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2001/75 10 December 2001
SUZUKI\'s SV650S V-twin has always had a reputation for giant-killing performance, and this year\'s Quality Hotels Four-Hour race at Manfeild confirmed it.
In a heady display Taumarunui\'s Russell Josiah and Paeroa\'s Mark Whyte rode hard and fast the entire race to win the Naked Bike class in a canter, heading off the challenge from the 996cc Cagiva piloted by Bill Biber and Dallas Rankine as well as the 855cc Triumph fielded by Stephen Morris and Glen Tanner.
In fact, Josiah and Whyte brought the nimble SV650S home two laps ahead of the Triumph and six laps up on the Cagiva to emphatically underline the 650cc Suzuki\'s big bike beating abilities.
Backing up this first place performance was the South Island pairing of Daniel Jansen and Marty Wood completing 172 laps and putting another SV650 into third place.
For Mark Whyte, Saturday morning\'s qualifying was the first time he had ever ridden an SV650.
\"I was amazed at how easy it was to change directions. It\'s just so light and nimble and easy to ride\" he says. \"If you got caught behind a slower rider entering a corner, it was dead easy to change lines and dive around them. It just felt so safe.\"
As the fastest of the two in qualifying, Whyte started the race.
\"I got a good start and went from there. We didn\'t lose much time in the pits as we didn\'t make any tyre changes - we ran the same Metzelers from start to finish. The rear was sliding around a bit at the end but it was nothing to worry about.
\"Russell had done a good job of preparing the bike and we were doing an hour and 15 minutes on a 16 litre tank of fuel, so it was very economical too. We revved it to 10,500 rpm all day and it never missed a beat. I felt as fresh at the end as I had at the beginning.
\"We had to make a quick final fuel stop and Russell went out for the final 20 minutes and by then the front tyre was past its best and was sliding around. But Russell has a heap of experience and it was no problem for him. It was great to ride with him and the SV650 was just so much fun I\'d love to race one again\" Whyte added.
Building an easy to ride, fun package was just what Suzuki\'s engineers had in mind when they got together to design a new middleweight twin. They settled on a 650cc engine because they calculated that it could be much more compact than a 1000cc motor and therefore could be fitted into a lighter, more compact frame.
To make the motor as compact as possible, Suzuki has positioned the cylinders of the SV650S with the front cylinder angled up and forward and the rear cylinder sloping up and back to make a true upright vee-shape rather than the L-shape of traditional 90° twins.
At the same time the transmission shafts have been staggered off the horizontal plane to enable the crankcases to be shorter front-to-rear.
The result is a very compact engine that allowed the Suzuki chassis designers to produce a very compact truss-type frame in lightweight oval section aluminium tube.
Conventional 41 mm forks with spring pre-load adjustment offering 130 mm of wheel travel and a linkage operated single rear shock offering 125 mm rear wheel travel provide the suspension package.
The light, compact SV650S rolls on 17-inch wheels front and rear - a 3.5-inch wide rim in front and a 4.5-inch rim at the rear mounting the latest 120/60 ZR17 and 160/60ZR17 Metzeler ME Z4 tyres.
Weighing in at a svelte 169 kg, the SV650S is easily stopped by a pair of 290 mm disc brakes and twin piston calipers up front while a 240 mm disc and twin piston caliper take care of rear wheel braking duties.
The compact 650cc engine breathes through a set of Mikuni BDSR39 carburettors, squeezes the fuel-air mixture into the four valve combustion chambers to a 11.5:1 compression ratio and fires it with a digital electronic ignition.
Exhaust gases flow out through a set of two-into-one head pipes into a generously sized single muffler mounted on the right-hand side.
A convenient feature of the SV650S is the hinge that allows the fuel tank to be tilted rearwards to provide access to the air filter and rear cylinder\'s centrally-mounted spark plug.
Just like the 1000cc V-twins, the SV650S offers the same instant throttle response and a broad spread of power from low rpm - making it fun to ride every day, as Josiah and Whyte discovered on their way to the class win at Manfeild.
RESULTS Quality Hotels Four Hour Naked Class
1, Mark Whyte/Russell Josiah Suzuki SV650S 177 laps 2, Stephen Morris/Glen Tanner Triumph 855 175 laps 3, Daniel Jansen/Marty Wood Suzuki SV650S 172 laps 4, Bill Biber/Dallas Rankine Cagiva Navigator 1000 171 laps
