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Ducati Test |
History on Wheels (page 3) In spite of owning one myself at one stage, I always had a slightly jaundiced view of the MHR road bike, as being a triumph of styling over true race-replica engineering: an SPS version of the stock 900SS, it assuredly wasn't, in the way that the first 750SS was a street-legal version of Paul Smart's works Imola-winner. Now, though, having ridden the bike it was derived from, I have to qualify that opinion, because the most remarkable thing you immediately notice about the 900TT1 is how normal it feels to sit on and ride. Save for the substitution of an oil cooler for the headlamp you might expect to find in front of you, and the classical white-faced Veglia revcounter staring back at you, this could be any Ducati V-twin roadburner with a fairing ever made: definitely a Modified Production battletwin, rather than a twin-cylinder period Superbike racer! This is scarcely surprising, really, given that although the chassis is a specially-made lightweight chrome-moly frame, it was built by Verlicchi on the same jig as the street 900SS, though the seemingly-stock swingarm is actually wider than standard to slot in the wider rear wheel, which might have been shod with a treaded Dunlop as ridden by Mike, but for the fact that it's Avon who make the benchmark race-quality 18-inch tyres today - so that's what were fitted for the test. The advent of 13-inch Girling gas shocks like the ones Sports swapped to almost at once, replacing the shorter and less compliant Marzocchis the bike came with, were a godsend to those of us racing Ducati V-twins in mid-'70s Production events, because not only did they improve handling and help jack up the back end to remove ground clearance problems, in doing so they steepened the effective head angle and sharpened up the steering - well, made you less aware of the stretched-out 1500mm/59 in. wheelbase, at any rate. The lower mountings for the rear shocks are copiously drilled, though, to offer a choice of preload positions.
Though the clipons on Mike's bike are surprisingly steeply dropped - almost like a 125 GP racer - they do at least allow you to tuck elbows and shoulders well in behind the comparatively all-encompassing fairing, while the long shocks mean you sit a little higher off the ground, slotted into that comfy, well-padded seat. The riding position isn't quite as stretched out as the 750SS I've been racing on and off for the past 25 years, though, because the fat backpad that wedges you in place also helps push you forward a little, to offset the inherent 48/52% rearwards weight bias of the air-cooled 90-degree V-twin by using the rider's body weight to compensate. But the footrests feel lower and a little further back than usual on a racing Duke, testament perhaps to Mike's crash at the Nurburgring in '74 which ended his F1 car racing career, causing permanent damage to his right leg and foot that made even walking sometimes painful, and meant that after a classical career of right-foot shifting, for his comeback he had to learn how to use a left-foot one-up racing gearchange, here neatly installed on the Ducati via a linkage through the swingarm pivot shaft. I have to admit being rather glad of that myself - for my Mallory outing on the bike was actually my first time on a race track since breaking my right leg in a race crash three months before, and finding such a historic racer tailored to suit was an added bonus! Except - the low footrests may be more comfy, but in winning the Mallory race Mike ended up dragging his right foot hard enough on the tarmac to wear away the boot leather and finish with a bloody foot. Never having been brave enough to encounter a similar problem with any of the several big Ducatis I've owned and raced down the years, I surprised myself by emulating the master at Mallory - even Kushitani-san's effective toe scrapers couldn't prevent 40 laps of cranking round Gerards and the Esses delivering a severely chamfered right boot. No blood, though - sorry: obviously not trying hard enough. . . * * * * * |
