450s Four Ways

Cheap racing. Of all the oxymorons, that's arguably the most moronic. Racing is the fastest way to turn money into noise. Always has been, always will be. And as you climb the rungs of competitiveness, it only gets more expensive. Want to beat the guy who blew his inheritance on engine work? Better cash in your 401K plan--and never mind that pesky penalty for early withdrawal.

Then again, racing motorcycles is about the most exciting thing a person can do. And there are some forms of racing that, if not exactly cheap, are certainly less expensive than others.

Consider the four motorcycles shown here. Never mind that two race on dirt, one on pavement and one on a bit of each--they all started out as 450cc motocrossers, which sell for around $7500. Change the wheels and tires, maybe make some engine, brake and suspension mods, and you're still looking at being ready to race for under 10 grand. And that's if you start with a new dirtbike--you could save thousands by using a used one.

Don't be put off by the state-of-the-art hardware shown here. These bikes are pure eye candy, chosen as much to entice you into reading this story as for their relevance. But do note that there is one from each of the Big Four Japanese manufacturers, so you can campaign whatever brand you'd like. And know that you don't have to modify your bike nearly as much as these to get started. Or at all: You can in fact dip your toe into the competitive waters on a factory-fresh motocrosser--and not just in motocross. There's nothing to stop you from racing a stock MX bike off-road, whether that's in an enduro, hare scrambles or desert race. Likewise, many dirt-track clubs have a Knobby class and supermoto sanctioning bodies typically have a Sportsman class for bikes with dirtbike-sized wheels. Spoon on a set of street tires and you could even roadrace in the Singles class.

Perhaps best of all, you could conceivably take part in all four of these racing disciplines with one bike and a few sets of wheels--harking back to the glory days of the AMA Grand National Championship, when racers rode the same bike in dirt-track and roadraces. That's good whether you're an old guy racing just for fun or a young gun aspiring to future greatness.

How do you get started? Just turn the page...

Motocrosser To Off-Road Racer In 46 Easy Steps
1 Suzuki RM-Z450 Off-Road Racer
Though converting a motocrosser into an off-road racer is a far subtler transformation than the other three bikes in this story, it still takes a significant effort--especially to compete at the national level. Motocross bikes are built without compromise and roll off showroom floors bare bones. Light weight is paramount, with explosive acceleration and stiff suspension capable of absorbing supercross-style triple jumps and whoop sections. Thus they're often too much bike for off-road racing, which throws a whole different set of obstacles at you, such as rocks, tree roots and river crossings.

This 2009 Suzuki RM-Z450 is campaigned in both the Grand National Cross Country (GNCC) series on the East Coast and the World Off-Road Championship Series (WORCS) in the West. In general, GNCCs feature tighter, more technical woods riding than WORCS races, which are faster and typically held on extended motocross tracks. If you're interesting in trying off-road racing, there are organizations in every part of the country running everything from timed enduros to hare scrambles to long-distance desert races.

Because Suzuki doesn't have a dedicated off-road bike in its lineup, the factory team has no choice but to start with a motocrosser. The other Japanese manufacturers all offer enduro models(Honda CRF450X, Yamaha WR450F, Kawasaki KLX450R), but because these are better suited for amateur trail riders than professional racers, prepping them for serious competition can take even more work. Their engines have to pass noise and emissions standards; their suspensions are tuned for mellow trail work; their wide-ratio transmissions are too widely spaced for tighter courses; and they're heavier and less powerful (as many as 10 horsepower down) than their motocross counterparts.

To build a motorcycle capable of winning at the highest levels of off-road racing, Suzuki carefully modifies the RM-Z to enhance performance yet retain reliability. Significant effort is spent trying to get the right kind of power to the ground. In addition to a Pro-X piston and mild headwork, the fuel-injection mapping and FMF exhaust are changed depending on conditions. A Hinson clutch helps the bike survive the oft-grueling races, which can run as long as 3 hours. An IMS gas tank holds 1 gallon more than stock, with a dry-break system for quick fill-ups. RG3 re-valves the suspension and provides a shock link with a revised leverage ratio to improve compliance and bump absorption. RG3 triple clamps with 1.5mm less offset increase trail for greater stability, while a GPR steering stabilizer keeps the Renthal handlebar pointed in the right direction. A plethora of aftermarket bits protect the RM-Z's engine and chassis from brushes with Mother Earth.

An all-too-short test ride on GNCC racer Charlie Mullins' factory RM-Z showed this to be one of the most confidence-inspiring dirtbikes we've ridden. The mildly massaged motor is plenty fast, with power everywhere you need it. But it's the suspension action and cornering that really blew us away. Where stock 450cc MXers have a "see-saw-like" feel over jumps and bumps, the factory RM-Z is much more stable and controlled, marrying plush with firm. As is often the case, a lot of little stuff really adds up. The factory team's testing and attention to detail created a bike that's versatile yet supremely capable.

Not to mention expensive, and $14,000 is a lot of dough to go racing. But depending on your weight and skill level, you'll likely achieve appreciable results by leaving the motor stock. Adding weight to the flywheel can help tame power delivery for tighter/more technical conditions, and adding a quieter slip-on silencer with a spark arrestor is absolutely necessary. Having the suspension re-sprung/re-valved is money well spent, and if you want to keep engine fluids where they belong and the brake rotors straight, you'll need guards. Granted, without the fancy factory bits your bike won't perform like Mullins', but unless you ride like him, it won't matter one bit.

Suzuki RM-Z450 Off-Road Racer
What You Need
Re-done suspension, quieter silencer/spark arrestor, heavier flywheel, larger gas tank, engine/chassis guards

What A Pro Needs
Motor work, full exhaust, recalibrated EFI, heavy-duty clutch, personalized bars/clamps/controls/seat, gearing, tires with flat-proof inserts

How much?
$10,000 to get dirty
$14,000+ to run with Mullins & Co.

How to Get Sideways Without Going Broke
2 Yamaha YZ450F Dirt-Tracker
Flat-track is something like sculpting redwood with a chainsaw. It looks easy...until you strap on a steel shoe and try it yourself. But for those of us who idolize Scotty Parker, Jay Springsteen and Chris Carr, the hardest part can be finding a suitable tool to try it with--something less intimidating than a purpose-built $20,000 Harley-Davidson XR750, but more capable than your average dirtbike.

But what?

"I tell people who want to get into flat-track to start out with a motocross bike," says Jimmy Wood, who rides this artfully converted #37 Southland Racing Products Yamaha YZ450F. "Take the back rim and throw it on the front; then all you really need is a [wider] 19-inch rear rim and a spoke kit. Lower the fork and shock, put on a set of dirt-track tires and you're pretty much ready to go."

Lower speeds make short-track racing easier to wrap your mind around than the larger half-mile and mile ovals. Especially when you can convert a 450cc motocrosser into a competitive short-tracker for about $1600 tacked onto the price of a new (or used) bike.

The parts list gets longer for someone like Jimmy, who contends the fiercely competitive AMA Grand National Singles series from Daytona Beach, Florida in March to Springfield, Illinois in September. Still, converting a modern four-stroke motocross bike is easier and a whole lot less expensive than bolting said engine into a purpose-built steel tube frame and waiting for the UPS man to deliver a laundry list of esoteric essentials from all over the country.

Despite being 30-35 lbs. lighter than Wood's converted motocrosser and wickedly fast under someone with the skills to wield one, the pure-bred, $16,000-plus "framer" is also irrelevant in the AMA GNS Championship. According to the 2009 rulebook, the main frame and swingarm must be stock. "Last year you could ride anything you wanted at the Nationals," says Wood. "At Daytona, everybody had a framer. The track is slippery and bumpy, so you need something with a lot of grip. There wasn't one stock frame in that main event. Then at the end of the year we went to Springfield, where there's a whole lot of grip, and everyone was on a stock frame."

Though it looks more like a slammed motocrosser than what Jim Rice and Gene Romero rode in On Any Sunday, Wood's Yamaha is much more accessible in every sense of the word. Start with the engine: A stock YZ450F makes about 50 horsepower. This one makes 59, thanks to a Rocket exhaust, bored stock carburetor, new cams and valve springs, higher compression, a ported cylinder head and assorted other top-end tweaks from Jim Wood--a.k.a. Jimmy's dad--the one-man brain trust behind Southland Racing Products in San Bernardino, California. He'll add a few more horses for faster tracks like Peoria, but smooth, linear power is the key. And the Yamaha's bottom-heavy power delivery is a good place to start.

The stock YZ450F hits hard and trails off quickly--perfect for point-and-shoot motocross tracks, but not the best for sliding around a quarter-mile short-track. Wood's version draws a straighter, more linear power curve that translates to controllable acceleration out of slippery corners. Adding 60 ounces to the stock crankshaft--the most extra metal you can stuff into the stock crankcase--smoothes out the power delivery to improve grip, but it's expensive: $450-$750 depending on how much weight you add. "The heavier flywheel lets me turn it on harder in the middle of a corner and it'll grip better at the exit, but the bike doesn't accelerate as hard," Wood explains. "And when you shut it off at the end of the straightaway, it doesn't want to stop." A simple Yamaha GYTR bolt-on flywheel weight adds 30 ounces that make the stock bike's 50 horses easier for most riders to use.

Flat-track is all about grip, and the engine is only half of that equation. The other half of convincing a motocrosser to steer with the throttle and slide on cue starts with moving everything closer to the ground. Jim Wood says shortening the fork by 5-6 inches and the shock by 1-1.25 inches puts the YZ in its short-track happy place. More than that and the bike stands up mid-corner; any less and the rear wheel spins instead of putting power to the ground. The short-tracker's springs are 25-30 percent stiffer and damping rates are firmed up considerably.

Rubber-covered footpegs are essential when you're wearing a steel shoe on one foot. Armed with a set of Dunlop or Maxxis dirt-track tires, you have a tool that's good enough to win if you are.

After a few dozen laps around the Willow Springs half-mile, we had a pretty good idea of what it takes to be a dirt-tracker. Cojones like Brunswick bowling balls, for starters: With no front brake, engine braking and sideslip slow you down going in--try to ignore that fence around the outside. Snap the throttle shut and the front end wants to wash out. Roll it off gently and the bike tracks to the apex, at which point you dial it back on and drive off the corner. In too deep? Closing the throttle just makes things worse. You've got to get the back end sliding to get the front end pointed toward the bottom of the racetrack. Yes, it's counter-intuitive at first. It's addictive too. And the only known cure is topping off the tank for another dozen laps.

Yamaha YZ450F Dirt-Tracker
What You Need
19-inch wheels with dirt-track tires, lower/firmer suspension, heavier flywheel, rubber-covered footpegs

What A Pro Needs
Motor work, exhaust, adjustable triple clamps, quick-change rear wheel, gearing (13-15-tooth countershafts, 40-50-tooth wheel sprockets)

How much?
$9000 to go get sideways $14,000 to line up with Jimmy Wood et al

Fulfilling Your Superbikers Fantasy Is Just A Wheel Set Away
3 Honda CRF450R Supermoto
The other disciplines in this story may be faster, more graceful or more daring, but nothing comes close to the fun factor of supermoto. And it's one of the easiest forms of racing to ease into.

Whether your background is dirt or street, your skill set is readily adaptable. Knee down or leg out? It's entirely up to you.

Supermoto racing clubs are plentiful, and because races can be held at roadrace courses, kart tracks, in parking lots or even on public roads, there's no shortage of venues. Lever some dual-sport skins onto your stock rims and have at the Sportsman class. Odds are once you've gotten a taste of this outlandishly amusing form of racing, you'll be hooked. Thankfully, transforming your motocrosser into a competent, competitive supermoto racer is a straightforward and affordable enterprise.

The main thing that sets a supermoto bike apart from its motocross brethren is its wheel set. Bolting on a pair of 17-inch hoops opens the door to a wide range of sticky street rubber--a necessity when navigating hairpin turns and fast sweepers. If you're willing to say sayonara to your knobbies, any experienced wheel builder can lace your stock hubs to supermoto rims for around $800.

If you'd still like to be able to ride in the dirt, various online retailers peddle ready-to-roll supermoto wheels (with tires) for as little as $1200. Upgrading the brakes is the final essential step.

Repetitive hard braking will wilt a stock dirtbike rotor like steamed spinach, leaving it blued and warped after a few laps. Bolting on a 320mm disc adds braking power and fade resistance, but requires an adapter to relocate the stock caliper. Most supermoto brake kits come with the adaptor and hardware, and can be picked up for around $275.

That's all you really need to do, and it doesn't have to be that expensive. Specialty shops such as Motostrano (www.motostrano.com) sell complete kits for around $1100, complete with wheels, tires, tubes, rotor, adaptor and even a short front fender. All the other stock components will suffice, although you'll want to dial up suspension damping for better control. For just a few hundred dollars more, the setup can be improved significantly. Racing brake pads, stainless brake lines and a slip-on muffler are worthwhile investments. Plastic sliders on the axles, bar-ends and footpegs will go a long way toward protecting your bike and staying on the local kart track owner's good side when you push that hacked-out corner entry too far. Depending on what grade of rubber you run and how aggressively you ride, tires can last several weekends.

If you have your sights set on AMA Pro racing, the parts list swells considerably. The modifications aren't extensive, but they are expensive. Troy Lee Designs set us up with one of their team's 2009 Honda CRF450Rs (Jeff Ward won on his the following weekend at Southern California's Auto Club Speedway) to see what a money-no-object racer feels like.

At nearly $20,000, the Troy Lee Honda is an outstanding performer, as dialed-in as anything we've ridden. "We'll go to the track maybe two or three times in a week, tuning and testing everything to get it working perfectly for the rider," says mechanic David Joy. We were apprehensive at first, but the suspension, brakes, tires and fuel injection were so spot-on that we felt comfortable and in control within a few laps. The Hinson slipper clutch kept the rear wheel tame while dropping gears going into corners, and the worked-over engine, exhaling through a titanium Pro Circuit pipe, was strong enough to loft the front wheel at corner exits. Suspension work was limited to installing stiffer springs and reshimming the damping cartridges.

The Troy Lee bikes run Marchesini forged-aluminum wheels, mounted with ultra-sticky Dunlop slicks. The 16.5-inch front hoop is endowed with an impressive brake setup, which retails for $2500--the single most costly upgrade. The hardware is all Brembo, with a full-floating 320mm rotor, billet-aluminum Monobloc caliper (with four titanium pistons), racing brake pads, master cylinder and stainless brake lines.

Supermoto racing favors riding skill over power, so don't let the exotic parts on this top-level racebike intimidate you. Slap some roadrace rubber on your old motocrosser and get out there!

Honda CRF450R Supermoto
What You Need
17-inch wheels/tires, oversized front brake, axle/footpeg/bar-end sliders

What A Pro Needs
Engine work, exhaust, slipper clutch, re-valved suspension, mag wheels, radial front brake caliper

How much?
$9000 to get your feet wet $19,000+ to run with Wardy and all

Learn To roost The Roadrace Track In One Easy Lesson
4 Kawasaki KX450F Roadracer
While the other bikes in this feature bear at least a vestigial resemblance to their motocross ancestors, you'd hardly guess there's an unaltered dirtbike frame and engine lurking under a Formula 450 roadracer's aerodynamic skin. Even more unexpected is how well these radically reconfigured machines navigate a road course. A few laps on a properly fettled F450 bike might convince you that roadracing is the most inspired mutation to dirtbike DNA yet.

Surprisingly few changes are required to complete an F450 conversion. You'll need 17-inch wheels to accommodate roadrace rubber, plus an oversized front brake. Clip-on handlebars and rearset footpegs are a must to create a roadrace-appropriate riding position, and bodywork is a no-brainer now that Catalyst Racing Composites manufactures kits to fit all popular 450cc 'crossers.

Rolling your own F450 is essentially a bolt-on endeavor, save for suspension. Contrary to popular belief (and earlier efforts), you cannot successfully re-purpose sportbike components. Sportbike forks are too short, which takes away too much trail (degrading front-end grip) and excessively flattens the swingarm angle (making the bike squat too much under power). A better solution comes from Paul Thede at Race Tech, who spent countless hours analyzing F450s on his in-house chassis dyno to develop a turnkey tuning package that reconfigures the stock motocross suspension for roadrace use.

Technicians internally shorten the stock shock, fit it with a shorter, stiffer spring and re-valve it using their proprietary Gold Valve technology. The fork legs are also shortened, and likewise retrofitted with Gold Valves and stiffer springs. New triple clamps radically reduce offset to increase trail (lessening the tendency to tuck the front), and new fork bottoms have provisions for mounting a radial brake caliper. Lastly, Race Tech machines the tapered upper fork stanchions to a constant diameter to accept clip-ons. The result is an effective roadracing tool with near-flawless handling and a power-to-weight ratio to rival most 600cc sportbikes: 252 lbs. full of gas and 55 bhp with an FMF pipe and mild fuel-injection tuning.

We rode two F450s at the Willow Springs Horse Thief Mile: Max Capps' 2009 Kawasaki KX450F-based machine, as well as an '08 Suzuki RM-Z450 belonging to Gavin Trippe, promoter of the legendary ABC-TV "Superbikers" events, who now proselytizes about F450 movement at www.450moto.com. Capps' brand-new bike was a stunner, bristling with hand-machined components, but zero set-up time (he literally finished assembling it in the paddock that morning) meant the handling was less than optimal. Trippe's well-developed RM-Z, on the other hand, was a revelation. Imagine a more stable, less twitchy (but still very agile) 250cc Grand Prix bike with a powerplant every bit as torquey and tractable as a Suzuki SV650--that's essentially what an F450 feels like at speed. Nothing brakes better than a bike this light, and abundant cornering clearance, coupled with right-now responsiveness that's only possible from a 250-pound package, encourages tight lines and high corner speeds that result in surprisingly quick lap times.

The easiest way to get into F450, Trippe says, is to buy a used supermoto bike fitted with 17-inch wheels and an oversized front brake. Add bodywork ($1100) and suspension ($2500) and you'll be race-ready for well under $10K. To go the fresh-and-tasty route like Capps, double that figure. Not exactly pocket change, but that's substantially cheaper than a similarly outfitted 600, and the operating costs are much lower--tires last at least three race weekends, Trippe claims, and you can run all day on 4 gallons of gas. Such advantages have Trippe lobbying hard for F450s as a more affordable and accessible alternative to the (now-discontinued) Red Bull Rookies Cup and the AMA/DMG's new under-21 Supersport class (which attracted just seven entries at California's Auto Club Speedway the weekend after our test). These bikes also make competitive Formula Singles-class racers at the club level.

"Formula 450 is a great way to encourage young riders," Trippe proclaims. "It's back-to-basics racing, emphasizing riding skill over horsepower, and you don't need a six-figure sponsorship just to make the grid."

Think of Formula 450, then, as a new--and even more literal--twist on the old adage that dirtbikes are the most direct route to future roadracing success.

Kawasaki KX450F Roadracer
What You Need
17-inch wheels with roadrace slicks, oversized front brake kit, lower/firmer suspension, triple clamps, roadrace bodywork, rearsets, clip-ons, axle/frame sliders, taller gearing

What A Pro Needs
Motor work, pipe, slipper clutch, steering damper, mag wheels, radial front brake caliper, custom paint

How Much
$10,000 to drag a knee$20,000 to land a magazine feature

Mini Mille
Not feeling the thumper vibe? You can also roll a V-twin variation of the F450 concept based on the Aprilia SXV 4.5 supermoto, which is what Roland Sands did. The same excellent handling and favorable power-to-weight characteristics that typify the single-based 450s remain intact, though the quicker-revving V-twin changes the bike's character completely. Spoked wheels are an elegant touch, and exhaust outlets frenched into the tail section remind you that Sands is not only a former AMA 250cc Grand Prix champion but a gifted customizer as well. Now, if we could only try one based on the 550cc SXV 5.5...

Two By Two
Why did Roland Sands Designs fabricator Rodney Aguiar adapt a Christini all-wheel-drive system to his Honda CRF450R-based roadracer? "I just wanted to see how it worked on pavement," he says. A mechanical reduction allows the front tire to free-wheel until the rear tire spins more than 8 percent, at which point the front drive is engaged. Where the concept is proven off-road, it's mostly a novelty on a 50-bhp roadracer. We detected only a slight difference at deep lean angles, where throttle applications improved steering and stability instead of further overwhelming rear grip. Perhaps we should have run it into a gravel trap?