Innholdsfortegnelse for January 2019 i Transworld Motocross

The first job I got out of high school was at my local Honda dealership, and one of the first products I bought myself at an employee discount was a set of Prostyle Levers. Distributed by O’Neal, the forged aluminum levers featured a distinctive notch in each of them that was designed to accommodate the rider’s actuation fingers. The patented bend in the Prostyle levers allowed complete actuation—all the way to the handlebar grips—without coming into the rest of the rider’s fingers. The levers looked odd, no doubt, but they did exactly what they were designed for and I loved them. Though the first set I bought were black, O’Neal soon began to offer a ton of wild colors, including the oh-so-trendy splatter paint. When I showed up at Ascot…

Price: $85 (jersey); $209 (pant) What It Is In line with the recent trend of super lightweight and stretchy riding gear, Troy Lee Designs created SE Pro—a new high-end line of apparel that is unlike anything previously offered by TLD. Developed on the race track by Team Honda HRC’s Cole Seely and the entire Troy Lee Designs/Red Bull/KTM team throughout the 2018 season, the SE Pro comes in three color schemes: red/white/blue, black/white, and Team Replica in orange/blue/white. Featuring a new athletic cut, the jersey and pant feature four-way stretch materials and laser-cut vents for comfort. The jersey and pant have a slim cut and the pant is pre-articulated in the riding position. Hits • This is, by far, the best fitting pant and jersey that Troy Lee Designs has…

Price: $349.99 What It Is Though the flagship Tech 10 boot is what most people think of when they hear the name Alpinestars, the Tech 7 is a wildly popular high-end boot that offers many of the same features of the Tech 10, only in a more straightforward design that does not incorporate an internal bootie. The Tech 7 features a dual-compound bonded sole, high-impact protection panels, a pivoting ankle support system, four buckles, and a wide entry in the ankle area. The Tech 7 is offered in many limited-edition colorways, like this red, white, and blue Union version made to commemorate this year’s 2018 Motocross of Nations at RedBud. Hits • Riders who do not care for the feel of an internal bootie system will love the straightforward fit…

At precisely 9:30 on the morning of October, 13, 2018, Joey Savatgy came charging through the automatic doors of the Planet Hollywood Casino, dodged his way through the valet line and then hopped into the back of an Audi passenger car. His debut aboard a Monster Energy Kawasaki was set to take place just a short drive away. The former 250-class racer had experienced many emotional roller coaster rides in Las Vegas, but he hoped to put that all behind him and start fresh. “I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little bit anxious,” Savatgy said. “That’s just part of it. I’m anxious to get everything going and to kind of get the day going. Now and when we get to A1. Those will be the two worst…

At just 12 years of age, Kiana Clay’s life was changed forever. To this day, she remembers the moment she suffered her injury vividly. As Clay crossed the finish line aboard her YZ85, the front wheel of another rider came crashing down on her neck. The impact resulted in a broken neck and severed nerves. It would be seven minutes before she awoke to realize that she could not feel or move her right arm. “The first thing that I saw was a paramedic standing over me. I started moving all of my fingers and toes and everything, and I noticed that I couldn’t feel my arm,” said Clay, now 24. “I just started screaming, ‘I can’t feel my arm, I can’t feel my arm!’ That’s when the paramedic’s eyes…

THE BIKE A few days before the Monster Energy/Yamalube/Star/Yamaha team packed the team semi and headed to RedBud for the Motocross of Nations, we asked Assistant Team Manager Wil Hahn if we could swing by and take some photos of Aaron Plessinger’s YZ250F race bike. “Only if you bring a girl” was his reply, so we recruited a model in record time and showed up the next afternoon to have a look at the machine and take care of this month’s pinup poster. Plessinger’s Billy Hartle-tuned YZ250F featured some slightly different ignition map settings for the MXoN due to the FIM’s stringent fuel and sound regulations, but other than that it was the same bike that carried him to the 2018 Western Regional 250 Supercross and 250 National Championships. For…

Price: $749.95 What It Is Arai Helmet is a family-owned helmet manufacturer from Japan that produces high-quality off-road, street, and automotive helmets largely by hand. The Arai VX-Pro4 received an update with a new visor, air ducts, and mouthpiece a few years ago, and the new 2019 graphic schemes were just released. We were pumped to get our hands on a new VX-Pro4 in the Slash graphic. Arai’s philosophy for helmet safety is based on a round helmet shape that is designed to flex on impact, with no sharp edges to snag against the ground in the event of a crash. The VX-Pro4 is certified to DOT and Snell standards, and it is considered by many to be one of the safest helmets made. Hits • The comfort of an…

Price: $239.99 (pipe); $229.99 (carbon silencer) Application: All two-strokes (tested here on 2018 Kawasaki KX85) What It Is Bill’s Pipes is one of the major players in the two-stroke aftermarket exhaust game, and they have systems for virtually every two-stroke available today. We smashed the stock pipe on our 2018 Kawasaki KX85 test bike and needed a replacement, so we turned to Bill’s Pipes for an upgrade. Hits • Craftsmanship of Bill’s Pipes exhausts and silencers is impeccable. The welds are beautiful, and the parts bolted onto our KX85 perfectly. • The MX2 carbon fiber silencer is super light and has an audibly cooler tone than a standard aluminum silencer. • Low-end roll-on throttle response is noticeably improved and the KX85 gains some much-needed torque down low that pulls hard…

For many years, motorcycle manufacturers limited the performance of their dual-sport-specific models. The general consensus was that high-horsepower motorcycles would not meet government regulations, would sacrifice reliability for performance, and that they would be too much for the technical conditions one would encounter in off-road settings. With this, most of the street-legal machines produced were simple air-cooled four-strokes that required very little maintenance and could be enjoyed for hours without exhausting the rider. That trend changed a few years ago when KTM found a balance between performance and reliability with their EXC line, models many consider to be motocross bikes with headlights. The popularity of the lightweight models is impossible to ignore and it has created a new category of dual sport. Honda is the latest OEM to bring a…

Motocross racers using mountain bikes for cross training is nothing new, but did you know that mountain bike racers have lots to gain from motocross bikes, too? Three-time World Champion Anneke Beerten started riding motocross when she moved from the Netherlands to Southern California a few years ago, and we were stoked that she chose the second round of the TWMX Fall Classic Series to make her motocross racing debut. “I’ve done a few off-road GPs before, but this is my first official motocross start behind a gate,” Beerten said. “There is plenty to learn on a motorcycle that carries over to what I do, but for me, the big part of riding motocross is fun, with all of the little other things thrown in. It’s good for riding ruts…

Last month we got to bomb the trails around our SoCal locale aboard the all-new Intense Tazer pedal-assist MTB, and we were understandably bummed when we had to return it to the crew at Intense Cycles. Seeing the disappointment on our faces, they softened the blow and sent us home with a brand-new Tracer in the $4,999 Pro build. With a rich history in the downhill and enduro categories, Intense is no stranger when it comes to building mountain bikes that beg to get rowdy on the trails. The Tracer isn’t all-new for 2018 (it was revamped in ’17), but it is a serious trail weapon that inspires confidence in otherwise frightening trail conditions. Equipped with 160mm front and 165mm rear wheel travel, the Tracer boasts slack frame geometry and…

Price: $249.99 What It Is The Leatt brace is the original neck brace in the sport, and the GPX 3.5 is the newest version of the brace that changed the way we all think about protective gear. The new brace features a polycarbonate shell with polyamide-reinforced EPS construction, as well as a visibly different design. The GPX 3.5 is the only brace in the Leatt line to feature a split design that is much more flexible. Both the helmet rim striking platform and rear thoracic strut are split at the rear and held together by a flexible piece of rubber. Also unique to the GPX 3.5 is the brace’s front open and closure design, which is operated by a large red button on the left side of the brace. Hits…

Yamaha’s release of a 65cc mini-bike in 2018 was one of the biggest developments for amateur motocross in years. The blue bike brought even more competition to one of the biggest, albeit youngest classes in amateur motocross and there was an almost immediate change to the color palette of the starting gate at races around the country. Because Yamaha hadn’t had a “junior cycle” in their model line since the 1980s, the YZ65 was an all-new design that made good use of other YZ parts and technology, including the YZ85 mini-bike and full-size YZ125 and YZ250, and has been praised as a near-perfect mini-machine. Although full-size motorcycles get much of the development attention from OEMs, plenty of work goes into making a well-rounded mini-bike. If a company makes an engine…

Being the crew chief at one of the largest American motocross and Supercross race teams is one of the highest responsibility positions in the paddock. For Monster Energy Kawasaki’s Mike Williamson, his last two decades of work have been everything he needed to prep for the job title. In fact, his career as a mechanic could be considered the benchmark of success for any up-and-comer in the field. His path began in the ’90s with Jeremy Albrecht on the North County Yamaha team, wrenching for Donald Upton. Moving along to FMF Honda and then over to Factory KTM after that, Williamson saw his first championship success in 2003 with Grant Langston. His next step to Kawasaki would be his most successful, eventually pairing up with a young James Stewart and…