Good bloody luck selling a green one dude. Could put it on my ZXR250 I suppose. I guess you have been on Ebay looking for an RM250 piston for your streetstock. Bloody Dyno's eh? How many lovely engines have been buggered by rolling roads over the years. And as for admitting to Dynoing a streetstock, Man that was ballsy. Most streetstock tuners do it on the street at 3am. You must be gettin soft or rich.
"That's rooted!! What's next??"
Sorry, but that sounds like a nice fantasy to have. I would love it to be reality but its not. If you are competitive here you can be competitive internationally. Remember Jimmy and Gareth on 600s a few years ago? Jimmy could be top ten in the IDM EASILY. I would even be as bold to say Craig Shirrifs could be too if he stopped falling, finished a race, and was more photogenic. What Jed and some off the other boys had to pay to get their foot in the door in Germany would be nearly three times the average annual wage in NZ.
Sorry, serves me right for generalising, and I wasn't aware that Gareth had to cough up for a ride. Stoner's a whole different kettle of fish with the lengths his family went to to maximise his opportunities.
But my examples were only meant as an off the cuff list of Strayans who are doing amazingly well. You can add Aitchison, Richards, Donald, Waters, McConnell and a whole swag of riders who have headed to different parts of the globe to have a crack, and they aren't all buying rides. Cudlin has prided himself on duffing up those who have and he's testing Moto2 and MotoGP Claiming Rule bikes.
Sure it makes it much easier to buy into a top team with a pocket fulla cabbage but I still dream that it's not mandatory to succeed. Although I guess it depends how you define "success". ASBK? BSB? AMA? Or the big shows of WSB, MotoGP? Given where we are at the moment I'd be aiming lower rather than higher.
For example there's absolutely nothing stopping a Kiwi fronting up and kicking some Aussie arse, and their championships carry a lot more weight than ours. Faark, you can even enjoy a 25-30% pay rise while you're doing it if ya move there. So why aren't we? Stroudy was at the pointy end in Oz a few years back with little experience on most of the tracks. What would another season have yielded? How would Choppa or Craig go now?
Nothing against Jimmy but I reckon you need to prove and sharpen yourself against the best riders in the NZ Superbike field, that's where our few international calibre riders are concentrated. Gareth was right there on a superbike as well as a 600, whereas Jimmy would probably acknowledge that he isn't quite there on the big banger....yet. Not saying he won't improve but Gareth was a 21 year old heading over there, while our best young talent generally matures much later than that Jimmy was 27/28 racing Gareth? And Choppa is going great guns but knocking on 30?
I met last years ASBK champ Bryan Staring in WA 6 years ago and have followed him ever since, and there is simply no way we can compete with that career or rider development in NZ. And he's still just 23 years old.
Yup nearly there.... Jimmy is 31 I think, Hayden and Nick are still getting a bit old for a decent tilt at world Domination. For me im not doing it to try make a living, just want to be the best I can. Would like to win NZ titles and have another 15 years or so in the class. An ozzy season is on the cards and one day id like to have a play around in AMA really just to say I did.
NZs best chance is Nixon Frost id say, but he is still just a tad young...
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