CHINESE CRACKER
WK calls it ‘Marty’, we call it impressive.
“Don’t go revving it above 10,000rpm but make sure you’re not letting it sink below eight grand. And be sure to slow the thing right down before you crash through its ’box, because it really doesn’t like that,” came two time TT winner Johnson’s words of wisdom. I never normally listen to Gaz, as his advice is assured to get me into trouble, but this was a topic he knew better than anyone. From the early days of WK’s TT programme, which kicked off six years ago with the support of Chinese powerhouse CF Moto, he’s been a linchpin to the team’s success which sawWK just miss out on their first podium by a mere two seconds in last year’s Lightweight TT… riding the same priceless bike I was now bumbling off down pitlane on amid a sea of anxious looking faces.
I’d been badgering the guys and gals at WK to let me go for a spin on this zebra-liveried commuter bike (well, that’s what it started off as) for as long as I can remember, and they’d finally given in. They must have been having a weak moment, which ironically reflected the power I was experiencing as I navigated my way around Barn corner and pinned the throttle back for the straight. It’d only taken me a few corners to forget Gaz’s golden nuggets that included the necessity to keep the motor buzzing like a spinning top on acid… which I wasn’t. It didn’t help that I was in the wrong gear either, which pretty much set the theme for that first, troublesome lap of Cadwell Park as I fudged my way from section to section trying to figure out what I was doing so wrong.
I’d never ridden a mini-twin racer before, or any bike quite like this come to think about it. It felt odd, being very tall in the saddle with broad open clip-ons and an all-encompassing screen which could’ve covered me plus five others and still had room for Vanessa Feltz to nestle in. The latter feature was perhaps the most unnerving of all, being so large that I couldn’t work out whether to sit up and see over it, or relax down low and watch the world through a bubble. I spent the next few laps undecided, though I did gradually manage to feel my way around the rest of the package and partially redeem my ineptitude with every circulation.
On rails
It was a relatively basic bike, sporting no electronics or fancy gismos to distract my attention from the raw riding experience, which saw a slightly diluted 90bhp motor try its best to warm my cockles without much joy. I’m not sure what I was expecting from the WK, but I’d heard so much of what’d gone into building this podium contender that I had hoped for more. Much more. I wanted power wheelies, big jumps and all the things affiliated with the TT, but what I got was a pleasantly mapped, smooth delivering parallel twin motor in a bike that handled uncannily well thanks to a smart pairing of the stock WK’s tubular steel frame with custom damped Maxton suspension. No, it wasn’t fast per se, but it could be ridden bloody fast if you rode it in the way it craved to be ridden. So fast that on a tight and technical track such as Cadwell, the output deficiency against cock-swinging 200bhp litre bikes was rendered null and void, as they simply couldn’t hold a candle to the TT machine’s handling prowess.
Of course, it took time for me to grasp the gold mine I was sat on, with my confidence building with every risk taken. The bike was kitted with decent Pirelli Supercorsas and the planted front end feeling on tap was the stuff of legends – that Holy Grail that’s forever being searched for by road and track riders alike.
If you’re acquainted with Cadwell you’ll know the first corner well. Coppice is a blind faith bend where you just have to hope things work out as you pitch yourself into its clutches at speeds of over 120mph. It’s a corner I’ve ridden a thousand times, and I knowwhat it’s like to feel the front push as the positive camber’s goodness wears thin and you contemplate an evening in hospital checking out the X-ray facilities. But there was never any of that negativity to note, despite greedily pushing the limits of the WK with every lap.
From being flat out in sixth, I’d just cog down a gear and pitch in to the steep ascending bend, driving hard on the gas to maintain my pace up to Charlies. Gary had buzzed about the bike’s handling credentials on too many previous occasions, saying how he’d “ridden the absolute nuts off the thing and never had it throw its toys out the pram like I know other bikes would. It’s not the quickest machine out there, but I don’t reckon much can get the better of it in a bend. The thing’s on rails”.
No easy ride
While there were no rails to be seen, the high corner speed and planted disposition were very much tangible qualities, and I was on a mission to exploit them to the max. Another thing that demanded capitalising on was the bike’s unbelievably potent braking package. The whole front end is nabbed from a ZX-10R. The calipers and discs are designed to stop a bike that crests speeds over 180mph and weighs a good 20kg more, so you can appreciate why they appeared so impressive on a slower and lighter machine. Time after time I’d have to readjust my braking markers as I was slowing for corners a good ten metres sooner than was needed, aided substantially by a notable dollop of back torque from the motor. My favourite braking place was Mansfield, for the childish reason that every descent guaranteed an effortless endoing moment. It’s the simple the things, eh?
The WK was a bike that had to be learned. Not just to know how hard you could push it in a bend, or how quickly it flicked from side to side, but also how best to extract every ounce of its limited output. Ninety ponies is small fry by today’s numbers, but it was still enough to allow Gary to lap the Island at a 118mph average – a staggering pace. To do so, he had to know the machine intimately, to grasp what gear suited what corner.
Around the TT course’s 37-plus miles of bends, that a pretty steep feat, but the challenge wasn’t so great around my local playground. I’d initially been a gear too tall in most places or had kept hold of gears for far too long. The bike’s sizeable AIM dash clearly highlighted the chosen gear and utilised revs, which came into its own when pairing these two crucial elements for some fast laps.
First gear was very much needed on the chicane and hairpin, with the latter destination rewarding the right gear choice with an emphatic wheelie as I powered it on the run to Barn. The scenario couldn’t have been much more different when tackling the bend in second, as the motor just felt as flat as an intolerable gym-goer’s perfect stomach. The other thing to note was the necessity to throw gears at the motor in order to keep the engine’s narrow 2,000rpm power band in sight at all times. This meant engaging in a lot of fancy footwork to meet the insatiable motor’s lust for specific rpms; like a finicky friend who will only eat pizza if you pick all the green bits off it. For example, it required going up from third to fifth and back down to third, all in the space of Chris Curve to the top of the Gooseneck, as holding fourth would just see the revs climb pointlessly, with pace making a hasty exit from the party.
The same was true in other sectors such as Charlies one and two, where two gears would be sequentially cogged down before reaching the back straight in third for mere seconds before clogging back up to sixth. The WK required constant input to extract the best from it, which in some respects made it a frustrating ride to blitz around on, but the rewarding feeling that came from aligning all those pre-requisites made for a ball-tinglingly good time when you got it right. It was a reality that took me far longer than expected on the open pitlane MSV run trackday, which ended unceremoniously as I an out of fuel down the start straight and had to walk my way back to the pits under a hail of verbal abuse. Still, it was worth it for the experience I’d just had. If nothing more, I came back better placed to see past the jovial paintwork of the WK and grasp its inner magnitude. It might not have seen the top step just yet, but trust me, it’s just a matter of time.