Here’s some highlights from a quick ride to the Rock Store today!
I got to the shop to meet up with my partner Adam and our newest employee, Cory before we took off. I couldn’t help but notice that one of our techs (Olly) had a Yamaha R7 on his lift, and I loved seeing the shower injectors! The R7’s fuel-injection setup utilized two injectors per cylinder – the shower injector above the velocity stack that you see here, as well as one below the throttle valve. This R7 is a project that we were inspired to work on as we have a R7 on the auction site right now!
I took my Tesi 3D, Adam took a KTM 1290 Super Duke R that our partners in Japan sent over to sell (going up on the auction site next week), and Cory took the Aprilia Tuono Factory that we have for sale. My partner Adam got a quick video before we took off:
While filling up the tank (a frequent occurrence because I had to have the Bimota tank lined and now I see the reserve light every 80 miles), I noticed someone driving by in a Porsche 959!
Our first stop was at Malibu Country Mart, where there was a beautiful Lotus Elan +2 (wider track, longer wheelbase, two small rear seats in the back) in the parking lot (right hand drive, of course). Fun anecdote, according to the Anna Lisa Collection: “Convinced the car would appeal to people who wanted to get from point A to point B as fast as possible, Lotus even offered a package in 1970 name “Total Mobility” which included, for a price lower than that of a Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow, a Piper Cherokee 140 aircraft with flying lessons called “Fly Lotus”, an Elan +2 car and a Raleigh ‘Executive’ bicycle!”
Our buddy Jay showed up on his BMW HP2 Megamoto. When we were getting ready to leave I almost hopped on his bike because I’m so used to mine.
Speaking of BMWs, there was a whole gaggle of them parked together.
My favorite was the R1100S Boxer Cup.
Then a gentleman showed up on an incredible custom – from far away I thought it based on a Husky because of the white/neon yellow livery which gave it 701 Enduro Long Range vibes.
I overheard the owner talking about it to some of his friends, and turns out that it’s a custom built by Max Hazan around a KTM 1190 Adventure R.
The owner previously bought Max’s KTM 950 SM (pictured below), and gave him his 1190 to go crazy on as well. He has a great build thread on ADVRider about the 1190 going back to November of 2021 if you have some time to kill.
I just went through said build thread and noticed there’s a photo of me checking it out at the end, haha:
It appears that it’s called the “Rally SM,” where SM presumably stands for Super Moto.
A stock 1190 Adventure R weighs 478 pounds dry. Impressively, this bike weighs 398 pounds – and that’s with four gas tanks which total up to 7 gallons.
Next stop was the Rock Store, where I got to meet this very well-behaved dog. Good doggo!
Here are some of my highlights at the Rock Store:
Kawasaki Z900RS Special Edition (The Special Edition comes with the special paint job, Brembo front brakes, and an Ohlins shock)
BMW R90 with a RS fairing, all painted in Daytona Orange.
Honda CBR1100XX Super Blackbird.
Turbocharged Suzuki Hayabusa with an extended swingarm and a decidedly-not-extended exhaust. When Suzuki developed this bike, the current top speed champion was the above Super Blackbird. Well, a predator of the blackbird is the peregrine falcon, and as you can probably guess, that’s what Hayabusa translates to.
Suzuki Bandit custom with a Ducati 916 tail.
A lovely Yamaha RZ350 and a lovelier Vincent.
Lastly, there was a new GasGas SM 700 (a KTM 690 SMC in red drag and with cast wheels instead of spokes).
We took Decker Canyon back to PCH on our way back to the shop.
Cory comes around a gorgeous hairpin on Decker on a Tuono V4 Factory…
…that made me think of a photo Larry Chen took of me at the Tuono 660 launch, where I’m powering out of the same corner (but going the other way).
Thus concludes my Sunday Ride. Can’t wait for the next one!