Shakey and Stalker in the KRC Spotlight

Recently Kawasaki Riders Club members were given a chance to ask their Superbike heroes some questions. From the hundreds of brilliant, funny – and sometimes left field – questions five lucky winners were selected and their questions put to a brace of the most popular, long-serving and successful Superbike riders to have ever swung a leg over a Ninja, Shane “Shakey” Byrne and Chris “The Stalker” Walker. Here is what they said:

Adrian Knight asked:

“What are the happiest memories of your career so far, and also which memories would you most like to forget!?  Also, who would you say is the toughest rider you have raced against?”

Shane Byrne Answered:

“Well, that’s three questions in one LOL, I’d love to say my happiest memories of my career are yet to come!! Winning my 1st race, my Brands Hatch WSB double and last year’s final round are pretty high up there though!!

Double Brands Win

In terms of lows (not Lowes – ha ha), 2000 was a pretty bad year, I got hurt bad a lot that year, a broken back and a split liver in two separate crashes!!!

Toughest rider, not too sure to be honest, I think if you’re a clean rider you get ridden cleanly against. I remember Ruben Xaus trying to stripe me a couple of times, a BIG block pass put paid to that, what goes around comes around!!!

Xaus comes off second

Chris Walker’s response:

Happiest memory? Easily the World Superbike Win at Assen. Pouring rain and went off just after the start. It was a fairy tale race. I literally rode from last to first having just got engaged to Rachel the week before!

Victory at Assen

Time to forget? My time on the Shell Advance Honda in 500GP's – too many maybe’s and too many disappointments to make up for the excitement of being in GP’s.

A time to forget

Toughest rider? So many people think they are tough but it’s a tough business anyway so it takes something special to stand out as being exceptional. For my money, the “never give up” attitude of Troy Bayliss stands out. Whatever he rode, he rode it to win… and who can forget him coming out of retirement and winning a MotoGP race – now that’s tough!

Bayliss is super tough

Simon Lee was keen to find out what advice the pair of Kawasaki veterans had for those just starting out saying: If someone was starting out in competitive racing what would be the best advice you could give them from your own wealth of experience?'

Chris Walker is typically enigmatic saying: “I now work with young up & coming racers at the Chris Walker Race School. The advice I always give them is you have to be prepared to lose to win. It’s a learning curve, I am still learning…. If I don’t qualify well, or do as well in the race as I expected to, I don’t just turn my back, I analyse it and learn from it.

Shakey is more succinct commenting:

“I guess you have to have a dream and follow it. Listen to only those you know and trust because all paddocks are full of know it all’s that are full of sh*t!!

A welcome question from David Cook who wanted to know: Of all the great motorcycle riders, which one would you like to have raced against?'

Considering his light the blue touch paper style – no surprise that Shakey nominates all action hero and recent Suzuka 8 Hour returnee, Kevin Schwantz.

Schwantz never gave up

For Chris Walker the chance to reflect on one of the highlights of his brief 500cc GP career: “Rossi...& I have! He is a legend!

Stalker has raced the greats

Still on the subject of past glories Alan Pucknell asked 'If there is one race in your career that you could go back and race in again, for whatever reason, good or bad, which one would it be?'

With his own memories of GP’s (after a stint in the early MotoGP paddock) Shane Byrne nominated a memorable Italian round saying:

“Mugello Moto GP 2004. I got up to 4th place right behind some Italian guy called Valentino. I tried too hard and made a big mistake at the final turn and dropped to 10th at the finish, still in the points but not where I should have ended up:

Byrne had a year in MotoGP

If anyone thinks Chris Walker would give an answer other than this then they might as well pack up and go home:

Donington British Superbikes 2000 - last round, last race... All I needed was a valve spring retainer to last another five laps & I would have been British Superbike Champion. What would I change? Simple: I'd make sure the modified updated ones that Suzuki sent us the week after were already fitted!

But for a broken spring eh...

The final question for our racing legends Patrick Mead asked about the ever-present issue of rider safety:

 'While we all accept racing can be dangerous and no one likes to see riders get hurt, if there was one thing you could change to help protect riders what would it be?'

Pragmatically, Shane Byrne reflected on the modern pressures of racing saying:

“I'd take away the pressure riders get put under to return too quickly whilst still injured, it's a cut throat business racing bikes, the second your off your bike someone else will be back handily trying to get on it”

And, for Chris Walker, the amusing yet wholly understandable plea for riders to have:

“Free BUPA private health care”

With thanks to:

Simon Lee, Patrick Meads, David Cook ,Alan Pucknell and Adrian Knight. Plus, of course, Shane “Shakey” Byrne and Chris “Stalker” Walker

Kawasaki Riders Club

DragonMotoTours – Touring Season 2013, The Story So Far….

So far this year the Versys 1000 mounted team at DragonMotoTours have completed five of their planned ten motorcycle tours, two in the UK and three in Europe.  Here is a summary of the action in their own words.

On all of our tours we’ve had a great variety of bikes, people, weather and roads although the over-riding factor has been everyone’s enjoyment of motorcycling and sharing the experience with other like-minded people.

The UK tours have seen us spending three days in Mid Wales in early May and four days at the end of May riding through Northumberland.   We’ve toured Mid Wales on a couple of occasions and some of our clients this year have been with us before, they clearly enjoy the roads that this part of the UK has to offer!

Brecon Beacons

Northumberland was new on our programme this year and we were blessed with excellent weather for our two main ride-out days.   

Deserted Northumberland Roads

Taking tea - all part of the fun

We had a number of experienced tourers with us and yet none of them had ridden through Kielder and were blown away with the open road which flows through the largest forest and alongside the largest artificial lake in the UK.  On the Sunday we visited Lindisfarne crossing the narrow causeway which is governed by the tides before heading into the lower reaches of the Scottish Borders riding by the White Adder Reservoir stopping for lunch and coffees along the way.

For our first tour into Europe, we went to Northern France for four days.  We had a “first” on this tour with no pillions.  Including Jan (from DragonMoto), we had five lady riders and 45% of the clients had never ridden abroad before making this particular tour ideal to show them what Europe has to offer.  Many motorcyclists ride through Northern France on the autoroute to destinations further afield, but they are missing out on wonderful open roads, very little traffic and great places to visit such as the Caverne du Dragon, the old race circuit at Reims and the stunning chateau at Pierrefonds.

The old track at Reims

In early July we ran a six day tour to one of our favourite regions for motorcycling – the French and Swiss Jura mountains.  Another “first” on this tour – all male riders and no pillions.  Over 50% of the guys with us had not ridden abroad and we had a wide variety of bikes too - even had a 30 year old Honda “Nighthawk”. The great thing about the Jura is that it has such a fantastic mix of roads, tight twisties, wide open hairpins, mountains, valleys, lakes – the area is just stunning and we ‘re back there next year as we love it so much!

Typical old Harz village

The Jura mountains

Most recently we’ve been on a ten day tour through the Harz Mountains in Germany and the Northern Vosges in eastern France.  Unbelievable weather with temps rising to 30⁰ at times!   This was a destination tour where we stayed for 3 nights in the Harz and 3 nights in the Vosges with some transition days in between.  In Germany we had ride-outs through the Western and the Eastern Harz, two contrasting areas with meadowland and low lying hills in the West and mountains in the East, along all of our routes we encountered scenic villages and towns interspersed with great riding roads. 

Staying in the Northern Vosges, we were able to ride the roads over the Col Du Donon, with 11km of endless flowing bends rising to the highest point in this region.  We visited Dabo which is home to a wonderful little chapel which has 360⁰ views over the region.

In the Vosges

Coming up we have tours of South Wales, France & Italy (which is a repeat of the tour we did in 2012), ten days through Wales, Ireland and Scotland, a tour of the Eifel region in Germany and a 3 day tour of North Wales in October….. Plenty to keep us busy and to entice riders to join us!

Fairytale Chateau