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/885168
IN THE WIND P24 SEELY'S SHOCK FAILURE EXPLAINED T eam Honda HRC revealed that a spring holder in his fac- tory KYB shock was the culprit that caused Cole Seely's rear suspension to fail in both motos of the Motocross of Nations. "Clearly, we're very disap- pointed by what happened at the Motocross of Nations," said Takashi "Sam" Mishima, Manager of Motorcycle Sports at American Honda. "The factory KYB shock on our bike uses a cup-shaped spring collar with a slot where it slides over the shaft, and when the mud packed on the bottom- ing bumper during the first moto, enough force built up to shift the collar out of place. We used this same setup the entire AMA Pro Motocross season, including at muddy races like Unadilla, but this was the first time we experienced this issue. We replaced the entire shock for Cole's final moto, but the same problem occurred again. Normally with issues like this, it's difficult to even recreate them again, so the fact that this problem occurred twice on the same day suggests there was something particular about the Matterley Basin track layout and/or the consistency of the mud that created the perfect conditions for the problem. "Honda customers should know that the retaining system on the production Showa CRF450R shock is different; in fact, the system is the same as that on the factory Showa shock used by our MXGP counterparts at Team HRC, whose bikes didn't experi- ence this issue at the Motocross of Nations. Obviously, we'll look into this along with KYB and address it for next season, but in the meantime, we offer our sincere apologies to Cole, and to American motocross fans for the fact that Team USA's results were so significantly impacted by this issue." CN USA TOP WORLD IN SPEEDWAY GRUDGE MATCH T he 2017 Fast Friday's Motorcycle Speedway sea- son came to a close in Auburn, California, Octo- ber 7, at the Gold Country Fairgrounds, where Team USA emerged victorious in the annual International Grudge Match. Team USA—made up of eight-time AMA Speedway National Champion Billy Janniro, Tommy Hedden, Bryan Yarrow, Bart Bast, Luke Becker and Russell Green—took the win, 58-53. There was also a Youth program that was run and current AMA 250 Youth National Champion Sebas- tian "Big Daddy" Palmese took the win. Palmese went undefeated. Michael Kirby Team USA won the International Grudge Match at Auburn Speedway. KYB says that mud most likely contributed to the failure of a shock spring holder in Cole Seely's bike at the Motocross of Nations. PHOTOGRAPHY BY RAY ARCHER PHOTOGRAPHY BY MICHAEL KIRBY