Moto-X Comes to Town
These guys are NOT going to make it. All will end up jumping to their deaths. There’ll be blood all over, hell to pay, and the lawyers will have a field day long after these poor souls gave their lives up in search of that adrenalin high.
The place was Motorcycle Sales Centre’s Tanamera Motocross Park in Sungai Buloh, Selangor. About 20 motocrossers from Malaysia and Singapore huddled together on an eight-foot high earth ramp, supposedly to “scope out” the jump. Well, as it turned out, most had never jumped before, and you could just about see the blood draining from more than a few petrified faces in the crowd. Spiffing. This is going to be a fun morning then.
These jump virgins with their gaggle of motocross and enduro bikes are attempting a 60 feet jump with nought but air in between and hard earth underneath. 60 feet - imagine that. About as long as 4 E-Class Benzes parked nose to tail. Well, better them than me guvnor.
Opposite us were 4 of the most unlikely teachers I’ve ever seen. Meet Jeremy Carter, Doug Parsons, Jake Windham and Chuck Carothers, specially flown in from the US for the Asian X Games Moto-X demo at KLCC that week. Carter wouldn’t look out of place in a grunge metal band – bald, goateed, tattooed and ringed. Jake’s day job is a correctional officer at a jail in northern Calif. Doug is 25 but looks like a 17 year old choir boy, and Chuck, also 25 manages to look his age. Just. This is turning out better than expected.
Instructions given swam though thick fog as thoughts raced towards more important matters, such as should I take pictures of the mayhem that’s about to unfold, or put down the camera and help the injured and dying?
“…third gear… steady throttle… whatever you do don’t touch the front brakes…”.
“Any questions? No? Good! Lets do it!”
Err…yes…but what if you don’t make it to the other end? What if you jump short and head towards the solid earth landing ramp wall? Wonder if bike and rider would bounce of the wall with a sickening crunch, or just get embedded in the earth, legs and back tire sticking out. Time to find out I guess.
Our four instructors took to the ramp first. They made it look oh so easy. Whoop de loop. Up and down. Ho hum. Then amazingly, one, then another, then another of our local riders took off and cleared the jump.
There were two brothers that day who were only 12 and 13 astride teeny 80cc Yamaha crossers. Suddenly, the shrill high pitch zing of a small two-stroker being caned to within an inch of its death rose above the din. It was the signal that one of them has started on his maiden run and is giving shed loads of welly to try and gain enough speed to clear the ramp. The engine note dipped briefly once and then again as he banged though the gears but the boy wasn’t letting up. Mud flew in all directions from his rear tire as it scrabbled for grip, the bike shooting towards the take off point. Everybody’s heart stopped, and we all held our breath as he threw his Yamaha of the ramp, sailed in the air and miraculously landed safely on the other side. Cheers and yelps immediately erupted from the crowd. He bloody did it!
That was the turning point. The youngest rider on the smallest bike made the jump, and the floodgates opened. Shrill 2 strokes and thudding 4 strokes flew past again and again. It was unbelievable. Most of my biking has been on smooth roads with the occasional track day thrown in. Road riding is a completely different world where getting your knee down is the Holy Grail that everybody chases. We have always aimed to get closer to the ground and not further from it. Having both wheels airborne at the same time meant one of two things – either we had just taken off after cresting one of the many hills at the Isle of Man TT going flat oot at 130mph on a trick race prepped Harris Honda, or more realistically, that we’d just highsided both bike and self into the bushes. I’ve been off-road on a motocross bike before, and thoroughly enjoyed floating across ruts, roots and boulders at what seemed like impossible speeds, squirting the gas off corners and feeling the rear slide out ever so slightly. But jump? That’s only for nutters in skateboards and bmx-ers and roller blades innit? Until a few minutes ago, it just wasn’t in my biking vocabulary.
The fun really started halfway though when our tutors started to teach us party tricks. Look ma, no hands. Followed quickly by no feet, feet in the air, feet everywhere! Pretty soon everybody was trying out no hands, and some even tried no feet. Brave, talented fast learners this lot. The “whip” was pretty impressive. Chuck will chuck (sigh) the bike sideways and up in the air, flying though almost horizontally before getting it upright in time for a perfect landing. Believe me, bikes can fly. I’ve seen it with me own two eyes.
One and a half hours in the blazing hot sun flew by and before we knew it, t’was time to pack up as the Moto-X gurus had to journey back to KLCC in time for their demo at 1.00 pm. The highlight of the morning was reserved at the very end of our session, when one of the journos from ESPN (also a biker) could not resist the temptation of jumping and borrowed a bike and helmet and set out to test his bottle. He somehow managed to botch his 2nd and final jump, flying diagonally and landing precariously on the right-side edge of the ramp. Miraculously the bike managed to stay right side up on the steep side-slope and he careened of at great knots towards some folks standing where they must have thought was completely out of harm’s way. He swerved, people scattered, and everybody lived to tell the tale.
That was when I decided discretion is the better part of valour and banished thoughts of nicking Omar’s bike and having a go at it meself. But for those who are interested in breaking a few bones here and there, the Tanamera track is 2kms long, and has double jumps, whoops and step jumps.
Thanks to Omar from Motorcycle Sales Centre in PJ & ESPN for making this all possible. Same time next year and I bet our riders will be there challenging for honours.
arisoziar@yahoo.com
Pear Shaped Tips
Your very first jump. Kness knocking, heart pounding, and you have this great urge to go to the bog. Don’t forget the mantra – smooth throttle. Chopping the loud handle or suddenly gassing it just before take-off is a definite no-no as that will destabilise your bike and make it do all sorts of strange and not so wonderful things when you’re airborne. Once you’re up there doing a pretty good take of Evil Kneivel, at least 2 things can go wrong. Your bike can rear its front up too high, or the front dips too low. Front too high and you can end up tipping over backwards. Front too low and you might end up flipping over the handlebar. At two storeys high. Not good.
Now, what you do if the front gets too low is too blip the throttle hard – the spinning rear will raise the front wheel, just as if you were doing a wheelie in mid air. Cool innit? If the front gets too high, what you need to do is to pull the clutch in (to not let the engine die) and stomp on the rear brake to stop the rear wheel spinning. If you manage to do it right, your bike will pivot nicely in the sky and the nose will come down. Easier said than done, as none of our bikers got the hang of the back brake thingy.
Never ever touch the front brakes, as a stationary front wheel will not have the gyroscopic force needed to keep your bike pointed in the right direction. Or something like that.
And you thought all they did was jump, didn’t you?
Party Tricks
Amazingly, there are more than 50 different types of jumps that can be made, some of which can make your local circus contortionist green with envy. You cannot and will not be able to imagine what these guys can do during 200 foot jumps. I went to the last Moto-X Demo at KLCC and was dumbstruck by the sheer audacity of some of the tricks. Would you believe me if I told you cows can fly? It has to be seen to be believed. Go to http://www.freestylemtx.com/tricks.php3 for a photo compilation of tricks with names like the Coffin, Deadbody, Kiss of Death, Shaolin, Stripper and Sterilizer (ouch!).
The most hyped jump now is the backflip. Impossible as it sounds, a select handful of Moto-X nutheads can now jump and rotate the bike 360 degrees in the air, going one full circle and landing on 2 wheels. One has done a double back-to-back backflip. Some can even do the backflip with feet off the pegs! Check out this page for the history of the backflip, thought to be impossible on a big capacity motocross until only very recently http://expn.go.com/xgames/sxg/viii/s/020815_backflip.html it also has mind boggling low bandwidth video for those who can’t get their heads around it.
Links
http://www.motoxco.com >> home of the ESPN moto-x championships
http://www.freestylemtx.com >> top news and info site on freestyle motocross
http://expn.go.com >> Espn’s X-Games website
www.chuckcarothers.com >> chukie’s personal website – watch as he attempts the backflip!
1657 words
The place was Motorcycle Sales Centre’s Tanamera Motocross Park in Sungai Buloh, Selangor. About 20 motocrossers from Malaysia and Singapore huddled together on an eight-foot high earth ramp, supposedly to “scope out” the jump. Well, as it turned out, most had never jumped before, and you could just about see the blood draining from more than a few petrified faces in the crowd. Spiffing. This is going to be a fun morning then.
These jump virgins with their gaggle of motocross and enduro bikes are attempting a 60 feet jump with nought but air in between and hard earth underneath. 60 feet - imagine that. About as long as 4 E-Class Benzes parked nose to tail. Well, better them than me guvnor.
Opposite us were 4 of the most unlikely teachers I’ve ever seen. Meet Jeremy Carter, Doug Parsons, Jake Windham and Chuck Carothers, specially flown in from the US for the Asian X Games Moto-X demo at KLCC that week. Carter wouldn’t look out of place in a grunge metal band – bald, goateed, tattooed and ringed. Jake’s day job is a correctional officer at a jail in northern Calif. Doug is 25 but looks like a 17 year old choir boy, and Chuck, also 25 manages to look his age. Just. This is turning out better than expected.
Instructions given swam though thick fog as thoughts raced towards more important matters, such as should I take pictures of the mayhem that’s about to unfold, or put down the camera and help the injured and dying?
“…third gear… steady throttle… whatever you do don’t touch the front brakes…”.
“Any questions? No? Good! Lets do it!”
Err…yes…but what if you don’t make it to the other end? What if you jump short and head towards the solid earth landing ramp wall? Wonder if bike and rider would bounce of the wall with a sickening crunch, or just get embedded in the earth, legs and back tire sticking out. Time to find out I guess.
Our four instructors took to the ramp first. They made it look oh so easy. Whoop de loop. Up and down. Ho hum. Then amazingly, one, then another, then another of our local riders took off and cleared the jump.
There were two brothers that day who were only 12 and 13 astride teeny 80cc Yamaha crossers. Suddenly, the shrill high pitch zing of a small two-stroker being caned to within an inch of its death rose above the din. It was the signal that one of them has started on his maiden run and is giving shed loads of welly to try and gain enough speed to clear the ramp. The engine note dipped briefly once and then again as he banged though the gears but the boy wasn’t letting up. Mud flew in all directions from his rear tire as it scrabbled for grip, the bike shooting towards the take off point. Everybody’s heart stopped, and we all held our breath as he threw his Yamaha of the ramp, sailed in the air and miraculously landed safely on the other side. Cheers and yelps immediately erupted from the crowd. He bloody did it!
That was the turning point. The youngest rider on the smallest bike made the jump, and the floodgates opened. Shrill 2 strokes and thudding 4 strokes flew past again and again. It was unbelievable. Most of my biking has been on smooth roads with the occasional track day thrown in. Road riding is a completely different world where getting your knee down is the Holy Grail that everybody chases. We have always aimed to get closer to the ground and not further from it. Having both wheels airborne at the same time meant one of two things – either we had just taken off after cresting one of the many hills at the Isle of Man TT going flat oot at 130mph on a trick race prepped Harris Honda, or more realistically, that we’d just highsided both bike and self into the bushes. I’ve been off-road on a motocross bike before, and thoroughly enjoyed floating across ruts, roots and boulders at what seemed like impossible speeds, squirting the gas off corners and feeling the rear slide out ever so slightly. But jump? That’s only for nutters in skateboards and bmx-ers and roller blades innit? Until a few minutes ago, it just wasn’t in my biking vocabulary.
The fun really started halfway though when our tutors started to teach us party tricks. Look ma, no hands. Followed quickly by no feet, feet in the air, feet everywhere! Pretty soon everybody was trying out no hands, and some even tried no feet. Brave, talented fast learners this lot. The “whip” was pretty impressive. Chuck will chuck (sigh) the bike sideways and up in the air, flying though almost horizontally before getting it upright in time for a perfect landing. Believe me, bikes can fly. I’ve seen it with me own two eyes.
One and a half hours in the blazing hot sun flew by and before we knew it, t’was time to pack up as the Moto-X gurus had to journey back to KLCC in time for their demo at 1.00 pm. The highlight of the morning was reserved at the very end of our session, when one of the journos from ESPN (also a biker) could not resist the temptation of jumping and borrowed a bike and helmet and set out to test his bottle. He somehow managed to botch his 2nd and final jump, flying diagonally and landing precariously on the right-side edge of the ramp. Miraculously the bike managed to stay right side up on the steep side-slope and he careened of at great knots towards some folks standing where they must have thought was completely out of harm’s way. He swerved, people scattered, and everybody lived to tell the tale.
That was when I decided discretion is the better part of valour and banished thoughts of nicking Omar’s bike and having a go at it meself. But for those who are interested in breaking a few bones here and there, the Tanamera track is 2kms long, and has double jumps, whoops and step jumps.
Thanks to Omar from Motorcycle Sales Centre in PJ & ESPN for making this all possible. Same time next year and I bet our riders will be there challenging for honours.
arisoziar@yahoo.com
Pear Shaped Tips
Your very first jump. Kness knocking, heart pounding, and you have this great urge to go to the bog. Don’t forget the mantra – smooth throttle. Chopping the loud handle or suddenly gassing it just before take-off is a definite no-no as that will destabilise your bike and make it do all sorts of strange and not so wonderful things when you’re airborne. Once you’re up there doing a pretty good take of Evil Kneivel, at least 2 things can go wrong. Your bike can rear its front up too high, or the front dips too low. Front too high and you can end up tipping over backwards. Front too low and you might end up flipping over the handlebar. At two storeys high. Not good.
Now, what you do if the front gets too low is too blip the throttle hard – the spinning rear will raise the front wheel, just as if you were doing a wheelie in mid air. Cool innit? If the front gets too high, what you need to do is to pull the clutch in (to not let the engine die) and stomp on the rear brake to stop the rear wheel spinning. If you manage to do it right, your bike will pivot nicely in the sky and the nose will come down. Easier said than done, as none of our bikers got the hang of the back brake thingy.
Never ever touch the front brakes, as a stationary front wheel will not have the gyroscopic force needed to keep your bike pointed in the right direction. Or something like that.
And you thought all they did was jump, didn’t you?
Party Tricks
Amazingly, there are more than 50 different types of jumps that can be made, some of which can make your local circus contortionist green with envy. You cannot and will not be able to imagine what these guys can do during 200 foot jumps. I went to the last Moto-X Demo at KLCC and was dumbstruck by the sheer audacity of some of the tricks. Would you believe me if I told you cows can fly? It has to be seen to be believed. Go to http://www.freestylemtx.com/tricks.php3 for a photo compilation of tricks with names like the Coffin, Deadbody, Kiss of Death, Shaolin, Stripper and Sterilizer (ouch!).
The most hyped jump now is the backflip. Impossible as it sounds, a select handful of Moto-X nutheads can now jump and rotate the bike 360 degrees in the air, going one full circle and landing on 2 wheels. One has done a double back-to-back backflip. Some can even do the backflip with feet off the pegs! Check out this page for the history of the backflip, thought to be impossible on a big capacity motocross until only very recently http://expn.go.com/xgames/sxg/viii/s/020815_backflip.html it also has mind boggling low bandwidth video for those who can’t get their heads around it.
Links
http://www.motoxco.com >> home of the ESPN moto-x championships
http://www.freestylemtx.com >> top news and info site on freestyle motocross
http://expn.go.com >> Espn’s X-Games website
www.chuckcarothers.com >> chukie’s personal website – watch as he attempts the backflip!
1657 words
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