Ride To Dakar

 A good rally bike is one that is as light and fast as possible while making sure that damage from minor crashes don't turn into race enders. Cory at Camel ADV struggled through a coolant leak at the Desert 100 race  and may have done significant engine damage to finish the race. Things like broken radiators and cracked engine case covers mean your bike is going home in a truck or a trailer, scratched paint doesn't.  Battle scars My old Kawasaki KLR650 was covered in the dirt from almost 100k miles of adventures and the plan was to outfit the Tenere 700 based on the damage it had taken. It's crash bars had done their job and kept the radiator off of the ground but they were unnecessarily large because they were also designed to protect the bodywork. My Tenere 700 had already taken a fall that cracked some body work so my only goal was to prevent damage to the radiator and the engine case covers.  Tenere 700 Rally build montage For a bike like the Tenere 700 that is d...

In January while watching the 2022 Dakar Rally, I got a wild hair and decided to enter the race myself. A few years ago I trained for and finished a 100 mile ultramarathon for basically the same reason. It's big and it's out there. I entered my first motocross race because a buddy at work offered to let me race his bike and I like to take the opportunities that come my way. Over the last 20 years, I have watched the greats of Dakar like Stéphane Peterhansel from a distance and occasionally imagined racing it myself - but never seriously. The same goes for the Baja 1000. I had watched Dust to Glory as a kid and imagined what it would be like to ride it Ironman. One motorcycle, one man, one thousand miles. The Malle Moto class now called Original by Motul is the Dakar version of Ironman where you also have to navigate solo. For 2 weeks you turn your own wrenches with only the most basic spare parts that fit in a trunk while trying to navigate trackless dunes as fast as humanly ...