Ninja Training
NINJA TRAINING
A little screamer goes a long way
STEVE NATT
Motorcycle racing is an amazing thing. One moment it fills you with near-orgasmic joy, the next it fills you with unbridled terror. Each second stresses your mind like a three-hour final exam. Each inch of track strains your body as though you were pushing the motorcycle up Sisyphus' hill. It is a world of superlatives-of extreme, explosive moments of perception snapping by like the flip-cards in a nickelodeon.
What you need as a newcomer to this environment is a machine that will help you to get out of trouble almost as quickly as you got into it.
For this and many other reasons, I’m awfully glad I started on a Kawasaki Ninja 250.
Some guys learn this the hard way. They hit the track for the first time on so much motorcycle that they can barely keep the thing upright. Their novice brains are completely loaded as the abundance of acceleration and braking does nothing but help them blow it. You don’t have to be Nicky Hayden to see this; you just have to show up for the season’s first open practice at your local racetrack with an open mind. I did. Way back in 1986 on one of the (now, finally) old-style Ninjas.
Given their horsepower and braking advantage, every big bike should have blown right by me. To be honest, some did-like I was tied to a post. Others must have been annoyed by this little 250cc Twin beating their liter-class fire-breathers around the circuit.
Hey, I’m no pro, just a guy whose ability as a racer is matched, not overwhelmed, by the motorcycle. The only crashes in my New Rider’s School were liter-bikes.
Now, this is a tough step for all of us macho male motorheads. We were raised on musclecars and musclebikes. BIG motors, BIG tires and BIG horsepower claims are American statements of manhood. Well, nothing will transform you into a windmilling projectile faster than too much power on the track. Even so, I admit it’s tough to deal with comments like, “Why only a 250?” or “Don’t they make 250cc scooters?” or “It must be slow, are you afraid of horsepower?”
My answer to that is, “No. I respect it.” On roadrace tracks, size and weight are the two biggest liabilities. Horsepower is only as useful as your ability to get it to the track smoothly. Not that my Ninja was a gutless wonder. What I got with this 300-pound, four-stroke, four-valve, water-cooled double-cammer was balance. With tuner Kenny Augustine working his motor magic, my carefully massaged (but class-legal) motor pumped out nigh on 40 hp as it happily revved right up to its 14,000-rpm redline. Add it up: That’s a very livable horsepower-to-weight ratio. The stock binders weren’t exactly MotoGP fare (still aren’t), but with its
race-rubber shoes the thing could be flicked over so far I darn near dragged my elbows.
“So what?” you say, so can my full-liter hyperbike. The point here is that you don’t have to be Valentino to ride the Ninjette gracefully. If graceful is not what you want to be, then bolt a nitrous bottle onto your V-Max and go do the quarter-mile. In roadracing, it’s the adverb most synonymous with fast.
Other people start with 600s, but they suffer from being tossed into a much larger field of competitors. Of all the production classes, 250cc riders find themselves jockeying for the line into Turn 1 with the fewest competitors. Just look at the start of a 600 or 10OOcc race-there’s nothing quite like being in the middle of a crowd of 40 riders all trying to grab the same two-foot-wide piece of real estate. And since quarterliter bikes are so small and evenly matched (even with engine work), the racing is tighter and closer than in any other class. If the guy next to you has bad breath, you’ll know it.
The li’l Ninjas are also relatively simple to work on and cheap to fix. Stock and oversize parts are readily available, and since they’ve been competitive for years, there’s plenty of aftermarket support-same will be true for the new version. There are only two carbs to synchronize and two sparkplugs to change. Tires, chains and clutches last longer than on big bikes. It even gets better mileage, and at $7 a gallon for race gas, that adds up.
Being scared isn’t fun; it isn’t why we race. The Ninja 250 is a way to gently introduce yourself to a sport that has as much potential to hurt you as it does to make you smile. For those of you who remember math:
(BALANCE + GRACE + CONTROL) x SPEED = FUN
Think of it as The Little Ninja that Could, a machine as benevolent when you mess up as it is responsive when you don’t.
Oh yeah, one more reason to start with a 250: On race day they’re a helluva lot easier to get in and out of the truck.
Steve Natt is the host of Cycle World Radio, heard Saturdays 5-7 p.m. PST. For a list of stations or to access cataloged podcasts, sign on to. www.cycleworld.com.
