2012 French moped racing 2nd race
Just one week after the 1rst race April 8th, the second race of the 2012 season northern France championship took place in Douvrin race track Sunday April 14th.
Team Remi Cusso finished 1st overall dominating the event with the #48 motobecane Bidalot RS 50cc single variated with parallelogram ridden by Antoine his new pilot. You can witness the slight edge in power when listening to Remi’s engine in the straight away. I remember easily recognizing that specific sound among the other bikes on the track watching a race live in 2011. The magic touch…
Antoine did really good for his second race with a 50cc variated moped and first time on a new track. His amazing riding skills allowed him to place 1st in each 3 rounds and get the fastest lap time. He placed 3rd in the final 4th round due to a belt problem. It’s very early in the season but it looks like he has a good chance to win the 2012 championship in the 50cc variated moped prototype class.
Well done guys! Keep it up.
VIDEOS:
Posted by Phillipe 45 years old who started moped racing in 2010 to fulfill a childhood dream (kinda like me). He contacted in Remi 2010 who helped him build a motobecane av10 race moped. That’s his second season and he’s starting to progress as a rider and tuner. Unfortunately he just broke his clavicle bone in that last race and will be down for 6 weeks but he’ll be back. Here’s his #67 race bike with new 50cc engine setup scootracing89 cases for powerful Derbi h20 kits bridge exhaust + lightened Mykitech clutch pulley:
The energy in the pit early morning. Remi shares a guru’s trick showing how to use the roof steel frame to tighten a Bidalot variator when you don’t have a vice on the track. This is high level skills, don’t try this at home he’s a professional… lol
Antoine #48 won 1st, 2nd and 3rd round:
In the final 4th round Antoine’s belt slipped or broke at the 8 min mark. It happens sometimes with powerful 50cc variated engine even when you use a very precise and linear parallelogram. He learned his first lesson as a new variated moped rider, replaced the belt and got back on the track to finish 3rd.
2012 French moped racing, the pressure is on!
50cc single variated moped racing was big in France in the 80′s and 90′s but slowly died early 2000 because of the scooters and 6 speed bikes becoming quickly popular among the new generation more interested in drag racing with 80+cc set-ups.
In 2007 moped racing made a slow come back with old school tuners/racers and few young racers. Since then, the sport has grown every year but still needs new blood to survive.
For the first time this year, companies like Bidalot (pioneer of moped racing and #1 brand for performance parts in the 80′sand 90′s) are stepping in wanting to help the sport grow, by submitting their ideas like introducing an open class up to 80cc the most popular displacement among young racers today (scooters/6 speed in drag racing and speed track racing). The idea is not really welcomed by the hard core an long time 50cc moped racers but could attract new racers to secure the future of the sport. Some argue that Bidalot has always been only about business and fear that they want to jump in just to tap into a new market to sell their modern racing parts, with a risk that they could start controlling the rules like they did back in the days.
The 2012 season is going to be the busiest since 2007 with about 30 bikes in the 50cc open class (no cases and carb size limit, open chassis) in the northern championship with top moped racers traveling for Belgium to challenge the french racers.
The southern championship is packed as well with new crazy bikes this year in each class, 50cc open, 50cc gr1, and the most popular 50cc stock-ish.
Reading all the french blog we can feel that everybody is excited and starting to feel the pressure, working hard to finish their bikes on time for the 1st race starting late march. Some of the teams are even getting a sponsorship this year, that’s a good sign.
Some random pics of current race bikes and new projects under progress, mainly from Northern France. Some of those guys are getting serious for the 2012 season, bringing out the big guns! I’ll try to plan another trip this year and go to one of their races, last year I went to one of the Southern France championship event, gained tons of experience and brought some cool moped parts.
Bonus Video: A look inside Polini Motori.
50cc variated french moped racing, the next level
Some updates about the 3 top french racing teams.
1- Team Remi Cusso:
http://karaokeman92.skyrock.com/
Remi the tuner and Mick the official pilot did some track testing with the new Bidalot Replica 50cc Gr3 race bike (28mm carb) outside Paris at “Carole” big motorcycle race track. The bike was faster than some of the Suzuki 125 RG, 250 RGV and vintage motorcycles. To give you an idea, that’s how fast a top level 50cc variated french bike is. The motorcycles were only able to catch up or pass in the long straight away because Remi’s bike is geared for moped tracks and not long motorcycle tracks.
After losing motivation in moped racing, reaching the chassis limits of his fast motobecane av10 frame 50cc Gr3 engine against the other high tech moped frames, Mick is now eager to get back in the competition with the better Bidalot Replica chassis version keeping the same old Gr3 engine. He can lean the bike so far in the turns that “he’s gonna have to get new knee sliders every 3 races”…Watch out!
Latest pics of St Genis 50cc moped race September 4th 2011.
Remi is also working on Chi King race bike the Bidalot RS 50cc Gr3 (currently 3rd in the championship), building a new stronger lower bracket for the parallelogram to prevent the belt from twisting and jumping because of the insane power of the Gr3 50cc engine. I saw it in action live on the french tracks and it sounds like an 80cc engine.
2- Team Mir 35:
Julien is finally releasing his new machined Gr2 cases for motobecane Bidalot h20 Gr2 50cc kits + 20mm crank + 21mm carb size limit. It looks like you could remove the Gr2 “standard” 2 petal reed block adapter and use a huge Gr2 “open” 4 petal reed block for no carb size limit. Nice!
3- Team Clycomania:
http://cyclomaniateam.skyrock.com/
Video of St Genis 50cc variated moped race May 15 – 2011 and Hugo’s 1rst place.
BONUS ARTICLE:
Check out the no gear racing blog that talks about David a french pastry chef who moved to California and started speed racing in 2002 at Bonneville, Utah with a motobecane av10 imported from France. The latest 50cc engine evolution seems to be using a Derbi 6 speed engine converted to a variated transmission with 77 mph top speed in August 2011. David is still trying to beat the current 50cc speed record at 85 mph established by Cathy on a ultra prepared Aprilia RS 50.
I found out about that cool story through http://www.treatland.tv who sent me that first link.
http://southsiders-mc.blogspot.com/2011/08/team-no-gear.html
http://www.nogearracing.com/the-machine/
Bonus speed & monster bike videos for fun and inspiration:
France, a motobecane av10 drag moped with kitted minarelli horizontal scooter engine, first start.
France, a MBK Nitro scooter minarelli horizontal engine (like the Yamaha Zuma 50cc) with a malossi 77cc h20 kit, Keihin 28mm carb and a 6 speed gear box adapted from an AM6 /Derbi engine.
France, BRD drag scooter dyno testing. The only moped part on that bike is the front motobecane grimeca 17″ mag wheel 
I’m too busy but I have a similar scooter engine at my shop with a Honda motorcycle frame and I have been wanting for a while to build a similar but slightly higher bike with a cafe’ racer top tank. At least I know that it can be done and the lines would work fine even with a scooter engine and smaller rear wheel. I think it could be the future for small size street custom bikes, combining the look of a bad ass top tank cafe’ motorcycle with retro lines, the power of modern Euro 2 stroke scooter 70cc/80cc technology or even 150cc 4 stroke engines from Asia (more available and popular in the US scooter world), the practicality of a dual variated automatic transmission with no gears just like a moped “twist and go” but with more speed and reliability than kitted moped engines that were never really designed to hold extreme power.
My first sketching with a GY6 150cc 4 stroke engine and my current 23 hp Minarelli 77cc 2 stroke engine project on hold.
50cc french moped racing, Salbris
May 29 – 2011, 3rd round of the TGO 50cc racing organization in Salbris, south of France.
The 50cc variated Mbk/Bidalot mopeds competed and dominated the race against the 50cc 6 speed motorcycles. Well done guys!
The results after 3 rounds:
1- Julien Dore’, Team Mir 35, Bidalot RS 50cc variated
2- Hugo Nouzille, Team Cyclomania, Bidalot RS 50cc variated
3- Chi King, Team Cusso, Bidalot RS 50cc variated
The black and orange moped racer coming back on the powerful 50cc Gr3 variated mopeds and 50cc motorcycles is only a 50cc Gr1 air cooled bike! Man, he’s fast.
If you watch the race closely you’ll recognize 16 year old Cathy with long hair racing in the middle of the pack with the blue mbk 51 CF yellow wheels built by her dad.
MBK 51 CF fairings for sale at http://www.treatland.tv
http://www.treatland.tv/1987-MBK-CF-51-fiberglass-front-race-fairing-p/fairing-front-mbk-1987.htm
http://www.treatland.tv/1987-MBK-CF-51-fiberglass-racing-seat-p/fairing-seat-mbk-1987.htm
Daggr1, another Tomahawk 50cc ripper
The engine feels just the way I anticipated it. I can tell by ear that we’re close to 11,500 rpm. Not bad for a beat up 50cc Bidalot kit with an old nikasil. When I looked at the small ports I never thought that kit could rip but I increased the port duration to Gr2 specs and it worked. I was afraid to lose some low end power with the new port duration but it didn’t happen, even with a standard pulley. I can’t imagine how good the bike would feel with a clutch pulley. In general, Gr1 set ups are not as powerful as Gr2 or Gr3 but have more torque.
Overall the bike feels good, not quite as powerful as my Peugeot 103 Rcx 50cc h20 but close with more torque and way lighter. The downside is that it’s an air cooled engine so it won’t stay as consistent during the entire race, especially if it gets hot in the desert.
