Quote:
Originally Posted by andys 900ss No-no Kev, the bike really encourages you. I loved it and desperately want one... Andy |
I'll second that...I'll be after one of Ducati's 848 demo bikes for a session at Cadwell. I remember how good it was last year and want another hit.
As for the body positioning Bradders, I move around on the bike a lot, and hang off in what feels, to me, like a gibbon. As you can see from the photo, I'm just going into Barn the same as Andy is ^^^^ up there. Similar lean angle (Andy might be over a couple of degrees more), similar body position, but my knee is still yards from the tarmac and I very seldom get it on the deck.
The main difference is that I've got short stumpy legs compared to Andy, and what you can't see behind the zorst is that I'm already right on tiptoes with my left boot in order to use my left leg to lock into the tank, whereas Andy's boot is much flatter. This in turn means that I'm already hanging off about as far as the length of my thigh will let me, any more and my outside boot would be off the peg. Bayliss can do that but I can't without compromising the cleanliness of my undies. That and the fact I'm not very flexible in my hips and can't splay my legs any wider (ooerr missus) probably costs me a couple of inches in my ability to hang off, and my inside leg has the same affliction so that probably costs me another couple of inches between my knee and touch down. Alright, my outside foot is probably on tiptoes a bit more 'cos this is obviously my ST and it's got loads more seat to peg distance than my 888, but it's pretty much the same story with the T8, my knee hardly ever touches down. I don't sweat it, the pic above is about as far off the bike as I'm comfortable with right now.
One thing I do notice is that I'm up to 15 1/2 stone now and my beer belly really does restrict how easily I can get my torso down low - not just on a bike but during karate training as well, so I know I need to lose weight to be really mobile, another thing you can't see is that my belly is pressed flat on the tank so a few inches off my waistline would let me get my upper body a lot lower