JCR HONDA CRF450R AND CRF250R
RACER TEST
P68
so you want one that is super
rideable and not grossly power-
ful to where it has a big spikey
hit. Sometimes that's really excit-
ing and that's all good if you're
riding it short periods on a track,
so we try to broaden the power
out and smooth it out through
the range. We want to be able to
ride first gear over super snotty,
technical, rocks, and we also
have to be able to go fifth-gear
on a grass track, so we need
real broad power that: one,
won't stall; two, we can click it
into fifth and hit 70 miles an hour
if we need to."
That same kind of philosophy
goes into suspension setup.
"Suspension, in GNCC rac-
ing, a lot of the tracks have been
raced on for several years now,
forward and backward, and the
holes are getting pretty big, and
so are the roots and the rocks,"
says Campbell. "So it's kind of
a tricky deal how to set up a
GNCC bike, because you need
the suspension firm enough to
be able to go over holes and big
dips and ravines and stuff like
that, and whooped-out trails, but
you also need it soft enough to
absorb sharp rocks, sharp roots,
in a very consecutive form. So,
kind of the path that we use with
suspension is, we need to ride
up in the stroke, but we need it
to react quickly, like high-speed
quickness for the rocks and
roots to where it's not getting
knocked all over, and you're not
losing traction. On top of that,
we can't have it bottom in big G-
outs and holes. So it takes quite
a bit of tweaking. Bones (Jim
Bacon) at Pro Circuit has helped
us with that, with suspension
settings.
"Our 450 has been in devel-
opment for two years and now
I feel like we have a really good
winning package. Chris proved
last year that he can win; overall
it's coming together."
Campbell says that setting
up bikes for Baja and bikes for
GNCC racing are two completely
different animals.
"Setting up a GNCC bike is
quite a bit different than Baja,"
says Campbell. "Baja was kind
of easy for us in a way, because
that is the type and style of rac-
ing I did growing up doing and
that came second-nature to me.
Bach's CRF450R Honda is built for speed and comfort.
