When I was racing first time around, at club level, early to mid 90's. RS125's were cleaning up against FZR1000's, CBR600's and GSX-R750's. TZ and RS250's Would win everything, open class races, etc.
At national level meetings it was a different story. Money, equipment and rider ability was at a much higher level.

Andy wrote:

2T Institute wrote:
RS....TZ they are TOYS, if you want a GP bike the ONLY one to have is an Aprilia

Tell that to Aoyama! HRC won it when they wanted to... when they wanted that last 250 milestone.

An HRC RSW250 is right up there with the Aprilia. At each level, whether SP, SS, F3, or GP, each make and model tuned to its ultimate potential has been within only a couple of HP of each other.

Of course one manufacturer has consistently got it worse than all the others, hence why the 250GP Aprilia uses a totally different motor to the piece of sh*t road bike one!

Anyway, what does all that have to do with an RS125 beating up an SV650?

Nothing

Had as much to do with Aprilia losing as much as it did with HRC winning, forgot how far behind HRC was the year before a Japanese ride was on board? Pity all it needed to be competitive was a pair of THESE pistons(but don't ask the price).All well and good talking about the RSW that was the same bike ,passed down from Pedrosa to Dovi then to Ayoama, but where are the other 10 ? Willarot had the only other one and not one customer or kitted RS was in the top 20 for many years. At least anyone CAN buy or lease good stuff from Aprilia try getting a proper A kit from HRC .................
Parts are not that expensive from Aprilia 99Euro for a piston (gudgeon is outreagous at 132Euro), the bit where they become expensive is learning to ride them completely on or off the throttle no feathering.
Aprilia showed evryone how to make a decent frame. NSR only won 1 Australian 250cc production championship so RGV/RS engine can be too bad

2T Institute wrote:At least anyone CAN buy or lease good stuff from Aprilia

You're joking aren't you? A couple of Dorna's main problems with the 250's was the Piagio group choosing who'd compete for the title in a boardroom in mid Italy and the astronomical cost of the bike, which as you point out was the only option for a team not tied to HRC wanting to compete.

2T Institute wrote:forgot how far behind HRC was the year before a Japanese ride was on board?

Not sure what you mean there, "the year before a Japanese rider was on board" was 2007, Dovi came 2nd on the HRC backed RS losing to Jorge Lorenzo who is plainly the better rider out of those two.
In 2008 that Japanese ride (Takahashi) was never going to match Bautista, Kalio or Simoncelli, he wouldn't have won even if he'd had a factory Aprilia.
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2T Institute wrote:
NSR only won 1 Australian 250cc production championship so RGV/RS engine can be too bad

If you know as much as you think you do, you'll know the RGV motor is a piece of sh*t!

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see how flawed the design is. Just because a JDM bike only ever won one championship in your (foreign, non-supported) country, doesn't make a crap bike any better.
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The reason there are no Aprilia 125,s at the front in british racing, apart from the fact they are too dear, is because nobody knows how to keep em going, believe me they have tried, there have been several over the years, there was even one today at Brands Hatch, but all to no avail.
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Lesviffer750 wrote:The reason there are no Aprilia 125,s at the front in british racing

You checked the Brands Hatch GP125 results, or glanced at the brit top 3 recently?
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Geez I set the ladies auxilary into a right flap.
1. HRC are just as guilty of board room wins, even recently made a fuss of giving satellite MotoGP teams the extra 1000 rpm the factory teams have.
Aprilia lease costs are high but it is one hell of a bike. I asked a rider who won the 125cc GP in Australia what 125's had he ridden and what was the best. He had ridden a VERY good Interwetten RS125 to top 10 finishes, but first ride on an Aprilia was 'another world' of performance.A well set up RSW was still competitive against the RSA as it handles better.
I also asked Herve Poncheral about the 2000 PI GP and the season(where Jacque pipped Nakano on the line and won the title). The difference was 99 they had to do everything themselves and 2000 the factory did everything for them.
The RGV a crap bike eh well it won all bar 1 title with riders such as Troy Corser, Mat Mladin, Brock Parkes, Kev Curtain and Ant West in stock form, as Graeme Morris(600cc Supersport champion) told me the NSR handled well but the RGV made more top end.
The big thing jumping on to an Aprilia is to never feather the throttle they must be either 0-100% throttle if you feather the throttle you will seize it. Unlike reed valves the disc valve detonates at part throttle not at full throttle. Master that and race wins soon follow.

http://www.mcnews.com.au/MotorcycleRacing2000/Australian/ChampionsModern.htm

2T Institute wrote:The RGV a crap bike eh well it won all bar 1 title with riders such as Troy Corser, Mat Mladin, Brock Parkes, Kev Curtain and Ant West in stock form, as Graeme Morris(600cc Supersport champion) told me the NSR handled well but the RGV made more top end.

It really depends what you're allowed to mod, in any champinship with restricted regs there are going to be winners and losers.
But an RGV can make good top end power, despite what seems to happen on the RGV forum, Matt (who raced most 250 proddy bikes when they were raced properly) reckoned without cracking a Dremel out an NSR would struggle to out do a well setup stock vj22 motor. But top end power isn't everything and it matters less and less as the riders get less talented plus the design of the motor itself is rubbish and it's an absolute pain to work on.

Dave Reynolds Aprilia pulls like a train, but it's near unusable. I know people say 2t's don't work at lower revs but what we (NSR) owners mean is they don't pull hard, they still work. But Dave's Aprilia doesn't, if you're stupid enough to have the rev counter down below about 9000rpm it just doesn't accelerate and it's so vicious slipping the clutch at big lean isn't an inviting prospect.
Even so, it's SO quick I was still 2 seconds faster on it than I was on my own bike at Snetterton despite only riding it for 6 laps and never putting in a lap I was happy with, every single lap I either went in too hot, go booged down and more than once I had to back off down the back straight so as not to re-overtake someone who'd lapped me. Yet I did plenty of slower (far slower) laps on my NSR that I felt were OK, they weren't fast but I didn't make any mistakes.

It's a shame, that Aprilia chassis is sublime.
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