FIRST PERSON/OPINION

Via e-mail:

Hard tires, no choice”¦

I entered my 1st AMA race weekend this past week at NJMP in both the Moto-GT class and the Daytona Sportbike class, and being a Pirelli rider for the last 4 years this was my 1st real taste for the Dunlop tires.

I first tried the DSB tires with soft front, hard rear”¦my impression was pretty good, very confident with the front end, the rear wasn’t bad and having a dirt bike background rear slides were no big deal and they were actually predictable”¦but then we switched to the MANDATORY Moto-GT set up of hard front and rear and holy crap! Instant chatter followed by consistent front end slides, and a drop in pace of over 3 sec’s from the softs, tried several suspension adjustments but NEVER got rid of the chatter or slides. Saved at least 4 crashes with my knees before Sat’s race!

I went to both Dunlop and the AMA to ask if I was permitted to use the soft front as my choice in the Moto-GT race and both said no, even though I expressed concern with the hard front’s performance and that it would my loss when I would have to change front’s during the race if performance dropped off significantly and still was told no”¦

Well, the race started and I rode a conservative pace and believe we were as high at 5th or 6th after approx. 50 mins when the fuel light came on, I came in and turned over the bike to my teammate Larry Karpinsky and warned/reminded him of the chatter and slides and told him to be careful on his corner entries”¦well 2 or 3 laps out after tipping into turn 4, the front end for NO reason just let loose”¦turn 4 is very high speed”¦luckily Larry only sustained minor injuries, the same could not be said for the Ducati 848″¦it was trashed, unrepairable for the remaining races that weekend”¦

Larry and I are not known as “crashers”, actually quite the opposite”¦this front tire debate is serious and the rider should have the choice period! We are the ones that “feel” what’s right for us, not the engineer who predicts what’s best for a given situation, I won’t even get into the “dumping” issue”¦I’m positive Dunlop knows their product better than any of us will, but it should still be OUR choice”¦by the way, Dunlop did provide excellent service throughout the weekend”¦so thanks for that.

Also a big thank you to Tyler Dollard of Ducati North America and Steve Cooper of Trebour Motorcycles, Ledgewood, NJ for making another 848 available to us to complete the weekend! From the showroom to the track in 2 hrs and 15 mins!

Dennis Espinosa 

AMA #254 

MWT Racing 

Vernon, New Jersey