There may be some big news for Sand Del Lee so stay tuned.....


James Lissimore Photos: