Qualifying goes extremely well for Jorge Martin who obliterates the track record! Pecco Bagnaia, previous track record holder, then goes on to be ever so slightly faster while looking tidier and holds the track record for fast lap another year.
In the sprint Jorge Martin gets a killer start, per usual, and pulls into the lead and immediately sets a hot pace to push Bagnaia. Bagnaia would hang on for a lap and then WRECK OUT in the low speed and tricky turn 9. 12 points to Martin for a 29 point lead which is significant given how late in the season we are. Marc Marquez with a good start from second row into third then holds on to second after Bagnaia's crash. Incredible pace from the GP23 and Marc Marquez over the sprint.
In the race proper Martin again looks like he will be pressuring Bagnaia from the lead. However, a race 2 incident where Jack Miller crashed and his head contacted and was torqued by Quartararo's rear wheel was cause for a red flag. I thought Jack might be seriously injured or paralyzed, but he would later be up and walking! Given that people are seriously injured and killed even at this level it seems a minor miracle that his neck wasn't twisted too far. In the restart Bagnaia nails the start this time and holds the lead going into turn one. Jorge and Bagnaia would bump and barge into one another and slice and dice through the corners for several laps. Jorge seemed aggressive almost beyond belief in what I can only assume was an effort to force another error from Pecco. The #1 plate would hold strong and hang on for a victory as a late charge by Martin attempting to close the gap established just 5 laps in was met with a few near-wrecks and he settled for second place. Marquez would wreck out but return to the points positions - again - to keep his fingerhold on 3rd place in the championship vs Bastianini who finished third.
I had earlier said 1-2 finishes with Bagnaia winning everything would still see Martin with the championship. The situation is looking dire unless Martin has a late season blunder in the full blown race. If Jorge Martin wins the sprint and Bagnaia places 2nd then Martin will be +26 over Bagnaia and everything is settled.
MotoGP's final round of 2024 takes place in, as the Spaniards say, Barthelona next weekend (15th-17th).
I wouldn't say Lando is completely uuseless, but he's spoiled now amd he cant go back. He's definitely not an awful driver and but if you wanna talk about princesses, him and George are sisters. He not only mocked Max, who's clearly the best driver on the grid, at his home race, but when Max embarrassed the ever-living hell out of him on Sunday, he had the audacity to say it was 'not talent or, you know, just luck'. He's honestly more of a princess than George if you ask me...
It was actually more directed at Red Bull 'the team' not Red Bull 'the driver' (we aren't talking about Perez anymore) but i feel like it still puts the same basic point across
Interesting you mention GM not scoping the competition.
There was definitely a strong case of myopia within the halls of GM at one point, and I’m sure the execs were keen to disregard the little “upstart” companies from the Far East, but I think that even by the mid-late 70s, GM quietly knew it was losing the plot against the foreign competition.
What made the X cars so bad (and the Vega, and the GM10s, and so many other moonshot projects before and since) was GM’s inability to claw out of its own mess. I fully believe GM intended to build the best dang cars out there, and probably could have…but its legacy issues were coming home to roost. Things like bloated UAW/Unifor obligations (and GM’s enmeshed, vulnerable situation with those entities), a terribly inefficient management structure and all manner of corporate infighting. GM was unable to overcome those obstacles each and every time it would try to do something remarkable in a volume segment.
And then, when GM did get out of its own way and set up a subsidiary with a completely different structure and its own engineering, sales and manufacturing operations, Saturn, it spent so much doing so that it lost billions of dollars at the expense of its other brands. And the cars were only mediocre, anyway; it was the marketing and culture that everyone loved.
Speaking of which: I, last week, suggested that instead of spending billions to do Saturn, which was a low-margin segment that would have never paid off (they were still losing as much as $3,000 per car by 1999)…GM should instead have sank that money into launching a luxury brand with a car the likes of the LS 400. If GM was determined to do a loss leader, why not do so on a high-ATP car, wherein it’d be easier to eventually recoup its investment, the way Lexus has for all these years? And the same way GM set up Saturn as its own thing and let it be separate from GM…GM could have done it with a luxury brand. It would have embarrassed Cadillac, but it would have paid dividends if done correctly. Unlike Saturn, which was a fiscal dead-end.
I think the idea was the need to setup new facilities, development and union contracts that would allow GM to make a competitive product rather than improve an existing brand with those legacy issues dragging it down.
Yes it was. Which is exactly the point. If GM was determined to lose money initially, why not do so in an impactful way, where it might have paid dividends? Saturn was a dead end.
I always liked this quote from Ross Perot, part of a 1988 interview on GM management:
“I took the position that anybody who needed a chauffeur to drive him to work was probably too old to be on the payroll, and that anybody in a car company ought to be driving his own car because you didn't get much of a feel in the back seat. We shouldn't be giving handmade cars to executives. We ought to cut out this business that if you're an executive your car comes into the garage every morning and the mechanics take it, and if there's anything wrong with it they fix it. You don't know what reality is. Your car is perfect. I say no. Go to a dealer. Buy a car. Negotiate for it. Have the engine fail. Have the transmission fall out. Have the tailpipe fall off.”
For the record, I am an MKZ "intender" who is currently unable to stretch past a Milan.
Now, our Mr. Klockau is on the exalted rolls of men who are fortunate enough to steer through life in the Mark Zed. Which is why I resent him so bitterly, among other reasons.
I was actually tempted to trade at McLaughlin last Saturday, they had a mint little old lady owned 2019 XTS. 12k miles! Only problem was world's most boring colors, silver with black interior.
I have an MKZ Hybrid as well and I'm surprised how much I enjoy it. I used to rent Fusions and could never get comfortable in the drivers seat but even though it is probably the same seat frame thew Lincoln's fits me perfectly like a glove. It has averaged just a hair under 39 mpg over its lifetime which means that every mile I put on it for work makes me money when the company reimburses me based on an SUV. It is a great commuting/travel for work car. Its only shortcoming is that its pretty slow, fortunately its other virtues more than make up for it.
During the Oldsmobile Diesel debacle I was working for Oldsmobile and those same cars had problems with the newfangled gas charged trunk struts failing and allowing the trunk to bash the head of the owner .
Oldsmobile Division was happy to B.S. most Customers and when they pitched a bitch they'd get some new struts at dealer cost plus labor .
Then some Detroit GM honcho was at the golf course and his head was bashed by a falling trunk, we got a memo that every single Oldsmobile that came in for service was to be checked for trunk struts and replaced automatically at no charge .
In general I agree that car men should run car companies and that's where GM went oh so wrong .
then something meaningful started happening - seems to me proving Mr. Perot’s point nicely!
I still have a pair of Vice Grips in my toolbox that came out of my first ever car, a Datsun; the previous owner had left behind said Grips to allow me to hold up the Datsun’s hatch with its blown out struts…. Grips are still going strong, the Datsun not so much!
In 1996 I began dating psycho-bitch and her 1982 Ford Escort L's hatch struts were gone, she was using a broom stick to hold it open at the grocery store, even then when I was seriously broke I couldn't tolerate my lady doing this and Pep Boys had new gas struts in stock for $10 each .
Then I discovered the latch and striker were kaput when she called me at work the day after I installed the new hatch struts ~ she was driving down the street when the hatch opened and stayed open .
Amazing how long some hair shirt rattle trap would run with so many things broken / amiss .
You'd have been shocked to see this one ~ it had been sideswiped so the passenger window couldn't roll down, hit in the right front so the entire headlamp bucket was loose in the back, the power steering pump had begun to leak so they simply removed the drive belt and pulley.....
The rockerbox had a bad gasket so it dribbled oil onto the exhaust manifold .
The entire front end of the unibody was tweaked that's when I discovered there were _no_ adjustments possible (!) .
The heater core had failed so they disconnected it and looped the hose back to the engine ~ in these cheapo cars the heater core was part of the cooling system, no hot water valve .
On and on ~ I think she told me she'd paid $250 for it because it ran and had current tags .
I cleaned that P.O.C. within an inch of it's life and hand polished then waxed the surprisingly good red paint then I began fixing all those niggly little things .
Eventually the timing belt snapped at sundown on a Friday in "you don't want to be here at night" Los Angeles, all the valves bent so I went back the next day and collected it , towed it to Pick A Part and coasted it into the yard and across the scales, tossed them the keys & title. said 'you'll have to jump it, battery's no good .
They gave me $800 (!) for it .
Yes, it was a hair shirt .
Yes, because I'm a dummy I didn't mind as long as it cranked up and went every day and it did that very well indeed .
Respectfully, I think that your analysis involves too much hindsight and a counterfactual.
Two key facts which were not known at the time of decision were a) that GM could *NEVER* compete in the mainstream segment and b) that the mainstream segment would vanish along with the middle class but the ultra-premium segment would sell out years in advance. Beyond that, I think you are also making a third assumption, namely, that people would pay premium prestige prices for a GM car.
GM arguably did make multiple attempts to go upmarket contemporaneously with Saturn: at some point in the 1990s, the General offered Allanté, Lotus, Hummer, and Saab in addition to their legacy upscale marques Buick, Oldsmobile, Cadillac, and Corvette.
Maybe the best course would to spend the money buying Toyota and/or Nissan.
After writing it out, the below is a bit of a wiki dump. The tl:dnr is they had all the ingredients but there were too many terrible cooks in the kitchen.
I disagree with your statement a)
Obviously with hindsight it is correct that GM never DID compete in a mainstream car segment. GM also historically emptied a magazine into their own foot, reloaded, and emptied it into their other foot with the luxury and near luxury brands you mentioned. Saab seems like the biggest own goal in that sense, but reasonable people can disagree.
GM demonstrated in the time period between 1980 and 2009 that they still had the technical capability to develop and produce any component or system at a world leading level. They simply couldn't get out of their own way to get those components into one product, assembled with care, and not styled by a committee of people who couldn't agree on a lunch order, so they buy the Panera.
Playing ifs, if Saturn was treated a little but more like a customer than an alien, they could have developed their first line for less. I am baffled by the development of the Saturn engine when the Quad 4 was available.
Or the other way around, if they created Saturn to debut and figure out new platforms. IMO the "Z" platform used only on the 91-02 SC, SL, and SW cars what lightyears ahead of the "L" platform used by the rest of GM until 05. An easy decisions the GM execs could have made was to say to Saturn "gimme" in 1995 and switched all the compact cars to that 10 years before the debut of the rather ass Delta platform.
"Playing ifs, if Saturn was treated a little but more like a customer than an alien, they could have developed their first line for less. I am baffled by the development of the Saturn engine when the Quad 4 was available"
Possibly, but the Quad 4 was criticized for NVH, and a true clean-sheet design rather than yet another parts bin derivative was a key to success.
Granted, it is possible to have differentiation despite a shared powertrain (Lotus vs the Toyotas whose engine it shares), but I would't trust Roger Smith-era GM to do differentiation right.
That's exactly it: The Allanté had all of the ceremony, but none of the prestige in the engineering. Hummer was a cash grab, although--if not for the bankruptcy--it could at least have been developed into a full-line of SUVs, a la Jeep. I'm not sure what GM expected out of Saab, but it certainly didn't put its best foot forward in being the steward of that brand. And Lotus was especially baffling.
Basically GM half-assed everything for a long time. Complete lack of focus and strategy. The result of all finance types and not car types in upper mgmt. And there were way too many upper managers.
The unions and their unreasonable expectations, plus their reluctance to be held accountable, had a lot to do with it, but that’s not to say that unions are awful. The UAW and Unifor are were and are terrible, though, and that’s mainly down to corrupt leadership. I wouldn’t necessarily blame the 20-year-old who just joined the production line on the issues.
Put another way, I am broadly pro-union. Just not *those* unions.
I grew up in MI during the 70s. The big 3 mgmt gave in to all those stupid union demands, the worst being the jobs banks and the idiotic work rules. No sane person then could figure out why they agreed to that crap. And I grew up in a union household.
The bad reliability due to endless stupid “cost savings” really sunk the big 3. Along with very poor decisions re drivetrain designs. And they built in way too much cost with way too many options vs the imports.
What tends to piss me off is that Cadillac has built a number of stunningly beautiful concept cars, none of which they have built. There should be NO, NONE, NADA Caddy’s with front wheel drive. The CUV blobs should have been Buicks. And then there is that Celestiq (sp?) god awful ugly thing they expect to sell for 300k. The idiot who approved that should have been fired. Has anyone actually seen a real one?
That's exactly the problem. GM has brilliant designers and engineers, probably the best in the world. But they rarely prevail over the politics and corporate red tape. None of those stunning Cadillac concepts had or has a chance of being green-lit, because that would be too risky.
Even the CT6, which was by all accounts a great foundation, was supposed to be so much more than it was. Yet, GM chose to pull back at the eleventh hour in order to mitigate risk, and the end result is that it's merely a bittersweet footnote in the automaker's large sedan heritage, instead of America's answer to the S-Class.
The Celestiq is, I agree, ugly, and the decision to make it an EV is more political than sensible. I guarantee if it had a stonking LS engine, or even that Blackwing V8, people would forgive the looks. We will see whether its Soleil convertible counterpart makes it to production (doubt it) and whether the styling will overcome the foolish EV powertrain.
Oh god, you had to get my blood pressure up over the Blackwing engine fiasco. Brilliant engine killed off after only a few made. Morons.
The CT6, yet another great car killed off way too soon by GM. And there was no marketing behind it. I was thinking of getting a CT6 PHEV, until found out it was imported from China - nope f that.
And explain to me why there should be any options on a Caddy other than ext and int colors, and maybe a sunroof. And there had better be an interior color option other than all black.
Those looks can’t be forgiven at that price. The Soleil conv would likely sell a lot here in SoCal, even as an EV. But sadly it will likely never be produced.
"I just adore how sad she looks at the races. No wonder she’s wifed-up with two kids already"
wut
glad to see max show everyone why hes the best to ever do it but its a shame checo still has a seat and lando is genuinely annoying at this point and id like it if he just shut up for a while
i still like watching lewis get dunked on by george proving that those 7 championships were kinda bunk because we all know it was very heavily because of the car
the xaomi is alright looking i guess but its chinese and electric so i have zero interest in it otherwise and maybe they ought to just focus on building better ice vehicles
this might be the zero sleep, hungover, 12 hours of high stress work talking, but that chick is a 5/10 in all the right ways. like a sad eastern european brunette 10 years past her prime that will suck you off in a bar bathroom for 20 euro
still think seeing not only the same guy but the same teammate for several years on podium was somewhat indicative of a bad fast car because did anyone think that lewis and bottas were roughly equal in talent
When he was young and very very hungry at McLaren he was spectacular. I also rate JB very highly, and he faired well against a confident post championship version of him, prior to JB aging out.
All champions have been in the best car for that year. The exceptions to that rule are the rare occasions when there were TWO best cars for the year, such as ‘94 where you could argue that the Benetton was as good as the Williams.
maybe i should have said that the car looked so unbelievably dominant that there was no real demand for the best drivers to bring out the fastest laptimes
theres a difference between winning each race by a tenth and winning each race by 30s
the size of the gap in performance is what im whining about
Checo gets Carlos Slim money for "Sponsorship" on the car to the end of the year. The money from the WCC position doesn't really matter. What does matter is finishing 3rd gives you more wind tunnel time. Checo is doing exactly what they want him to do this year. But, I don't think they realized how bad the car really is.
They are tanking to a degree for wind tunnel time.
Five races. That's how long the RB20 had the upper hand. Max's RB20 also conked out with less than two laps in the book during one of those five races. Half of the season would mean about a dozen races. The McLaren has been above the RB20 for sixteen rounds now.
Red bull was competitive for the first 10 and basically not after. Although you are correct on the dominance only lasting five. I really remembered it being more! Probably mixing up this and last year.
It was less debatable that 1995 was won in an inferior car than 1994. The B195 may have had a much more powerful engine than the B194, but it was a treacherous handler, and the FW17 and FW17B were exceptionally well sorted from the start. Cubehead had five pole positions that year. Schumacher won because there was a gulf between his talent and that of the pretenders at Williams, and because those losers were incredibly crash prone. Hill tried saving his title chances by taking out Schumacher at Silverstone and Monza rather than letting Michael build a points lead.
Put Schumacher in the FW17 instead, and neither Hill nor Coulthard would have gotten close enough to crash into him. It's funny just how good Schumacher was. People talk about Spain '96, but his victory in the 1995 Belgian grand prix ranks above anything else I've seen since I started watching in 1976. It could also be argued that he won without the best car in 2000, for that matter.
This year will be won by the driver in the third best car, something that I'm certain also happened back when reliability was hypothetical.
I agree with most of your comments here, and will add that Schumi in ANY of the Williams from those years he was in F1 until maybe ‘98 would have been even more devastatingly dominant than he already was.
"I don’t know why the media has been so agitated about Jim Farley’s recent pronouncement that he has been driving the Xiaomi SU7 for about half a year. "
I agree. Isn't competitive testing part of the job of being a manufacturer?
Nice of Johnny to wait until McLaren did their position swap before pushing the virtual safety car button during the sprint race. Hope Zac sends him a nice gift for Christmas.
I have a good friend who is a diehard, lifelong McLaren fan. He is an early riser, whereas I am not … unless there is a competitive Formula 1 session to watch, as there was at 5:30 AM on Sunday morning. As I watched the delayed qualifying session half awake in bed, I texted him that I thought it would end up being a race like Brazil 2012 - a race we had watched together, while nursing rollicking hangovers over coffee, carbs, and cigars. He was confident that Lando would take 25 or even 26 points on a weekend during which Max wouldn’t score, given he was starting from 17th on the grid.
I was looking forward to watching live as the race start time was much more west coast friendly, but somehow I messed up the start time due to the time change.
That’s when I looked at the app to plan when to get up and switch on the broadcast. Didn’t think to cross check it as I assumed being the official F1 app, it would be correct.
Playback started at lap 28 for me, thank goodness the chaos was such that it didn't spoil much. Luckily the preshow also recorded and I found that start of the race.
I never watch F1 races (or quali) live, even the ones near my time zone. They are interrupted with commercials here (not to mention the commentators), so I can save some time by fast-forwarding and watching at my convenience). This week I saved about 3 hours. There are two downsides: I have to avoid all media the day of, and I have to put up with my wife grinning and saying, “ I know who won…”
Incredible race. I hear people saying Norris really isn't that intelligent and doesn't have the killer instinct to become a champion. I'm trying to reserve judgment as long as I can, but I'm thinking there's something to it. His droll sense of humor is quickly turning into actual morosity. Big Pastri fan tho. When the succession happens, what will Norris do? Will Zak's love affair with him become extinguished? Will he put himself into a Lawrence stroll situation at the expense of the team? Will red bull still want him?
I'm jealous! I drove one back-to-back with the contemporary BMW K75S at the dealership I worked at in the 90s. The manager asked me how they compared. I said the K75 is who you bring home to meet your parents, but you spend the weekend with the TDM.
Lawson and Tsunoda might be one of, if not my favorite driver pairings in the paddock. Wish we could have had them together all season. If Max ever left Red Bull I’d love to see them at the “big team”
Ducati, even with no concessions, still has Bagnaia and Martin who are tops on these aerobikes, and another six bikes besides to gather set up data for tuning. I am modestly hopeful that losing one of their satellite teams makes them less dominant but 6 is still a lot of data.
At the very least the 2027 rules changes should shake things up a lot!
I wanted to re-familiarize myself with the Ford small compact from the era, but searching "Erika Escort" did not yield the intended results.
I have never enjoyed hating a driver more than I enjoyed hating JV. Didn't know much about the backstory with his father until much later. Still cant stand him.
I hate Briatore as well, but god damn it, I respect him.
If it were not for the contract I would drop Norris and try to poach Gasly until we see how one of the other young drivers shakes out. He is not going to mature into mental toughness.
It seems like American cars used to look so ungainly compared to cars from other parts of the world. Is it just they're too familiar to me or are they really just frumpy-looking compared to what was on offer in Europe and Japan in the 70s and 80s?
They were frumpy due to bumper regulations and also what the Detroit executives saw as American tastes. The 1981 Escort had way too many big car styling cues.
We need to retvrn to standardized sealed beam headlights for the sake of my wallet (scratched the acrylic or polycarbonate on my Mazda 3 so now the top is fogged and it's an $800 unit with the clear bit not being a separate component??).
Oh, been a while since I checked, it is now a $1000 unit, but the halogens have the same clear bits, I think, and are 1/4 the cost...
The reason that they had the same code name was that it was supposed to be THE SAME CAR.
The result (Wikipedia):
The program intended to consolidate the replacements for the North American Ford Pinto and the European Ford Escort Mk II under a single model architecture. Intended for a 1981 model launch, the original intent was for the American Escort and the European Mk III Escort to share a common chassis architecture and components. During model development, American and European design teams diverged in thinking, leading to extensive differences in the final product lines.
Though they share the same basic shape, the 1981 Ford Escort and Escort Mk III share no interchangeable body parts; the only common components between the two vehicles are the CVH inline-4 engine and the ATX automatic transmission. The suspension is the same basic design between both cars, but again the components are not interchangeable. While sharing a common 94.2 inch wheelbase, the American Escort is longer and wider than the European version; most versions are fitted with a larger amount of chrome exterior trim typical of American vehicles of the period, and the altered proportions gave the car a heavier and more ungainly appearance than its European sister.
I heard the early Pans had some significant electrical/engine probs, I assume they sorted them out? I feel you somewhat about the nerdy-lady-repelling un-interesting nature of such bikes....I felt that way about my NC700X way, way, way, more than this Africa Twin I ride now, which is still boring to some. I sat on top of that NC and the buffeting was obnoxious. Anything done to mitigate it looked dorkier than shit on an already kinda dorky looking bike, and my legs still got the brunt. I sit more inside the AT and barely have any buffeting at all, so I don't feel exhausted or really beat up after long rides. Until I figure out the logistics of a BDR or some other kind of ride like that, it's just going to be used as a Santa Cruz mountains taco Tuesday touring bike.
My first wife's second husband had an NC700X that I wanted to buy from him -- I hear the fuel economy is excellent -- but he traded in on a VFR800 before I could sell him on my pitch. I mean, why not have ME be the second rider for once?
Africa Twins are astounding bikes and hugely desirable.
The Multi V4 doesn't use desmo valves. Not saying it'll be easy to service, but it will be less frequent and no more difficult than the KTM Jack mentioned.
Sincere question: what makes an F1 driver superior to another one besides the car? Reflexes? Courage? No idea.
My only racing involvement was listening to the Indy 500 on a transistor radio on the actual Memorial Day and wondering what it would be this year to cause Andy Granatelli to lose another heartbreaker.
-Mental bandwidth to think about the race as it emerges / develops while driving the car at its maximum; not all of them have this - Alonso, Sainz, Max do; Charles does not, imo
-Great sensitivity to the tires (“tyres”) - all surfaces, all compounds, all conditions
-Ability to guide setup with conviction, even during a sprint race that has only one hour of practice before sprint qualifying
-Comprehensive knowledge of the Byzantine rulebook
There was a race earlier this season in which there was a crash and Alonso asked on tam radio about the driver and mentioned having seen it on one of the big screens along the track.
I was floored. flying around the track at ungodly speed, thinking six moves ahead on the chessboard and still finding mental bandwidth to glance at a screen and process what he's seen.
There was an anecdote about Schumacher or Senna barreling into a breaking zone and having noticed that the fans in the grandstand at the end of the straight had their umbrellas out, so he knew that it would be wet(ter) in that corner.
Plenty of the drivers can do that, while some likely can’t, even at the highest level.
As a mental exercise in the SR8, I try to identify and place every person I know in the audience, so I can then tell them afterwards where they were. It takes some doing.
"I just cannot understand how I did that. I was taking it no differently than I had been before. The wall must have moved."
His team did not believe him and Senna persuaded them to inspect the wall after the race, only for them to find that the barrier had indeed been moved by an earlier crash, moving only a mere 4–10 mm (0.2–0.4 in) into the track
I think there are a lot of people out there with the mental bandwidth part. Operating anything a several multiples of what is normal, legal highway speeds or whatever the equivalent is for a given activity is an out of context problem until you did it a bunch and get used to it.
Th exceptional speed part seems to be the missing component. I submit Stroll is 99% (I don't know how to quantify this and I am obviously making up numbers) as competent as Alonso with mental bandwidth, and 99% as competent, with a lot of help and coaching and practice, when it comes to pure speed.
Those missing precents make a big difference. It is one of the fascinating things to me that people think they can discern it with very little data when it comes to young drivers.
fangio missed getting involved in a crash when he rounded a corner and noticed the people were looking down the track and not at him; of course the spectators were a lot closer to the track in those days.
Good answer. I'd add team building. Feels like some drivers fly in just for the races. Others seem to be part of the team fabric. I think there's something in that, getting all the team employees to give just a little bit more.
It’s the other series - NASCAR, Indycar, WEC, IMSA, Formula E - in which the drivers are absolute automatons. ALWAYS thank the sponsor, ALWAYS thank the manufacturer, NEVER show any disappointment, etc.
Now i want a triumph tiger i will drive 1200 miles a year. Back when i had a life of my own instead of 3.5 kids and a wife, the gf and i used to commute to wrigley field from my western suburb on the street triple and occasionally the r1. In a car, it was a 2 hour commute on game day. We would do it on the bike in 35 minutes by taking a very liberal interpretation of traffic laws and bike lanes. The kids are great but i miss the stupid danger and i was stupid. Alone, id probably still do it but i dont want the kids to be orphans with mom on the bike
25k for a bike is a lot of money. 10 years later kbb says my street triple is worth what i paid for it 8,500. Could probably get a 1-2 year old tiger for 5k off and it’s only 12k net. Optimistic valuations on my part but i have 12k! I have 25k too but thats too much
I think a new Tiger 1200 would be a poor place to put that much money. I regularly see those new for $8k off MSRP. Triumphs have a very small secondary market, too, so it'll still lose significant value from there. Nobody will be impressed, but you'll also have to accept more expensive maintenance and worse reliability compared to a Honda. They are very tall and top heavy. All that for a bike made in Thailand.
Shaft drive heavyweights is what I'm thinking - I don't like chaintenance on a commuter.
Agree they are regularly marked down heavily from MSRP - not competing well with the GS/As where each and every one sells immediately.
Yamaha is selling a "de-contented" read - normal motorcycle - version of the Tracer 9 in the US next year for under $13k which might get me to change my tune because I a) like that CP3 motor having ridden it a couple times and b) don't care for the radar cruise control, linked brakes, & etc on a bike. Still ugly though which I think most motorcycles are these days.
Where do you live that this is the case - there's virtually no (I think 1 or 2 2024s) Tracer 9 GTs within something like 150 miles of me and then a scant handful of used 2021-22s.
Alternatively - what are you using to search that I don't know about?
Yep same basic engine, but with some changes to heads/pistons/cams/etc. The TLRs made 125 iirc. Part of the reason the V-stroms can run to 400k miles is that mild state of tune. The updated DL1000s in 2014 got a very useful bump in torque while also losing about 15lbs (and also gaining that adv "beak" styling). A 2014-2019ish DL1000 is the sweet spot with these things IMO. Before all the TFT screens, can be found light used for a great price.
Makes sense. I didn’t know if there were differences in parts, or if they just tuned it more conservatively. Sounds like the answer is both. I rode a TLR with a power commander and some ohlins suspension bits years ago. I would not describe it as uninteresting.
Interesting that you like motorcycles because of the "I may die *right now*" feeling. I think that you can recalibrate your senses to get that feeling on *any* motorcycle. I almost lost a big toe taking MSF class while wearing Sidi boots - the front wheel locked up on sandy, paved parking lot where the class was being given, and my 500cc Buell (provided by the school) went down under me, almost taking my left big toe in the process. We were practicing emergency braking from 30mph.
I have had my eye on the Kawasaki Versys for many years now, and the 650cc one at that. But where I live it would get stolen, and if it didn't, I'd die of heat stroke while riding it. I do think it would be great for all the practical reasons you describe. As for it being an ADV with only 650cc, I have zero interest in projecting any kind of image with my motorcycle. If people think I'm somehow weak or a wuss for riding a 650cc adventure bike, I'd be more than happy to show them my teeth. Otherwise, it's always better if they underestimate you.
The other reason for an adventure bike is that I had to do a lot of manual labor to put myself through college. In the process I've injured my hands, which makes any sport bike riding position untenable.
Can you please elaborate on the problems you had to fix on the V-Strom? Back when I used to ride (maybe 20-25 years ago), I was told that Suzukis (back then) had the worst reliability record of all Japanese brands, from the people who did ride various Japanese brands. I have read that V-Strom has been (perhaps) the exception to this rule, so I'm curious what a 20-year-old V-Strom is susceptible to.
I rode my TW200 from MN to MA. It made it. Now I ride it around the woodsy forest roads, a job for which it was made, unlike the cross country adventure.
It was a really nice bike just not ideal for boring ass Illinois roads. Thats a long ride on that bike. Maybe it goes 65-70 if you really pushed it? Impressive or maybe slightly stupid 😂
definitely fully stupid, but it was a good, if slightly boring trip, due to lack of power. I changed the gearing to get 60mph all day from it without burning it out.
The twisty, rocky trails of New England are lots of fun on the TW. There aren't enough trails close enough to me in Mpls/St Paul to make it fun, which is why I brought it out east. Why I didn't just buy it out in MA is where the stupid comes in, but I wanted an adventure, and now that it's there, it will stay out east where it thrives.
Twenty five years ago my roommate and I often joked about starting a small business that would rent bikes like yours to people who otherwise were attempting the Michigan riding test on their hogs, baggers, or crotch rockets. Most laughs concerned how much we’d have needed to charge considering liability and damage!
Roomie had been licensed back home in New Delhi and aced his test on the Honda 360 twin I’d delivered to him after a purchase elsewhere. I later skipped it by showing a RiderCourse completion certificate. Given I’d been reading about Professor Harry Hurt for twenty years, I thought it money well spent.
The Hurt Report is another classic case of nominative determinism.
Glad that he died of natural causes:
"Hurt suffered a heart attack Sunday at Pomona Valley Hospital. It was a complication of back surgery that he had a week earlier..."
...
"Hurt was a lifelong motorcyclist and never had a crash, said his wife, Joan.
He rode “a garage full of things: Hondas, Triumphs, Nortons, dirt bikes, street bikes -- all kinds of stuff,” his son said, including a Suzuki trail bike he used to walk his pet, “Gurl Dawg,” as recently as a decade ago, when he gave up motorcycles because he was no longer physically able to ride."
So, the school had two of these. Everyone else was on a Kawasaki 125cc or Suzuki 250cc (or was that the other way around?), but I wanted something ... different.
Joke was on me, 'cause the Buell would die when you closed the throttle, which meant I had to drag the clutch with part-open throttle at slow speed. Did I mention that I had no prior motorcycle-riding experience? Anyway, this made most of the final ride tests, and the figure-eight especially quite challenging.
I never did ride a Buell after that. How did you enjoy yours?
Early V-Stroms like to blow their airboxes off the throttle bodies. That was the problem with mine. I need to safety-wire it on over the winter, understanding that this can possibly lead to the airbox just plain exploding. Apparently it's not tolerant of WOT from low revs, even with the Power Commander fitted to it by the previous owner.
V-Strom most common issues:
* Fueling too lean and too surge-y. Everyone fits a Power Commander to address this.
* Airbox issues. You just have to get used to fixing them, or safety wire.
* Clutch basket "chudder", it doesn't really bother me and it's not a longevity or durability issue.
* Buffeting at speed regardless of windshield, due to the wacky aero of the bodywork itself.
That's about it. People can and do ride them to 400,000 miles and beyond.
I recall how those "early generation" of mass-produced fuel-injected bikes had problems with surging. I had my eye on an FZ1 for a while, back when they came out, and recall reviews talking about surging. I never did get one, 'cause ... heat stroke where I live.
But a friend of mine got an FZ6, and I got to experience some of that surging.
Another friend had a carbureted Ninja 500, so it was easy to see the difference in fueling.
Sadly, haven't been on a motorcycle for close to two decades. I'd have to take MSF again, before I'd trust myself on a bike again.
I don't think it's fair to judge overall brand reliability from one 18 year old bike. In my somewhat biased opinion, I'd put Kawasaki last in quality among the Japanese brands. A big part of that is how many of their models are made in Thailand. When it comes to Hondas and Kawasakis, there is an obvious step up in finish when you pay enough for a Japanese one. Even the badges are different. Suzuki sells a lot of inexpensive bikes that are still MiJ.
Not to say you wouldn't get good service out of a 650 Kawasaki or that Thailand means the engine won't be good. I really like the 650 Versys. It was the close runner-up when I bought a 650 V-Strom. The Versys is perhaps more comfortable and better handling with some nice convenience features (better side cases, more easily adjustable windscreen). The V-Strom engine is way more interesting, it's MiJ, and it cost less money at the time.
I have commonly heard of Kawasaki parallel twin owners doing top end engine rebuilds in the 60-70k mile range. Conversely, in the same category, the Yamaha CP2 engine is known as one of the most reliable motorcycle engines period. The Suzuki 650 V-twin is good for well over 100k miles. Hondas? There are 125 cc Hondas out there with six figure mileage.
MotoGP in Malaysia:
Qualifying goes extremely well for Jorge Martin who obliterates the track record! Pecco Bagnaia, previous track record holder, then goes on to be ever so slightly faster while looking tidier and holds the track record for fast lap another year.
In the sprint Jorge Martin gets a killer start, per usual, and pulls into the lead and immediately sets a hot pace to push Bagnaia. Bagnaia would hang on for a lap and then WRECK OUT in the low speed and tricky turn 9. 12 points to Martin for a 29 point lead which is significant given how late in the season we are. Marc Marquez with a good start from second row into third then holds on to second after Bagnaia's crash. Incredible pace from the GP23 and Marc Marquez over the sprint.
In the race proper Martin again looks like he will be pressuring Bagnaia from the lead. However, a race 2 incident where Jack Miller crashed and his head contacted and was torqued by Quartararo's rear wheel was cause for a red flag. I thought Jack might be seriously injured or paralyzed, but he would later be up and walking! Given that people are seriously injured and killed even at this level it seems a minor miracle that his neck wasn't twisted too far. In the restart Bagnaia nails the start this time and holds the lead going into turn one. Jorge and Bagnaia would bump and barge into one another and slice and dice through the corners for several laps. Jorge seemed aggressive almost beyond belief in what I can only assume was an effort to force another error from Pecco. The #1 plate would hold strong and hang on for a victory as a late charge by Martin attempting to close the gap established just 5 laps in was met with a few near-wrecks and he settled for second place. Marquez would wreck out but return to the points positions - again - to keep his fingerhold on 3rd place in the championship vs Bastianini who finished third.
I had earlier said 1-2 finishes with Bagnaia winning everything would still see Martin with the championship. The situation is looking dire unless Martin has a late season blunder in the full blown race. If Jorge Martin wins the sprint and Bagnaia places 2nd then Martin will be +26 over Bagnaia and everything is settled.
MotoGP's final round of 2024 takes place in, as the Spaniards say, Barthelona next weekend (15th-17th).
I wouldn't say Lando is completely uuseless, but he's spoiled now amd he cant go back. He's definitely not an awful driver and but if you wanna talk about princesses, him and George are sisters. He not only mocked Max, who's clearly the best driver on the grid, at his home race, but when Max embarrassed the ever-living hell out of him on Sunday, he had the audacity to say it was 'not talent or, you know, just luck'. He's honestly more of a princess than George if you ask me...
To be fair I think that comment was taken out of context. I'm too lazy to look for it tho.
It was actually more directed at Red Bull 'the team' not Red Bull 'the driver' (we aren't talking about Perez anymore) but i feel like it still puts the same basic point across
Interesting you mention GM not scoping the competition.
There was definitely a strong case of myopia within the halls of GM at one point, and I’m sure the execs were keen to disregard the little “upstart” companies from the Far East, but I think that even by the mid-late 70s, GM quietly knew it was losing the plot against the foreign competition.
What made the X cars so bad (and the Vega, and the GM10s, and so many other moonshot projects before and since) was GM’s inability to claw out of its own mess. I fully believe GM intended to build the best dang cars out there, and probably could have…but its legacy issues were coming home to roost. Things like bloated UAW/Unifor obligations (and GM’s enmeshed, vulnerable situation with those entities), a terribly inefficient management structure and all manner of corporate infighting. GM was unable to overcome those obstacles each and every time it would try to do something remarkable in a volume segment.
And then, when GM did get out of its own way and set up a subsidiary with a completely different structure and its own engineering, sales and manufacturing operations, Saturn, it spent so much doing so that it lost billions of dollars at the expense of its other brands. And the cars were only mediocre, anyway; it was the marketing and culture that everyone loved.
Speaking of which: I, last week, suggested that instead of spending billions to do Saturn, which was a low-margin segment that would have never paid off (they were still losing as much as $3,000 per car by 1999)…GM should instead have sank that money into launching a luxury brand with a car the likes of the LS 400. If GM was determined to do a loss leader, why not do so on a high-ATP car, wherein it’d be easier to eventually recoup its investment, the way Lexus has for all these years? And the same way GM set up Saturn as its own thing and let it be separate from GM…GM could have done it with a luxury brand. It would have embarrassed Cadillac, but it would have paid dividends if done correctly. Unlike Saturn, which was a fiscal dead-end.
everyone here already wants you in the higher positions making decisions at gm bro you dont have to convince us
"GM should instead have sank that money into launching a luxury brand with a car the likes of the LS 400"
dumb question but why cant they do that with cadillac or is that already committed to being an american bmw
I think the idea was the need to setup new facilities, development and union contracts that would allow GM to make a competitive product rather than improve an existing brand with those legacy issues dragging it down.
yeah but i figured keeping and revitalizing cadillac might have been at least cheaper than something brand new
Cheaper, but probably unlikely to be anywhere near as impactful.
Changing their crappy management would have fixed all the problems with all those crappy cars .
-Nate
https://www.avoidablecontact.com/p/wednesday-night-ort-max-attack-ridin/comment/75932062
Also, we have previously discussed here that the LS400 was almost certainly sold at a massive loss.
Yes it was. Which is exactly the point. If GM was determined to lose money initially, why not do so in an impactful way, where it might have paid dividends? Saturn was a dead end.
I always liked this quote from Ross Perot, part of a 1988 interview on GM management:
“I took the position that anybody who needed a chauffeur to drive him to work was probably too old to be on the payroll, and that anybody in a car company ought to be driving his own car because you didn't get much of a feel in the back seat. We shouldn't be giving handmade cars to executives. We ought to cut out this business that if you're an executive your car comes into the garage every morning and the mechanics take it, and if there's anything wrong with it they fix it. You don't know what reality is. Your car is perfect. I say no. Go to a dealer. Buy a car. Negotiate for it. Have the engine fail. Have the transmission fall out. Have the tailpipe fall off.”
Great now Jack's cars are commenting on his substack Mr. MkZ
Ha ha, I did consider getting one just for that!
For the record, I am an MKZ "intender" who is currently unable to stretch past a Milan.
Now, our Mr. Klockau is on the exalted rolls of men who are fortunate enough to steer through life in the Mark Zed. Which is why I resent him so bitterly, among other reasons.
I was actually tempted to trade at McLaughlin last Saturday, they had a mint little old lady owned 2019 XTS. 12k miles! Only problem was world's most boring colors, silver with black interior.
The XTS has odd proportions, to me. It looks too tall and narrow, with a stubby bonnet and boot. The DTS was better-proportioned.
Which engine in your MKZ and how has it behaved?
What drivetrain on that XTS?
I have an MKZ Hybrid as well and I'm surprised how much I enjoy it. I used to rent Fusions and could never get comfortable in the drivers seat but even though it is probably the same seat frame thew Lincoln's fits me perfectly like a glove. It has averaged just a hair under 39 mpg over its lifetime which means that every mile I put on it for work makes me money when the company reimburses me based on an SUV. It is a great commuting/travel for work car. Its only shortcoming is that its pretty slow, fortunately its other virtues more than make up for it.
Sort of Mark ;
During the Oldsmobile Diesel debacle I was working for Oldsmobile and those same cars had problems with the newfangled gas charged trunk struts failing and allowing the trunk to bash the head of the owner .
Oldsmobile Division was happy to B.S. most Customers and when they pitched a bitch they'd get some new struts at dealer cost plus labor .
Then some Detroit GM honcho was at the golf course and his head was bashed by a falling trunk, we got a memo that every single Oldsmobile that came in for service was to be checked for trunk struts and replaced automatically at no charge .
In general I agree that car men should run car companies and that's where GM went oh so wrong .
-Nate
So once a manager felt the pain, quite literally,
then something meaningful started happening - seems to me proving Mr. Perot’s point nicely!
I still have a pair of Vice Grips in my toolbox that came out of my first ever car, a Datsun; the previous owner had left behind said Grips to allow me to hold up the Datsun’s hatch with its blown out struts…. Grips are still going strong, the Datsun not so much!
In 1996 I began dating psycho-bitch and her 1982 Ford Escort L's hatch struts were gone, she was using a broom stick to hold it open at the grocery store, even then when I was seriously broke I couldn't tolerate my lady doing this and Pep Boys had new gas struts in stock for $10 each .
Then I discovered the latch and striker were kaput when she called me at work the day after I installed the new hatch struts ~ she was driving down the street when the hatch opened and stayed open .
Amazing how long some hair shirt rattle trap would run with so many things broken / amiss .
-Nate
Dear god, a 14 year old 82 Escort? Those things were awful when new.
You'd have been shocked to see this one ~ it had been sideswiped so the passenger window couldn't roll down, hit in the right front so the entire headlamp bucket was loose in the back, the power steering pump had begun to leak so they simply removed the drive belt and pulley.....
The rockerbox had a bad gasket so it dribbled oil onto the exhaust manifold .
The entire front end of the unibody was tweaked that's when I discovered there were _no_ adjustments possible (!) .
The heater core had failed so they disconnected it and looped the hose back to the engine ~ in these cheapo cars the heater core was part of the cooling system, no hot water valve .
On and on ~ I think she told me she'd paid $250 for it because it ran and had current tags .
I cleaned that P.O.C. within an inch of it's life and hand polished then waxed the surprisingly good red paint then I began fixing all those niggly little things .
Eventually the timing belt snapped at sundown on a Friday in "you don't want to be here at night" Los Angeles, all the valves bent so I went back the next day and collected it , towed it to Pick A Part and coasted it into the yard and across the scales, tossed them the keys & title. said 'you'll have to jump it, battery's no good .
They gave me $800 (!) for it .
Yes, it was a hair shirt .
Yes, because I'm a dummy I didn't mind as long as it cranked up and went every day and it did that very well indeed .
-Nate
Respectfully, I think that your analysis involves too much hindsight and a counterfactual.
Two key facts which were not known at the time of decision were a) that GM could *NEVER* compete in the mainstream segment and b) that the mainstream segment would vanish along with the middle class but the ultra-premium segment would sell out years in advance. Beyond that, I think you are also making a third assumption, namely, that people would pay premium prestige prices for a GM car.
GM arguably did make multiple attempts to go upmarket contemporaneously with Saturn: at some point in the 1990s, the General offered Allanté, Lotus, Hummer, and Saab in addition to their legacy upscale marques Buick, Oldsmobile, Cadillac, and Corvette.
Maybe the best course would to spend the money buying Toyota and/or Nissan.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Smith_(executive)#Drive_for_modernization "...1986...3-year capital expenditures projected at almost $35 billion...could be better spent on purchasing both Toyota and Nissan." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_Corporation#1990%E2%80%932000:_%22A_new_kind_of_car_company%22 "... drained $5 billion from other car projects..."
After writing it out, the below is a bit of a wiki dump. The tl:dnr is they had all the ingredients but there were too many terrible cooks in the kitchen.
I disagree with your statement a)
Obviously with hindsight it is correct that GM never DID compete in a mainstream car segment. GM also historically emptied a magazine into their own foot, reloaded, and emptied it into their other foot with the luxury and near luxury brands you mentioned. Saab seems like the biggest own goal in that sense, but reasonable people can disagree.
GM demonstrated in the time period between 1980 and 2009 that they still had the technical capability to develop and produce any component or system at a world leading level. They simply couldn't get out of their own way to get those components into one product, assembled with care, and not styled by a committee of people who couldn't agree on a lunch order, so they buy the Panera.
Playing ifs, if Saturn was treated a little but more like a customer than an alien, they could have developed their first line for less. I am baffled by the development of the Saturn engine when the Quad 4 was available.
Or the other way around, if they created Saturn to debut and figure out new platforms. IMO the "Z" platform used only on the 91-02 SC, SL, and SW cars what lightyears ahead of the "L" platform used by the rest of GM until 05. An easy decisions the GM execs could have made was to say to Saturn "gimme" in 1995 and switched all the compact cars to that 10 years before the debut of the rather ass Delta platform.
"Playing ifs, if Saturn was treated a little but more like a customer than an alien, they could have developed their first line for less. I am baffled by the development of the Saturn engine when the Quad 4 was available"
Possibly, but the Quad 4 was criticized for NVH, and a true clean-sheet design rather than yet another parts bin derivative was a key to success.
Granted, it is possible to have differentiation despite a shared powertrain (Lotus vs the Toyotas whose engine it shares), but I would't trust Roger Smith-era GM to do differentiation right.
That's exactly it: The Allanté had all of the ceremony, but none of the prestige in the engineering. Hummer was a cash grab, although--if not for the bankruptcy--it could at least have been developed into a full-line of SUVs, a la Jeep. I'm not sure what GM expected out of Saab, but it certainly didn't put its best foot forward in being the steward of that brand. And Lotus was especially baffling.
Basically GM half-assed everything for a long time. Complete lack of focus and strategy. The result of all finance types and not car types in upper mgmt. And there were way too many upper managers.
Some good points here Kyree ;
I am sad you'd stoop to bullshit union bashing, the rank and file had _zero_ to do with it, the engineering was bad .
-Nate
The unions and their unreasonable expectations, plus their reluctance to be held accountable, had a lot to do with it, but that’s not to say that unions are awful. The UAW and Unifor are were and are terrible, though, and that’s mainly down to corrupt leadership. I wouldn’t necessarily blame the 20-year-old who just joined the production line on the issues.
Put another way, I am broadly pro-union. Just not *those* unions.
I don't buy it .
-Nate
I grew up in MI during the 70s. The big 3 mgmt gave in to all those stupid union demands, the worst being the jobs banks and the idiotic work rules. No sane person then could figure out why they agreed to that crap. And I grew up in a union household.
The bad reliability due to endless stupid “cost savings” really sunk the big 3. Along with very poor decisions re drivetrain designs. And they built in way too much cost with way too many options vs the imports.
That’s true, too. Some streamlining really could have saved them a ton of money. Every car didn’t have to offer everything.
What tends to piss me off is that Cadillac has built a number of stunningly beautiful concept cars, none of which they have built. There should be NO, NONE, NADA Caddy’s with front wheel drive. The CUV blobs should have been Buicks. And then there is that Celestiq (sp?) god awful ugly thing they expect to sell for 300k. The idiot who approved that should have been fired. Has anyone actually seen a real one?
That's exactly the problem. GM has brilliant designers and engineers, probably the best in the world. But they rarely prevail over the politics and corporate red tape. None of those stunning Cadillac concepts had or has a chance of being green-lit, because that would be too risky.
Even the CT6, which was by all accounts a great foundation, was supposed to be so much more than it was. Yet, GM chose to pull back at the eleventh hour in order to mitigate risk, and the end result is that it's merely a bittersweet footnote in the automaker's large sedan heritage, instead of America's answer to the S-Class.
The Celestiq is, I agree, ugly, and the decision to make it an EV is more political than sensible. I guarantee if it had a stonking LS engine, or even that Blackwing V8, people would forgive the looks. We will see whether its Soleil convertible counterpart makes it to production (doubt it) and whether the styling will overcome the foolish EV powertrain.
Oh god, you had to get my blood pressure up over the Blackwing engine fiasco. Brilliant engine killed off after only a few made. Morons.
The CT6, yet another great car killed off way too soon by GM. And there was no marketing behind it. I was thinking of getting a CT6 PHEV, until found out it was imported from China - nope f that.
And explain to me why there should be any options on a Caddy other than ext and int colors, and maybe a sunroof. And there had better be an interior color option other than all black.
Those looks can’t be forgiven at that price. The Soleil conv would likely sell a lot here in SoCal, even as an EV. But sadly it will likely never be produced.
"I just adore how sad she looks at the races. No wonder she’s wifed-up with two kids already"
wut
glad to see max show everyone why hes the best to ever do it but its a shame checo still has a seat and lando is genuinely annoying at this point and id like it if he just shut up for a while
i still like watching lewis get dunked on by george proving that those 7 championships were kinda bunk because we all know it was very heavily because of the car
the xaomi is alright looking i guess but its chinese and electric so i have zero interest in it otherwise and maybe they ought to just focus on building better ice vehicles
this might be the zero sleep, hungover, 12 hours of high stress work talking, but that chick is a 5/10 in all the right ways. like a sad eastern european brunette 10 years past her prime that will suck you off in a bar bathroom for 20 euro
Willingness is worth at least 2/10ths.
I don't think this shows that Lewis' championships were bunk, I think it shows he is getting old.
"Willingness is worth at least 2/10ths"
agree
still think seeing not only the same guy but the same teammate for several years on podium was somewhat indicative of a bad fast car because did anyone think that lewis and bottas were roughly equal in talent
When he was young and very very hungry at McLaren he was spectacular. I also rate JB very highly, and he faired well against a confident post championship version of him, prior to JB aging out.
"I also rate JB very highly"
me too hes a great writer and racecar driver
crap, my laziness caught me out on that one.
that made me depressed
it made her depressed, too
All champions have been in the best car for that year. The exceptions to that rule are the rare occasions when there were TWO best cars for the year, such as ‘94 where you could argue that the Benetton was as good as the Williams.
I hate the 94 Williams for what it robbed us of.
RIP Ayrton.
That would have been a fucking epic title fight
maybe i should have said that the car looked so unbelievably dominant that there was no real demand for the best drivers to bring out the fastest laptimes
theres a difference between winning each race by a tenth and winning each race by 30s
the size of the gap in performance is what im whining about
Max Verstappen 2021
Max Verstappen 2024
Verstappen had the best car for half of 2024 before christian got horny! But yeah.
What if I told you that there is a way to measure this … it’s the Constructors Championship. Red Bull is third.
Checo sucks though.
YEAH HE DOES
Checo gets Carlos Slim money for "Sponsorship" on the car to the end of the year. The money from the WCC position doesn't really matter. What does matter is finishing 3rd gives you more wind tunnel time. Checo is doing exactly what they want him to do this year. But, I don't think they realized how bad the car really is.
They are tanking to a degree for wind tunnel time.
It’s bad for team morale and team bonuses (WCC position).
Five races. That's how long the RB20 had the upper hand. Max's RB20 also conked out with less than two laps in the book during one of those five races. Half of the season would mean about a dozen races. The McLaren has been above the RB20 for sixteen rounds now.
Red bull was competitive for the first 10 and basically not after. Although you are correct on the dominance only lasting five. I really remembered it being more! Probably mixing up this and last year.
It was less debatable that 1995 was won in an inferior car than 1994. The B195 may have had a much more powerful engine than the B194, but it was a treacherous handler, and the FW17 and FW17B were exceptionally well sorted from the start. Cubehead had five pole positions that year. Schumacher won because there was a gulf between his talent and that of the pretenders at Williams, and because those losers were incredibly crash prone. Hill tried saving his title chances by taking out Schumacher at Silverstone and Monza rather than letting Michael build a points lead.
Put Schumacher in the FW17 instead, and neither Hill nor Coulthard would have gotten close enough to crash into him. It's funny just how good Schumacher was. People talk about Spain '96, but his victory in the 1995 Belgian grand prix ranks above anything else I've seen since I started watching in 1976. It could also be argued that he won without the best car in 2000, for that matter.
This year will be won by the driver in the third best car, something that I'm certain also happened back when reliability was hypothetical.
Well said!
I agree with most of your comments here, and will add that Schumi in ANY of the Williams from those years he was in F1 until maybe ‘98 would have been even more devastatingly dominant than he already was.
"I don’t know why the media has been so agitated about Jim Farley’s recent pronouncement that he has been driving the Xiaomi SU7 for about half a year. "
I agree. Isn't competitive testing part of the job of being a manufacturer?
maybe people thing hes supposed to make major decisions based on nothing other than gut instinct
Johnny Herbert’s face was even redder than usual (he has the visage of a drinker) after GOATstappen’s masterclass at Interlagos.
Yeah, Herbert has gotten quite “comfortable” in his post racing life. He actually makes me feel a little uneasy when I watch his commentary….
Allan McNish looks rather well-fed in this recent Porsche video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BQ0XjJB9KY
Squeeeeze into that cockpit….
The car is gorgeous and that motor sounds so so sweet!
He’s eatin’ good in Monaco, it appears.
Nice of Johnny to wait until McLaren did their position swap before pushing the virtual safety car button during the sprint race. Hope Zac sends him a nice gift for Christmas.
In the end, it didn’t matter much!
I have a good friend who is a diehard, lifelong McLaren fan. He is an early riser, whereas I am not … unless there is a competitive Formula 1 session to watch, as there was at 5:30 AM on Sunday morning. As I watched the delayed qualifying session half awake in bed, I texted him that I thought it would end up being a race like Brazil 2012 - a race we had watched together, while nursing rollicking hangovers over coffee, carbs, and cigars. He was confident that Lando would take 25 or even 26 points on a weekend during which Max wouldn’t score, given he was starting from 17th on the grid.
But I knew better.
I was looking forward to watching live as the race start time was much more west coast friendly, but somehow I messed up the start time due to the time change.
Easy error to make. I had to triple check; the official F1 TV app was wrong for a brief period.
That’s when I looked at the app to plan when to get up and switch on the broadcast. Didn’t think to cross check it as I assumed being the official F1 app, it would be correct.
I only knew because I did the time zone comparison manually and therefore adjusted my alarm clock.
Playback started at lap 28 for me, thank goodness the chaos was such that it didn't spoil much. Luckily the preshow also recorded and I found that start of the race.
I never watch F1 races (or quali) live, even the ones near my time zone. They are interrupted with commercials here (not to mention the commentators), so I can save some time by fast-forwarding and watching at my convenience). This week I saved about 3 hours. There are two downsides: I have to avoid all media the day of, and I have to put up with my wife grinning and saying, “ I know who won…”
I like to watch it live - I enjoy the uncertainty and the tension, as well as the deranged Lewis Hamilton fans I hate follow on X.
everyone should follow a few lolcows for nothing more than entertainment
I was looking forward to watching live to see if the F1TV app crashes when you switch cameras too much like it does when you watch as a replay.
Incredible race. I hear people saying Norris really isn't that intelligent and doesn't have the killer instinct to become a champion. I'm trying to reserve judgment as long as I can, but I'm thinking there's something to it. His droll sense of humor is quickly turning into actual morosity. Big Pastri fan tho. When the succession happens, what will Norris do? Will Zak's love affair with him become extinguished? Will he put himself into a Lawrence stroll situation at the expense of the team? Will red bull still want him?
“Everything about the V-Strom
a) looks stupid
b) works great”
Damn it now I want a TDM 850. Again.
I one commented on just how ugly my father's BMW 1150GS was. "Doesn't matter," he replied. "They all look the same when you're on them."
I inherited that bike and rode it all over creation. It was sooooo good at so many things. But so very, very ugly.
We still talking about bikes?
Ill be here all night
Bikes or women the same advice applies - get a chubby 6 with a good personality because they’re givers.
Jack is falling in love with the minivan of motorcycles.
More like the CRV of motorcycles?
Bro I had a TDM 850! It was greaT!
I'm jealous! I drove one back-to-back with the contemporary BMW K75S at the dealership I worked at in the 90s. The manager asked me how they compared. I said the K75 is who you bring home to meet your parents, but you spend the weekend with the TDM.
Lawson and Tsunoda might be one of, if not my favorite driver pairings in the paddock. Wish we could have had them together all season. If Max ever left Red Bull I’d love to see them at the “big team”
They're doing really well both individually and together. The Danny Ric deviation was a waste of time.
For your consideration, Moto Guzzi Stelvio.
I hear good things!
Jack, you know better. Japanese motorcycles > all others.
I know what you're saying but this is ridiculous: https://www.motorsport.com/motogp/standings/2024/?type=Constructor&class=
Ducati, even with no concessions, still has Bagnaia and Martin who are tops on these aerobikes, and another six bikes besides to gather set up data for tuning. I am modestly hopeful that losing one of their satellite teams makes them less dominant but 6 is still a lot of data.
At the very least the 2027 rules changes should shake things up a lot!
I like the look of those, but if Jack thinks a V-Strom is slow, the Stelvio is going to be no faster.
unrelated to the topic but if i wanted to reach you for info on miata splitters should i dm you here or is there another method you prefer
I wanted to re-familiarize myself with the Ford small compact from the era, but searching "Erika Escort" did not yield the intended results.
I have never enjoyed hating a driver more than I enjoyed hating JV. Didn't know much about the backstory with his father until much later. Still cant stand him.
I hate Briatore as well, but god damn it, I respect him.
If it were not for the contract I would drop Norris and try to poach Gasly until we see how one of the other young drivers shakes out. He is not going to mature into mental toughness.
I also had to look it up:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Escort_(Europe)
Erika was also the code name used for the US 1st generation Escort, which was a fairly wretched derivation of the European 3rd generation Escort.
It seems like American cars used to look so ungainly compared to cars from other parts of the world. Is it just they're too familiar to me or are they really just frumpy-looking compared to what was on offer in Europe and Japan in the 70s and 80s?
They were frumpy due to bumper regulations and also what the Detroit executives saw as American tastes. The 1981 Escort had way too many big car styling cues.
Sealed beam headlights were mandated until around 1985, which also hindered the appearance of US versions of cars designed for other markets.
We need to retvrn to standardized sealed beam headlights for the sake of my wallet (scratched the acrylic or polycarbonate on my Mazda 3 so now the top is fogged and it's an $800 unit with the clear bit not being a separate component??).
Oh, been a while since I checked, it is now a $1000 unit, but the halogens have the same clear bits, I think, and are 1/4 the cost...
Seconding Jack, look how a Chrysler exec massacred Guigario's A1 Golf at Westmoreland.
Also compare the humble Vauxhall Chevette as driven by Tony Pond to the US version:
https://classicsworld.co.uk/guides/the-history-of-the-vauxhall-chevette/
The reason that they had the same code name was that it was supposed to be THE SAME CAR.
The result (Wikipedia):
The program intended to consolidate the replacements for the North American Ford Pinto and the European Ford Escort Mk II under a single model architecture. Intended for a 1981 model launch, the original intent was for the American Escort and the European Mk III Escort to share a common chassis architecture and components. During model development, American and European design teams diverged in thinking, leading to extensive differences in the final product lines.
Though they share the same basic shape, the 1981 Ford Escort and Escort Mk III share no interchangeable body parts; the only common components between the two vehicles are the CVH inline-4 engine and the ATX automatic transmission. The suspension is the same basic design between both cars, but again the components are not interchangeable. While sharing a common 94.2 inch wheelbase, the American Escort is longer and wider than the European version; most versions are fitted with a larger amount of chrome exterior trim typical of American vehicles of the period, and the altered proportions gave the car a heavier and more ungainly appearance than its European sister.
I heard the early Pans had some significant electrical/engine probs, I assume they sorted them out? I feel you somewhat about the nerdy-lady-repelling un-interesting nature of such bikes....I felt that way about my NC700X way, way, way, more than this Africa Twin I ride now, which is still boring to some. I sat on top of that NC and the buffeting was obnoxious. Anything done to mitigate it looked dorkier than shit on an already kinda dorky looking bike, and my legs still got the brunt. I sit more inside the AT and barely have any buffeting at all, so I don't feel exhausted or really beat up after long rides. Until I figure out the logistics of a BDR or some other kind of ride like that, it's just going to be used as a Santa Cruz mountains taco Tuesday touring bike.
My first wife's second husband had an NC700X that I wanted to buy from him -- I hear the fuel economy is excellent -- but he traded in on a VFR800 before I could sell him on my pitch. I mean, why not have ME be the second rider for once?
Africa Twins are astounding bikes and hugely desirable.
Since you are such a horsepower supremacist, how is an AT astounding but the V-Strom isn't?
If you are going to spend Civic money on an ADV bike, Multistrada V4?
Cause it has cool styling and a unified vibe, i guess?
That V4 Strada gets up to MDX money!
I figured you meant styling, not road performance.
The RS is almost 40k, but the V4S is right around all the other European ADVs. The dealer by me still has some new 2023s.
Plus they have seriously big intervals for the desmo adjustment these days. Why, they're a bargain!
The Multi V4 doesn't use desmo valves. Not saying it'll be easy to service, but it will be less frequent and no more difficult than the KTM Jack mentioned.
Sincere question: what makes an F1 driver superior to another one besides the car? Reflexes? Courage? No idea.
My only racing involvement was listening to the Indy 500 on a transistor radio on the actual Memorial Day and wondering what it would be this year to cause Andy Granatelli to lose another heartbreaker.
At the F1 level:
-Mental bandwidth to think about the race as it emerges / develops while driving the car at its maximum; not all of them have this - Alonso, Sainz, Max do; Charles does not, imo
-Great sensitivity to the tires (“tyres”) - all surfaces, all compounds, all conditions
-Ability to guide setup with conviction, even during a sprint race that has only one hour of practice before sprint qualifying
-Comprehensive knowledge of the Byzantine rulebook
-Exceptional speed a given, of course
There was a race earlier this season in which there was a crash and Alonso asked on tam radio about the driver and mentioned having seen it on one of the big screens along the track.
I was floored. flying around the track at ungodly speed, thinking six moves ahead on the chessboard and still finding mental bandwidth to glance at a screen and process what he's seen.
There was an anecdote about Schumacher or Senna barreling into a breaking zone and having noticed that the fans in the grandstand at the end of the straight had their umbrellas out, so he knew that it would be wet(ter) in that corner.
Plenty of the drivers can do that, while some likely can’t, even at the highest level.
As a mental exercise in the SR8, I try to identify and place every person I know in the audience, so I can then tell them afterwards where they were. It takes some doing.
Eyes on the road, Jack!
Senna at the 1984 Dallas Grand Prix [Wikipedia]:
"I just cannot understand how I did that. I was taking it no differently than I had been before. The wall must have moved."
His team did not believe him and Senna persuaded them to inspect the wall after the race, only for them to find that the barrier had indeed been moved by an earlier crash, moving only a mere 4–10 mm (0.2–0.4 in) into the track
I think there are a lot of people out there with the mental bandwidth part. Operating anything a several multiples of what is normal, legal highway speeds or whatever the equivalent is for a given activity is an out of context problem until you did it a bunch and get used to it.
Th exceptional speed part seems to be the missing component. I submit Stroll is 99% (I don't know how to quantify this and I am obviously making up numbers) as competent as Alonso with mental bandwidth, and 99% as competent, with a lot of help and coaching and practice, when it comes to pure speed.
Those missing precents make a big difference. It is one of the fascinating things to me that people think they can discern it with very little data when it comes to young drivers.
Probably fair. That missing 1% is the time spent in the wall or getting stuck fighting a Haas for 14th place.
fangio missed getting involved in a crash when he rounded a corner and noticed the people were looking down the track and not at him; of course the spectators were a lot closer to the track in those days.
Good answer. I'd add team building. Feels like some drivers fly in just for the races. Others seem to be part of the team fabric. I think there's something in that, getting all the team employees to give just a little bit more.
Also has to be a good corporate (both team and F1) spokesman and not use bad words.
I have a contrarian view on this.
It’s the other series - NASCAR, Indycar, WEC, IMSA, Formula E - in which the drivers are absolute automatons. ALWAYS thank the sponsor, ALWAYS thank the manufacturer, NEVER show any disappointment, etc.
F1 drivers are rather candid in comparison.
I'll wait to reply until I've seen Max's race suit for Las Vegas.
Now i want a triumph tiger i will drive 1200 miles a year. Back when i had a life of my own instead of 3.5 kids and a wife, the gf and i used to commute to wrigley field from my western suburb on the street triple and occasionally the r1. In a car, it was a 2 hour commute on game day. We would do it on the bike in 35 minutes by taking a very liberal interpretation of traffic laws and bike lanes. The kids are great but i miss the stupid danger and i was stupid. Alone, id probably still do it but i dont want the kids to be orphans with mom on the bike
For what it's worth I envy you for the 1.5 extra (versus me) kids far more greatly than I envy anyone's freedom.
The tradeoff is absolutely worth it but with 3 so young, there is not a lot of free time. The .5 mostly just bothers the wife right now
Also, we are very lucky to knock out 3.5 between 35-41
If they weren't $25k proposals I would consider a Tiger 1200. The 900 I've bopped around on is a nice place to be even if it's meh for excitement.
25k for a bike is a lot of money. 10 years later kbb says my street triple is worth what i paid for it 8,500. Could probably get a 1-2 year old tiger for 5k off and it’s only 12k net. Optimistic valuations on my part but i have 12k! I have 25k too but thats too much
I think a new Tiger 1200 would be a poor place to put that much money. I regularly see those new for $8k off MSRP. Triumphs have a very small secondary market, too, so it'll still lose significant value from there. Nobody will be impressed, but you'll also have to accept more expensive maintenance and worse reliability compared to a Honda. They are very tall and top heavy. All that for a bike made in Thailand.
Shaft drive heavyweights is what I'm thinking - I don't like chaintenance on a commuter.
Agree they are regularly marked down heavily from MSRP - not competing well with the GS/As where each and every one sells immediately.
Yamaha is selling a "de-contented" read - normal motorcycle - version of the Tracer 9 in the US next year for under $13k which might get me to change my tune because I a) like that CP3 motor having ridden it a couple times and b) don't care for the radar cruise control, linked brakes, & etc on a bike. Still ugly though which I think most motorcycles are these days.
If you don’t want to maintain a chain, just don’t. It’ll be almost no different except it’ll need replaced a little sooner.
Since 1300s have been announced, you can get 6k off a 2024 GSA right now. Quite a few in stock near me.
You can also get new 2023 Tracer 9s for 11k before tax. There’s basically no reason to wait for a more base version.
Where do you live that this is the case - there's virtually no (I think 1 or 2 2024s) Tracer 9 GTs within something like 150 miles of me and then a scant handful of used 2021-22s.
Alternatively - what are you using to search that I don't know about?
Cleveland.
At one point, they had like 30 of these but almost all are sold now: https://www.state8.com/inventory/2022-yamaha-tracer-9-gt-ca-mtt9gtncs-peninsula-oh-44264-12293656i
Individual dealer websites. I know some dealers do not have accurate inventories online, but that bike above is real.
BMW Motorcycles of Cleveland is the one with deals on GSAs.
Triumph Tiger owners are a distinguished lot:
https://www.imcdb.org/i022353.jpg
On the V-Strom: isn’t that the same engine as the old TL1000 and SV1000? I would think there’s some way to wake it up if so.
I believe it was at one time. not sure it still is; the TL left the stage in 2003.
Yeah, he mentioned his is an ‘06, so I thought it might still be the same.
Yep same basic engine, but with some changes to heads/pistons/cams/etc. The TLRs made 125 iirc. Part of the reason the V-stroms can run to 400k miles is that mild state of tune. The updated DL1000s in 2014 got a very useful bump in torque while also losing about 15lbs (and also gaining that adv "beak" styling). A 2014-2019ish DL1000 is the sweet spot with these things IMO. Before all the TFT screens, can be found light used for a great price.
Makes sense. I didn’t know if there were differences in parts, or if they just tuned it more conservatively. Sounds like the answer is both. I rode a TLR with a power commander and some ohlins suspension bits years ago. I would not describe it as uninteresting.
Wait, it was a TLS. Apologies, been a long time.
Nobody was EVER bored by a TL-S. That bike has the soul of a demon. The TL-R was the sane one!
It belonged to one of my Dad’s buddies. My first comment after riding it was “I think your friend is trying to kill me”.
And then I went and rode it again.
I wish I could go back in time and buy one. Just to preserve it for the current day.
Interesting that you like motorcycles because of the "I may die *right now*" feeling. I think that you can recalibrate your senses to get that feeling on *any* motorcycle. I almost lost a big toe taking MSF class while wearing Sidi boots - the front wheel locked up on sandy, paved parking lot where the class was being given, and my 500cc Buell (provided by the school) went down under me, almost taking my left big toe in the process. We were practicing emergency braking from 30mph.
I have had my eye on the Kawasaki Versys for many years now, and the 650cc one at that. But where I live it would get stolen, and if it didn't, I'd die of heat stroke while riding it. I do think it would be great for all the practical reasons you describe. As for it being an ADV with only 650cc, I have zero interest in projecting any kind of image with my motorcycle. If people think I'm somehow weak or a wuss for riding a 650cc adventure bike, I'd be more than happy to show them my teeth. Otherwise, it's always better if they underestimate you.
The other reason for an adventure bike is that I had to do a lot of manual labor to put myself through college. In the process I've injured my hands, which makes any sport bike riding position untenable.
Can you please elaborate on the problems you had to fix on the V-Strom? Back when I used to ride (maybe 20-25 years ago), I was told that Suzukis (back then) had the worst reliability record of all Japanese brands, from the people who did ride various Japanese brands. I have read that V-Strom has been (perhaps) the exception to this rule, so I'm curious what a 20-year-old V-Strom is susceptible to.
I hope you continue to enjoy the bike.
I too did a RiderCourse on a Buell Blast- but I was dumb enough to be riding my own bike. Your story is better than any of mine.
Did mine on a tw200. Loved the thing, bought one cheap, and never drove it cause it only went 60.
I rode my TW200 from MN to MA. It made it. Now I ride it around the woodsy forest roads, a job for which it was made, unlike the cross country adventure.
It was a really nice bike just not ideal for boring ass Illinois roads. Thats a long ride on that bike. Maybe it goes 65-70 if you really pushed it? Impressive or maybe slightly stupid 😂
definitely fully stupid, but it was a good, if slightly boring trip, due to lack of power. I changed the gearing to get 60mph all day from it without burning it out.
The twisty, rocky trails of New England are lots of fun on the TW. There aren't enough trails close enough to me in Mpls/St Paul to make it fun, which is why I brought it out east. Why I didn't just buy it out in MA is where the stupid comes in, but I wanted an adventure, and now that it's there, it will stay out east where it thrives.
I learned how to do motorcycle wheelies on a TW200!
The Trail Whale!
I always dreamed id buy it and ride it on trails. We dont have trails here
Twenty five years ago my roommate and I often joked about starting a small business that would rent bikes like yours to people who otherwise were attempting the Michigan riding test on their hogs, baggers, or crotch rockets. Most laughs concerned how much we’d have needed to charge considering liability and damage!
Roomie had been licensed back home in New Delhi and aced his test on the Honda 360 twin I’d delivered to him after a purchase elsewhere. I later skipped it by showing a RiderCourse completion certificate. Given I’d been reading about Professor Harry Hurt for twenty years, I thought it money well spent.
The Hurt Report is another classic case of nominative determinism.
Glad that he died of natural causes:
"Hurt suffered a heart attack Sunday at Pomona Valley Hospital. It was a complication of back surgery that he had a week earlier..."
...
"Hurt was a lifelong motorcyclist and never had a crash, said his wife, Joan.
He rode “a garage full of things: Hondas, Triumphs, Nortons, dirt bikes, street bikes -- all kinds of stuff,” his son said, including a Suzuki trail bike he used to walk his pet, “Gurl Dawg,” as recently as a decade ago, when he gave up motorcycles because he was no longer physically able to ride."
https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-harry-hurt2-2009dec02-story.html
So, the school had two of these. Everyone else was on a Kawasaki 125cc or Suzuki 250cc (or was that the other way around?), but I wanted something ... different.
Joke was on me, 'cause the Buell would die when you closed the throttle, which meant I had to drag the clutch with part-open throttle at slow speed. Did I mention that I had no prior motorcycle-riding experience? Anyway, this made most of the final ride tests, and the figure-eight especially quite challenging.
I never did ride a Buell after that. How did you enjoy yours?
The Blast was the first of three Buells. I still own the Ulysses, and I still miss the Firebolt.
Early V-Stroms like to blow their airboxes off the throttle bodies. That was the problem with mine. I need to safety-wire it on over the winter, understanding that this can possibly lead to the airbox just plain exploding. Apparently it's not tolerant of WOT from low revs, even with the Power Commander fitted to it by the previous owner.
V-Strom most common issues:
* Fueling too lean and too surge-y. Everyone fits a Power Commander to address this.
* Airbox issues. You just have to get used to fixing them, or safety wire.
* Clutch basket "chudder", it doesn't really bother me and it's not a longevity or durability issue.
* Buffeting at speed regardless of windshield, due to the wacky aero of the bodywork itself.
That's about it. People can and do ride them to 400,000 miles and beyond.
Thank you for that info.
I recall how those "early generation" of mass-produced fuel-injected bikes had problems with surging. I had my eye on an FZ1 for a while, back when they came out, and recall reviews talking about surging. I never did get one, 'cause ... heat stroke where I live.
But a friend of mine got an FZ6, and I got to experience some of that surging.
Another friend had a carbureted Ninja 500, so it was easy to see the difference in fueling.
Sadly, haven't been on a motorcycle for close to two decades. I'd have to take MSF again, before I'd trust myself on a bike again.
I don't think it's fair to judge overall brand reliability from one 18 year old bike. In my somewhat biased opinion, I'd put Kawasaki last in quality among the Japanese brands. A big part of that is how many of their models are made in Thailand. When it comes to Hondas and Kawasakis, there is an obvious step up in finish when you pay enough for a Japanese one. Even the badges are different. Suzuki sells a lot of inexpensive bikes that are still MiJ.
Not to say you wouldn't get good service out of a 650 Kawasaki or that Thailand means the engine won't be good. I really like the 650 Versys. It was the close runner-up when I bought a 650 V-Strom. The Versys is perhaps more comfortable and better handling with some nice convenience features (better side cases, more easily adjustable windscreen). The V-Strom engine is way more interesting, it's MiJ, and it cost less money at the time.
I have commonly heard of Kawasaki parallel twin owners doing top end engine rebuilds in the 60-70k mile range. Conversely, in the same category, the Yamaha CP2 engine is known as one of the most reliable motorcycle engines period. The Suzuki 650 V-twin is good for well over 100k miles. Hondas? There are 125 cc Hondas out there with six figure mileage.