Racing a hare scramble on full moto suspension

Yep I've been there. I was on an RM250. I coped and struggled at the same time, perfect in the wide open motocross style sections and awful in the low speed technical stuff (as expected).

Open the compression clickers out a lot, open out rebound a little too. Open out HS on the shock 1/4-1/2 turn. I found raising the forks higher in the clamps helps in the slow tight stuff, but it depends how fast/slow the HS courses are you ride. This should help a little but it will be stiff regardless of clicker settings.

Heavy duty tubes with lower pressures will help take out some of the real nasty edges. A 110 rear from a 250/450 could also add some more comfort? Just an idea.

Thanks for the tips, I think i have a 110 laying around in the garage somewhere.

I just did this two weeks ago and doing it again Sunday, also a KTM 150.

I ran everything with baseline settings, just to get a feel for how the bike would perform. I have are stiffer springs for my weight, HD tubes, PC pipe and silencer, rad valve, and 1 tooth up on the rear. Bike worked pretty good. The course was super rough with sand whoops on every section of straight trail. As mentioned above, suspension is stiff. I'm going to play with the clickers this weekend to try and get things a little softer.

Only real issues I had was a bit of stalling, but that was probably more due to user error, and some tough shifting. I just put Fastway pegs on though and they're much wider then the stockers so I believe that is the issue. I have a longer shifter to try on Sunday.

I am doing one on Sunday as well. So just make everything soft and I should be ok? Still trying to find where I like the AER for at exactly.

Open the compression clicks and you can prob speed up the rebound.

You can adjust the power valve to get more bottom and less hit up top. I believe turn the square bolt on the right case 1/2 turn out at a time until you like the feel.

Rickyisms wrote:

Haven't raced a HS since Auguste of last year, but that was on my Honda that was all set up for woods. Now i'm on a KTM 150 with stiff suspension and a motor that likes to be run up top. Im throwing my big tank, skid plate, hand guards (flag type, can't stand wrap around), and a spark arrestor.

Anyone ever raced a hare scramble with MX suspension? i'm guessing i'm gonna have the change my body position a good bit to try and soak up the little bumps, Try to conserve my legs as much as i can, and go to the gym to work on endurance instead of strength all this week. Anything else?

Come on Ricky, you gotta learn this stuff through denial and error.. (I hope you got this)..
In all seriousness I actually prefer a moto setup for offroad. Off-road only setups tend to dive too much the more you twist the grip. I leave the forks alone and slow down the shock rebound (if you think about it, it wouldn't work for xc) but it's how I like the bike to feel for it

Yep I did so for years. I'm a moto racer but I'd hit some woods races on off weekends or when moto got rained out. Usually just threw some bark busters on and maybe a few clicks softer on the suspension, I would move the forks up if it was a track that tended to be slower. Never had any problem but I never rode a good woods setup bike either so who knows it may have been awful!

Thanks guys, the track is mostly wide open whooped out sand trails after watching the club's preview video. I think my suspension will be just about right.

And Rocky, I don't get why you use those big schoolin words, maybe if you just used normal people words i'd be able to understand you.

So my 110 tire I had was trashed. I have HD tubes and the stock size front and rear Dunlop MX3s, should i change my PSI to something else?

I raced a Big 6 GP in 2016 with my moto suspension. I backed out the compression quite a bit, but it still wasn't enough. I was toast!

About killed myself when I did an off-road race, using my 450 that is set up for moto. I normally like a tad stiffer set up for moto, so I was screwed out of the gate doing off-road.

Yours will be better. Send us a review afterwards.