VOL. 54 ISSUE 19 MAY 16, 2017 P109
of braking at COTA, mind you,
and for the rest of the lap I don't
really have any braking issues.
One of the Suzuki's trump
cards is the way it falls into a
corner. The slimness of the
new design allows me to really
muscle it through the stadium
section and onto the marvelous
turn 16, 17 and 18 right hander.
This is where the GSX-R is at
its best, carving a nice wide arc
and yelling at me to stop being
a pussy and get on the gas on
the exit earlier and harder. We
are running the Bridgestone R10
track tires and they complement
the GSX-R beautifully, allowing
the chassis to show off what it's
good at.
From corners two to 10, the
GSX-R is a sheer joy. It laps up
direction changes, swapping
one side for another and rolling
through the bends like it's on
rails. Even with the soft Showa
BPF, I have very few complaints
other than I need to lose some
weight to really face up properly
to a GSX-R1000. The bike's diet
has made it more compact all
around, which, in turn, makes
the GSX-R a far better corner-
ing weapon than last year. And
makes me question my own diet.
Through the first session I run
traction control on level five,
switching to three for the rest
of the day and leaving it there.
