Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/128644
Colin Edwards ' Castrol Honda RC51 o n the A p r il i a , the H ond a ' s b est relax ed -fee lin g i n its e n gi n e c h a r - p o w e r i s a ll a t t he very t o p e n d, a c t e rist ic s a n d p owe r del iv e ry th an not a th ousa nd re vs be low th e its in - lin e f our -c y linder rival s , i t rev li m i t er , l i k e on a Du ke . The re ' s als o f l icks from si d e t o s i de so th e s a m e s p re a d of p owe r a s the mu ch m ore e a s ily , a n d b e cau s e of Ital ian b i ke , only it' s in a d iffe r ent i t s sl im bu i ld and conc ent r at ed p la c e . m ass i s s i m p ly le s s ph ys icall y Even a b ove the t rademark whin e d em and ing to ri d e ha rd . Th at's a from i t s ge ar -d r iv en cams , th ere ' s c r u ci al f a cto r i n any long - d ist ance quite a d istin ct i ve e xhaust n ot e rac e , w hethe r 2 4 h ours l o ng o r fr o m th e b ike 's t w i n Slov en i an - ' j u s t' ei g h t. made s ile nc e r s , becau se th e H o nda e n g i ne so u nd s sli ghtly h igh e r - Cha ngi ng di r ec t io n on the H o nd a is its stro ng suit: d oubt less pi t c h e d t h a n i t s g O-d egree des mo - than ks t o a c ombinat io n o f i t s qu a ttr o ri va l , t hou g h n o t so much c omp a ct bu ild , lo w er c e n t er o f a s t he 60 -deg r e e A p ril i a , w hi c h g ra vi ty , m or e ce nt r a lize d m a s s , a lso v ib r a t e s a li ttle mo r e than th e and s o - s moo t h RCS I . R i d in g th e S uz u - ge o m e t ry , i t s teers i n to a turn k a Eigh t Hou r - w i nn in g e n d u r a n c e versio n unde rl ines wh at a m ar velous bi k e t h is is f o r th e lo n g ha u l - n ot o nly is i t s m oot he r and m o r e Th e author discusses the RCSt with the lea de r of the RCSt project, T et suo Suzuki. Cham ion Year Ta lki ng to Wor ld Superb ik e Cham p ion Colin Edwards about how the Honda RC5! brought him the worl d crow n in its debut race season , under lines the tea m effo rt by HRC and Castro I Honda - involving no little brainpower, as well as lots of hard work - which ma de this ach ieveme nt possibl e. Coul d you have won the wor ld t itle this yea r with t he RC45 - or did you need Honda t o build the V -twin t o all ow you to do that? T he answer has to be - no, the RC45 j ust didn't have it. We're about a second quick er every where thi s yea r wit h the twin than we were in '99 on the V-four, though whether that's the bi ke or the tir es, I don 't know. Probabl y a co m binat ion of the two. Was it physically less dema nding to ride the V- t win in two hard 45-minute race s t he same day , four hours apart , t han it was the RC45 ? Definitely . Best way I can put it in layman's term s is that, on the RC45, yo u were wor ry ing about where yo u'd j ust been - becau se it had j ust tr ied to kill you . O n the V-t win, yo u ca n focus much better on where you're going, because it's not such a violent bike much easier to ride harder, for longer. In fact, I'm not surprised it m ade suc h a good endurance racer. You went quickly on th e V-twin st rai ght out of the bo x , from the very fi r st t est s at Philli p Island onward. Did it change much since then - or did Honda get it righ t fi rst time? We had one spec strai ght off that work ed pretty good - that 's wh at the AMA team ended up using all seas on lon g in th e USA , and they did well with it . Bu t we had a co uple of upgrades almost straig ht away - the first was a definite improvem ent , with ti-rods and other stuff that m ade it pic k up revs faster. But th en at Hockenheim we got a th ird spec where th ey were looking for top -end power, I suppose. I'd been asking them for thi s, sure - but at the same time, I begged them not to take any away from the bott om . Well , I guess yo u can 't do that - it's eith er one or the other, you either gain at the top or yo u gai n at the bottom . You can't have them both , and it took two races to figure out we had a problem , th en a thi rd to begin to fix it. Like at Misano, we were having to gear it shorter, and all of a sudde n the bot tom end wouldn't pull it out of co rners then, soon as it wou nd itself up , you co uldn't co ntrol it. It wasn't a twin any more. At Hockenheim we didn 't realize th is was such a handicap, becaus e it's a fast track and th is was a top -end m ot or - even though , if we only knew it at the ti m e, the reason we didn't win eith er of th e races there was probably th at new motor. Looking back , I think that's defi nitely the case - but then after Mi sano where we'd started to scratch our heads about wha t we had, next we came to Valencia , and we were over a second slower in the race than we had been in testin g there, on the sam e lires. We'd been wi thin a tenth of a second of the 500 GP guys there in testi ng. so we'd gone there figuring a doubl e was on the cards. No way! Tr ouble was, we didn't have the old engine to fall back on - everything was changed to the new stuff. But we m ade it clear to Honda we'd tak en a wrong tu rn - so for Lagu na they brought back the previo us ti -rod m ot or wit h m ore torque, and we figured - hey , let' s go win! But the prob lem now was tha t we'd got used to gearing it short, to get it to rev in orde r to get anyw here with the late st spec m otor . But with the older spec engine, we had it geared so ta ll, it was using nothing but bottom end. T rouble was , after th ree races wi th the higherrevving engine, I'd go t so used to that engine note, I was thi nki ng we had to hav e that lower gearing. But with th e older spec engi ne with more lowdown power, that only m eant the th ing was j ust spinn ing every where - at Laguna and at Br ands in August , I just co uldn't control it. T hen we went to A ssen, and in th e rain in the first race where you're using lower rpm through th e come r every where, it was ok ay and I had a nice win. But the n in the second race, in the dry - man , it was literally the worst I'v e ever ridden it. It was evil l We ended up getti ng fifth but it was ju st sp inning every where in a straight line. I just couldn' t fig ure out wha t was hap pening - and here we were, losing out on a world titl e with a bike th at at the start of the season had j ust been so great to ride, but now had gone and changed so m uch. So after A ssen , we all sat down once again to try to figure out wha t we'r e goi ng to do. My guy s cam e up with the idea of, "Hey , let' s j ack it up and put all the weight on the fro nt, lower the seat so my ridin g position 's in the same pi ace, then k inda see wha t hap pens." We'd tr ied that a little bit before, bu t I don 't th ink we'd sorta pushed through that barrier. Th en I got the dat a sheets from South A frica , wh ich was the best it had handled, and com pared them with A ssen , wh ich was the wors t it had been. Straightaway I decided we had to gear it way high, so as to chug thr ough those turn s at low rpm and use the engi ne's lowdown po wer to full advantage . > 36 J ANUARY 3 ,2001 cue I e n e vv s w e ll th o u gh t- ou t c h a ssis a l m o s t eff or t less l y , a n d ca n b e p it c h ed e as i ly f ro m s id e t o s i d e , l i k e i n t h e f as t uph ill c h ic a ne at M o t e g i , or in th e corne rs b efore th e p it s traigh t. Ye t , i n s p ite of th e c o nse r vative s t e er in g g eo met ry, hand ling i s ver y n eut ral : i t d o e s n ' t So, a week later we go to Oschersleben, which is a tight, twisty track yo u' d expect to gear low for. Bu t we'd geared it way high - and from the mom ent the bike got wheeled off the tru ck , it was perfect . Th e geo me try difference co m bined with the tall gea ring did the tri ck we got Superpole and went ou t and won both races , on a trac k everyone was say ing was a Haga tr ack or a Ducati track . Th en we came to Bra nds, and almost doubled up agai n there, except I pus hed a li ttle too hard on a drying track and cam e un stu ck in the fi rst race, But then we went out and un derli ned the Wor ld Championship by wi nni ng Race Two - and that was a nice way to end up the season. Did t he basic chassis setup change much over t he sea son, or was it mainly the engine spec you focused on, and ho w to adjust the setup t o t ak e account of that ? We had to pull out som ethin g new for every race - because what peopl e seem to forg et is that th is wa s a brand -new bik e, and we were starting fro m scra tch in making it work well every where . After we won the first race in South Africa, they all said, " Oh, he's goi ng to win everything, " but th ey forget it' s not that easy with a bike in it s fir st year, where you can't dial up last yea r's setti ngs and just go from there. We tri ed running it with RC4 5 geometry and suspension settings. but it just didn 't wor k - we had to fin d our own way all over again with the V-twin. But it seeme d the oniy way any one was goi ng to be im pressed wit h us win ning the champ ion ship was if we won every race - every body just sorta fig ured they kn ew it was going to happen, especi ally afte r Carl got hurt . Bu t we were show ing up at every race with a brand new m otorcy cle, and it was tough - espec ially co nsidering Hon da had never raced a V-twi n Sup erbike befor e, so they were learn ing as they went along , too. You ca n show up with a gearbox plan for an RC45 , and it doesn't relate, so you have to dial it in yourself for the new bike. There were only , let's see. two out of th irteen rounds where these guys didn't change two gearb oxes on a Satu rday night - one on each race engine. And that' s a long j ob, the night bef or e a race - Ad ria n and his guys wou ld sta rt work ri gh t afte r Superpol e, break bo th engines apart, fix the new gearbox in, the n ieave here at one or two o'clock in the m orn ing. Al most every race. They work ed their asses off - and thi s world titl e is as m uch their doing as m ine, or Honda 's. We have a real good team , between HRC, these gu ys and myself - and I say we earn ed that titl e. I'm real satisfied the way we got it, beca use it wasn't a foregone co ncl usio n, even if we set the pa ce rig ht at the start of the season and were ab le to live up to the ex pe ctati ons we cr eated by winn ing the title at the end. You've ne ver raced a f our stroke twin before. Was it a bi g swit ch t o go from a high -revvin g 750 V-four to a t orq uier, more punch y 10 0 0c c V -t win? To be honest, I do n't think it m att ers if it's a V-four or a V-tw in o r a n in- lin e fou r o r ev e n a 500cc GP bike, wha tever it is, I j ust race m ot orcycles, and it 's all a co nc ep t o f a dhes io n t o th e ground, and when y ou have it, yo u ha ve it , and if yo u don 't well , I think a goo d rider is gonna be able to get on anything with two wheels and go fast on it. Th e thi ng about m y sty le is th at I' m no t fantasti c and spectac ular to wat ch , I don 't bac k it in t o cor ners, I don 't get all crazy in the pa ck - but I' m s mo ot h . I' ve always been smooth on a bi ke, all through m y ca reer, but the Vtwin j ust brought it out - if you 're smooth on this m otorcycle, then yo u go fast, and that's what wins races, and cham p ionships .