Posts
317
Joined
11/29/2015
Location
Charlton City, MA
US
Edited Date/Time
10/31/2018 10:17am
So I've grown up racing MX like a lot of you but got out of racing when I was 14. Just came back into it last year and been enjoying it. However I ride with some fast A jday friends and when we go out we pound sand pit motos, trail loops and some grass track. I keep right with them and they convinced me to race some jdays and maybe a sprint enduro next year. Any advice for a MX guy looking to cross over a little ? I have a 350 im keeping setup for moto. Bike I will be racing is a 17 TC250. Stuff I've already thought about putting on are skid plate hand guards HD tubes and pipe guard. Any other must haves ? Thanks in advance guys
I can't speak from J-Day experience since I'm on the other coast, but based on my (limited) hare scramble experience is that Moto guys tend to way overdo the stuff they think they need for hare scrambles.
If I were you, I'd personally race the 350 but depending on whichever bike you're going to ride, the only thing I'd probably invest in is some decent hand guards. J-Day is a pretty shorter format so no need for a big tank from what I can tell, but upgrading to Heavy duty tubes is a good idea. You can put a skid plate if you'd like, but I think you'd probably be fine without it if you're not throwing your bike everywhere.
Good luck and have fun, off road is a blast!
The only thing i have is handguards , skidplate and a bigger silencer. I ride a GasGas EC300 now!
The Shop
Raced my first off-road race in 2016 with moto suspension and let me tell you, it was a huge mistake!
softer suspension
I always take an extra pair of gloves and a extra goggle with me and some tools.
Add a drybreak for the longer races...
With that being said, an MX bike is totally fine for just about any harescramble outside the extreme enduro stuff. Throw a set of bark Buster's on, a skid plate and maybe some radiator guards and you'll be good to go. You may also want to mess with the gearing a little bit too.
A lot of people cross over into HS racing and never look back. I've done both all my life. I enjoy "riding" MX more, but I like to "race" HS more. It is a lot of fun and a very relaxed atmosphere.
Pit Row
Edit: yeah, I just checked out a few videos of JDay events. They look like a blast. They're not harescrambles though. You could soften your suspension on an MX bike and be ready to go. It's mostly MX, grass track and wide open trails.
Restart time, 3rd place start, passed 1st and 2nd immediately and put the hammer(last name pun) down. Made it half a lap and hit the wall so hard! I ended up dropping to 5th before catching my foot on the side of a wall in a whoop section. Finished up 10th in my class out of 33 and 14th overall on track out of 90+ so it wasn't all that bad for a kid that grew up racing nothing but moto!
Just have fun with it and take a few races to feel it out and learn. It's a different world, but a ton of fun!
Expect to be bored.
A camel back you can sip out of a tube, or have water set up in the pits where you can blast in and grab a healthy swig is a real good idea. It's a bummer when your hamstrings go haywire.
Practice refueling. You will probably not make a 1.5 or 2 hr event on a motocross size tank. If the bike you run doesn't have a reserve petcock, I dunno how you're gonna keep an eye on fuel. Sucks to run out way out in a back section.
I used to have it set up to where I ran 45 minutes, then came in and watered and fueled up, and went back out hopeing to finish with that.
Keep a good, steady pace, avoid anything major, you'll be fine.
Stand up.
Don't freak out if you get a bad start, be patient.
If they're dead engine start, use the kicker, not the button.
Emphasize energy conservation, aka don't blow out all the pretty berms just because it's fun, you gotta flow. Think of Everts passing Stew in the sand standing up flowing.
I try to remember that going about 1 mph faster and flowing saves a ton of time at the end of a long race.
Have fun
I just looked up the JDay series. It looks like it's a 2 race format which is a half hour each? There's test sections such as MX, open trails, grass track and endurocross extreme type. You apparently do each section 4 times. I'm not really sure how that equals to being 2 30 minute motos though. I would be interested in doing their event at Unadilla. It looks like that's the only one somewhat close to me.
Edit: Thought it was a HR.
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