thats an R1, 4 cylinder liter bike by Yamaha. Kind of makes me sick to see all that lead hanging on it. Like the other Big4 4 cyl liter bikes, its a really nice extremely sporty bike on gasoline. Imagine taking a Lotus Elise and adding 1000 lbs of batteries....
If I had an Elise I'd toss a 1000 lbs of batteries in it*. I was at the Ferrari Club of America pow-wow many years ago and learned a valuable lesson. There where TONS of exotics there - it was a car geeks wet dream and I'm not really a car guy. After a long day of fawning Italian erotica it was time to head home and what was parked next to our old beater? A Ferarri 348 (which had just come out) and it was covered in stone chips and little dings that daily drivers get. The guy I was with, a total Ferrari fiend, almost wept. As luck would have it the owner was leaving as well and my friend struck up a conversation with him. Guy says he didn't understand the whole concept of auto dogma. They're machines, he says, and meant to be used. My friend protested and protested this view right up 'till the owner offered him not only a ride, but to drive the thing. I was not given the offer. :(
A few years later I was shooting in the World Championship Shoot-off in Montrose, Colorado and got to meet one of my long time shooting heros. I was very interested in his gun in particular the hammer/sear geometry. I spews all sorts of questions on him. He talked politely for a minute then reiterated what the Ferrari owner had said. Then he offered to switch guns for a little fun practice.
There *was* an R7, quite famous, but has not been manufactured for a long time. Song of the purist I guess.
The mighty R7 homologation special that Yamaha put together for Nori Haga. I lusted after one of those. The bike, not the dude. He woulda won won WSB if not for a little (sniff, sniff) Effidrine issue.
*I'd take it to the track and try my damnedest to drive the wheel out from under it THEN I'd pull that nasty engine. I hear what you're saying. Why take a machine that's capable of 160+ mph for 100+ miles and throw a lot of money at it so it goes 80 mph for 10 miles?
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