00:00 So on four days notice, the team of motorcyclists asked me if I could fly out to Barcelona to test the new Stark Varg.
00:06 And honestly, after five back-to-back weeks of travel, it would have taken a rare opportunity for me to want to take the trip.
00:13 And this was exactly that. From the first post that I saw this come online, it was a bike that I immediately was interested in
00:19 because I had recently done my first electric project.
00:22 In the attitude of ever evolving and improving, I immediately saw what it had to offer,
00:26 and it was something I wanted to get my hands on.
00:28 So when they asked me to come out to Barcelona to give this thing a test, first and foremost, I want to be honest with everybody,
00:33 I'm not a professional motocross racer, but I race sometimes and I'm somewhere in the mid-pack of someone who
00:38 confidently enjoys riding motocross, but it's not my home field of play.
00:42 From the moment I got here, from every lap and track condition, from the wet to swapping back and forth from the 450 to the end,
00:49 I literally fell in love with this motorcycle.
00:52 And I've done enough tests over the years, comparing different motorcycles.
00:56 I'm not to the level of rider where I'm going to dissect every 450 and give it a comparison to that,
01:01 but certain bikes make an impact that you remember indefinitely, and it's been a while since that's happened.
01:07 Upon arrival, I tried not to have any prerequisite, but given that it's electric,
01:12 there's always a give and take, or at least to what I currently knew, and it just gave today.
01:17 It was something that I have no skin in the game to endorse the brand.
01:21 I had, in full honesty, would spend my hard-earned money specifically to get one of these and was thoroughly impressed.
01:27 Like, it doesn't have longevity issues, power throughout the day.
01:30 I kept backing the power down, given the fact that, you know, you kind of hit points of fatigue throughout the day,
01:36 and it just tracks so incredibly well.
01:39 There's just this lightning snap that electric has, that this has found a way to transfer the data that you input into the motorcycle
01:47 to how it tracks up, and it's thoroughly enjoyable.
01:50 From the fastest to the slowest guy here today, it's pretty common consensus that they'd happily own one,
01:56 and it's not really a concession between a normal 450.
01:59 I think it's taken a while, but at this point, you could happily have this bike,
02:04 and I don't think you would miss, you know, having your normal one.
02:07 When people would ask me about my previous electric project, it was, you know,
02:12 "Would you ever get rid of your gas stuff, or would you ever get rid of your normal bikes?"
02:16 And I would always say, "No, it's an addition to."
02:18 It's, you know, it's an addition to the fleet.
02:21 And I might eat those words a little bit, because this thing today is not really an addition to.
02:25 Like, it's apples to apples, performs just as good in every category.
02:29 Suspension components, braking components, all of that with the cockpit was top-notch.
02:33 Like, that visibly is deliverable.
02:35 The R&D was done well. There was obviously a team of riders and engineers that worked together specifically.
02:41 The only thing that I thought may or may not deliver was the battery life and longevity that that had,
02:46 but this thing had far more in the gas tank than I did.
02:49 And there was riders of higher skill level here that actually gave it 10/10s for the whole session,
02:54 and it just delivered.
02:55 On the components that I've become familiar with over the years, with the Brembo braking components,
03:00 KYB suspension, those are kind of the staples in what you want to see and what delivers continuously.
03:06 And then, I mean, literally every finite detail from rim and wheel selection to the unified Torex hardware
03:14 that they use throughout the entire motorcycle, the minimalist mounting points that they have for servicing,
03:19 it's well thought out.
03:20 It's not like that, "Okay, how many pieces of hardware am I going to need to remove the seat,
03:25 and then the side shroud, and then go from there?"
03:27 It's just such a sectional, simple motorcycle.
03:30 And I got to watch them just do little service checks throughout the day on the motorcycle,
03:35 but there's just certain things that are so well thought of.
03:37 Like, if you needed to do a shock change, the fact that you can just pull the body off
03:40 and not have to worry about, like, half-lifting the subframe and removing all these different components,
03:46 it was just thought with a current mindset and not an adapted iteration of a motorcycle over and over again.
03:52 So there's things that I didn't even think of as a QAM that it just had delivered,
03:57 from the phone being the interface, which is mobile, and you can change that from either place,
04:01 and just the simplicity that that comes in and out.
04:04 No detail wasn't thought of, but they delivered it in the most minimalist fashion.
04:08 So, like, I myself and all of the builds that I do in my program, aspirationally,
04:12 just love every bit of attention to detail.
04:15 And obviously this team does completely because it's a, well, fine-tuned machine.
04:20 And I'm not here to critique this thing on what it didn't deliver.
04:23 Like, I'm here to give my general impression as a normal guy that wants to ride dirt bikes and have a good time,
04:28 and race maybe a couple times a year.
04:31 I took it off track some places here, did some trail riding, got to go up and down through the trees,
04:36 do some casual, calm motocross riding, gave it a couple hard laps,
04:39 and, like, I would happily ride this to replace the 450 or some of my other bikes,
04:44 just because it opens a lot of doors.
04:47 For someone like me, there's certain properties you can take these on and can't,
04:51 and there's gray areas here and there, and it's definitely not going to upset the same group of people.
04:55 And more and more it's becoming an issue with noise and emissions,
04:59 especially depending on where you live.
05:01 And the electric units before were cool, but they're always a little bit novelty, and this just delivers.
05:07 So I can't wait to see what this actually does heads up in a professional racing setting.
05:12 Not that that's the most important component for me.
05:15 I've already given it my check of approval, like this would happily do it.
05:18 But given what this can actually do as far as battery life and the power it puts down,
05:22 they're going to race this in the open motocross class, and it's going to be interesting
05:26 because it's going to turn some heads and it's no longer going to be a novelty category.
05:30 This is actually a serious replacement for someone who wants to get one.
05:33 When they gave me the 20-minute call to stop riding, I was very bummed.
05:36 I could have happily, just like a dog chasing a ball until he passes out, rode this all afternoon.
05:40 So, coming home happy, ear to ear. I can't wait until this thing gets off the production line.
05:44 Forkbarg, man, I was thoroughly impressed and thankful that the team of motorcyclists sent me out here for this one.
05:48 It's been an awesome trip to Barcelona, and it's going to be a bummer to leave,
05:52 because I could definitely cut some more laps on this thing.
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