Please find included minutes from the suspension shoot out conference call which took place on Monday, January 17. In attendance were Dick Wilk, Jeremy Wilkey, Terry Hay and Jim Sanders. Following are the topics that were discussed.
Media Coverage/Exposure
Goals of the shoot-out for the tuners
Business Impact
Testing Format
Location and Date
Testing platform
Bikes
Terrains
Funding
Participants
Moving Forward
Media Coverage
Certainly the main target audience to be recipients of the information generated from this shoot-out will be members of KTMtalk. With this said, once we have this event fully planned, it is feasible that we will float the concept by several publications in order to fish for interest. Magazine interest could be good in terms of garnering the support of funding sponsors.
Goals of the Shoot-out
See how the very best KTM suspension tuners stack up against each other.
o Generate an objective based ranking.
o Establish a clear winner.
Understand the relative strong and weak points of each tuners set-up.
Confirm or deny the effectiveness of each tuner’s technical philosophies.
Learn from each other.
Develop friendships.
Business Impact
It is possible that the results of this shoot-out could have a positive or negative impact on the participants business. The tuners are aware of this and can agree to support the results as long as they are in agreement with the testing methods, data acquisition, data processing and shoot-out management.
Testing Format
Two day event.
Day One: Real world test. The tuners will be given identical tuning specifications designed to simulate a customer call-in. This will involve written and verbal communication/dialogue. The suspension components will be tuned accordingly and tested as is; with no external adjustments accept for race sag.
Day Two: Philosophy maximization day. Tuners will be given full jurisdiction to adjust their components in order to maximize their philosophies.
Location and Date
Lakewood, Colorado - July 25 and 26. This is directly after the 7th round of the National MX series at Thunder Valley MX Park. So those that want to make a long weekend of the event can show up during the weekend, July 23 and 24, and check out the National. We would obviously coordinate this beforehand so we could all stay in the same Hotel.
Testing Platforms
Terrain: MX and offroad.
Bikes:
o MX: 450 SX
o Offroad: 450 EXC
o Year model: not really important. Presumably we’ll aim for an 04 or 05.
o 1 bike per 3 tuners so assuming 6 tuners we will need (2) 450 SX’s and (2) 450 EXC’s.
o Acquisition: Dick has a KTM contact that may be able to help with loaner bikes. Otherwise, we can turn to KTMtalk connected dealers. With a firm plan, they could be more receptive than initial impressions.
Logistics: 3 tuners will be testing MX while the other 3 will be testing offroad. Then after lunch the tuners will swap terrains; but the riders will stay with their testing terrains. This will minimize the number of bikes required and maximize the use of riders.
Statistics: In order to gather enough data to develop supportable trends; we’re looking for at least 30 data points per tuner per terrain. To this end, we could be looking at 6 total test riders. 3 for offroad and 3 for MX. In this scenario, each of these test riders would need to rate at least 10 separate areas of performance per tuner. This needs to be discussed in further detail.
Funding
Best case, we will be able to secure funding to help off-set, if not completely cover the tuners travel and expenses. With a completed plan for this event, the following are potential funding sources to be explored.
o KTM NA
o Motorex
o Synergy Seals
o Suspension symposium hosted by the tuners. This would be a pay only admittance session with all the participating tuners. The agenda could include presentations, debate and open Q&A. Presumably this would occur in the eve of day one.
o KTMtalk donations.
Participants
The overall intent of this event is to determine, as objectively as possible, who is the best of the best in terms of KTM suspension tuning. To this end, we want all participants to be the most well established and recognized KTM tuners. Previously; we were heading down the road of including a wild card but we’ve changed direction in this regard. The confirmed list is:
MX-Tech: Jeremy Wilkey
Race Tech: Terry Hay
Dicks Racing: Dick Wilk
Novation: Pete Russell
Precision Concepts: Bob Bell
So this leaves room for one more participant. We’ll first try for Factory Connection. (Jeremy to provide Jim with a contact) If this doesn’t work out, then we’ll go to Pro Action. And if that doesn’t work out, we’ll come together again to decide whom the next best participant should be.
Moving Forward
There are still many more details to be worked out. Following are a few that come to mind. Once this moving forward list is confirmed, we’ll schedule another con-call and continue to work through the details.
Riders:
o How many?
o Skill level?
o Size?
o Whom?
Data points: Specifically what aspects of suspension performance are we going to ask the test riders to rate? How are we going to rate them?
Entertainment agenda: There will be a lot of work to do during this event. But we need to plan some fun things for all of us to do together, aside from watching the National. This could be riding, group dinners, etc… Without losing focus on the task at hand, we also need to make this a very fun, memorable event.
Media Coverage/Exposure
Goals of the shoot-out for the tuners
Business Impact
Testing Format
Location and Date
Testing platform
Bikes
Terrains
Funding
Participants
Moving Forward
Media Coverage
Certainly the main target audience to be recipients of the information generated from this shoot-out will be members of KTMtalk. With this said, once we have this event fully planned, it is feasible that we will float the concept by several publications in order to fish for interest. Magazine interest could be good in terms of garnering the support of funding sponsors.
Goals of the Shoot-out
See how the very best KTM suspension tuners stack up against each other.
o Generate an objective based ranking.
o Establish a clear winner.
Understand the relative strong and weak points of each tuners set-up.
Confirm or deny the effectiveness of each tuner’s technical philosophies.
Learn from each other.
Develop friendships.
Business Impact
It is possible that the results of this shoot-out could have a positive or negative impact on the participants business. The tuners are aware of this and can agree to support the results as long as they are in agreement with the testing methods, data acquisition, data processing and shoot-out management.
Testing Format
Two day event.
Day One: Real world test. The tuners will be given identical tuning specifications designed to simulate a customer call-in. This will involve written and verbal communication/dialogue. The suspension components will be tuned accordingly and tested as is; with no external adjustments accept for race sag.
Day Two: Philosophy maximization day. Tuners will be given full jurisdiction to adjust their components in order to maximize their philosophies.
Location and Date
Lakewood, Colorado - July 25 and 26. This is directly after the 7th round of the National MX series at Thunder Valley MX Park. So those that want to make a long weekend of the event can show up during the weekend, July 23 and 24, and check out the National. We would obviously coordinate this beforehand so we could all stay in the same Hotel.
Testing Platforms
Terrain: MX and offroad.
Bikes:
o MX: 450 SX
o Offroad: 450 EXC
o Year model: not really important. Presumably we’ll aim for an 04 or 05.
o 1 bike per 3 tuners so assuming 6 tuners we will need (2) 450 SX’s and (2) 450 EXC’s.
o Acquisition: Dick has a KTM contact that may be able to help with loaner bikes. Otherwise, we can turn to KTMtalk connected dealers. With a firm plan, they could be more receptive than initial impressions.
Logistics: 3 tuners will be testing MX while the other 3 will be testing offroad. Then after lunch the tuners will swap terrains; but the riders will stay with their testing terrains. This will minimize the number of bikes required and maximize the use of riders.
Statistics: In order to gather enough data to develop supportable trends; we’re looking for at least 30 data points per tuner per terrain. To this end, we could be looking at 6 total test riders. 3 for offroad and 3 for MX. In this scenario, each of these test riders would need to rate at least 10 separate areas of performance per tuner. This needs to be discussed in further detail.
Funding
Best case, we will be able to secure funding to help off-set, if not completely cover the tuners travel and expenses. With a completed plan for this event, the following are potential funding sources to be explored.
o KTM NA
o Motorex
o Synergy Seals
o Suspension symposium hosted by the tuners. This would be a pay only admittance session with all the participating tuners. The agenda could include presentations, debate and open Q&A. Presumably this would occur in the eve of day one.
o KTMtalk donations.
Participants
The overall intent of this event is to determine, as objectively as possible, who is the best of the best in terms of KTM suspension tuning. To this end, we want all participants to be the most well established and recognized KTM tuners. Previously; we were heading down the road of including a wild card but we’ve changed direction in this regard. The confirmed list is:
MX-Tech: Jeremy Wilkey
Race Tech: Terry Hay
Dicks Racing: Dick Wilk
Novation: Pete Russell
Precision Concepts: Bob Bell
So this leaves room for one more participant. We’ll first try for Factory Connection. (Jeremy to provide Jim with a contact) If this doesn’t work out, then we’ll go to Pro Action. And if that doesn’t work out, we’ll come together again to decide whom the next best participant should be.
Moving Forward
There are still many more details to be worked out. Following are a few that come to mind. Once this moving forward list is confirmed, we’ll schedule another con-call and continue to work through the details.
Riders:
o How many?
o Skill level?
o Size?
o Whom?
Data points: Specifically what aspects of suspension performance are we going to ask the test riders to rate? How are we going to rate them?
Entertainment agenda: There will be a lot of work to do during this event. But we need to plan some fun things for all of us to do together, aside from watching the National. This could be riding, group dinners, etc… Without losing focus on the task at hand, we also need to make this a very fun, memorable event.
