Not really sure where to start to I guess start at the beginning and will work up to date from there…

I’ve been into messing with cars for years, mostly mk2 golfs but only got into bikes sorta by accident when I fell in love with stretched scooters (they’re ridiculous, I know). Somehow along the way I got the idea that I’d quite like to do the blood bikers thing and realised that i’d need a geared bike to get a proper license in order to do so… So after some online research, concluded R125 was the way to go. A friend happened to have one sat in his garage (see pic above, as I found her he’d since got a blade and was bored with the 125) so I did my CBT and here we are…

I’d only really been planning to be a fair weather rider but have had a bit of a streak of cars breaking on me (or me breaking them) so I spent most of last winter commuting on the bike in the dark, rain and sleet. The broken cars theme has continued this year so by now I’m just like whatever, I’ll go on the bike.

It’s pretty much physically impossible for me to own a vehicle for more than a week without tinkering with it so naturally work has started on the bike. So far much of the work has just been about bringing things back up to scratch but unsurprisingly that’s escalated a bit.

This is roughly where we’re at currently. I work nights quite a lot of the time so spend a lot of time riding in the dark, hence reflective everything. I don’t know if the red and white was an official colour scheme, seems more of a mishmash to me but I can relate and I kinda like it.

She’s now got a K+N panel and a Danmoto Carbon GP pipe and more recently a power commander V and remap. I put the baffle in since I tried it without and only got about two villages over before turning back…it was painfully loud. With the baffle it’s still about as subtle as a military transport plane but sounds nice – lush overrun burbles and splots, and a lovely “cnnaaackpop” at the top of the gear when you nail it and shift up.

Since getting it tuned with the PCV there’s a lot better low/mid response which makes it a more usable for daily riding. Beforehand there wasn’t really anything happening till 8k so you end up either all out banzai mode or nothing (spoiler: it’s always banzai).

I’m also trying out a 15t front sprocket at the moment since even before getting it tuned I was forever bouncing off the top of the gearing and rpm. So now whilst it does struggle a bit more to get up to *max* speed, up to 70-ish it seems quicker and the gears feel better spaced… and since up to 70 is actually what I use most of the time I’d say so far it’s probably been a net improvement.

I can now cruise around 70 without it revving it’s tits off the entire time which is an improvement. Also it means that the actual geared top speed has yet to be determined which I sorta like. I’m hoping with favourable conditions [on a private road or track] we might see 85 or beyond, and am looking forward to finding out 

Since I’m now using the bike as my main/daily transport I’m having to make a few adjustments to it. Daily use as well as longer test rides (a couple of hours or so) showed that it knackers my wrists and shoulders, plus being hunched over all the time isn’t great either (previous back injury). I like the sporty position for on the track but also want to be able to go to places and still be able to use my arms the next day, so am gonna see if I can figure something out with the bars to mean I can just reach them when sat a tad more upright. I’ve got some bits on order so will post any progress.

Speaking of tracks – After getting into a couple of sketchy situations on roundabouts and having then realised that there’s a bit more to this riding lark than I’d thought, I’ve been trying to improve my riding skills. I read on a forum somewhere that go-kart tracks can be good to improve low-speed cornering skills and some of them let small cc bikes on (like a 125).

I liked the idea and turns out a place reasonably near me allows bikes, so have been there a couple of times now over the summer – epic fun, especially when it’s empty and you have a whole track to yourself. Also surprisingly cheap day out. With the track being small I don’t think you’d really get up to much over 45mph but that wasn’t really the point (for me anyway). Over the course of the day I was still able to push myself and the bike way harder than I’d ever dare on the road. It seems to have helped my confidence in the bike when riding on the road so all good.

Being able to practice taking the right line through specific twisty corners over and over again, practice rolling on and off the throttle, getting the weight placement right etc…and then start to link the corners into coherent smooth laps – it’s absolute bliss and I learned so much from it.

For me that track time is also some of the purest enjoyment I’ve experienced in a “omg i’m totally doing gran-turismo”-type way. absolutely recommended with bells on \o/