11/11/2022 0 Comments Yamaha motogp![]() ![]() The Yamaha-Rossi combination had long since established itself as the ones to beat, but it’s worth bearing in mind that during their four-year relationship from 2004-2007 the Italian was the only rider to win a race on a Yamaha. Nine wins meant he cantered home to another championship, but team-mate Carlos Checa and satellite riders Marco Melandri and Norifumi Abe couldn’t come close to replicating his performance, so Honda still won the manufacturer title. ![]() The nut holding the handlebars was swapped for a part that had previously only been seen on Hondas in MotoGP. On track, the changes worked instantly, along with one other alteration. The 2004 engine also dropped Yamaha’s previous five-valve-per-cylinder layout in favour of a more conventional four-valve design.Īlthough launched in Yamaha’s corporate colours, the works racers would run in the familiar Gauloises blue. Mimicking the firing pattern of a V4 engine while retaining the compact inline packaging, it’s something that the firm has stuck to and that would reach road bikes five years later with the launch of the 2009 R1. Inside, it also carried a leap forward that’s become a Yamaha byword – the crossplane crankshaft. The swingarm, braced underneath instead of above, for instance, and even the bodywork around the tail already has a style that’s very similar to the clean-looking Yamahas that would follow. The 2004 M1 is the first to carry signature elements that have remained on the bike to this day. A far cry from the fly-by-wire, traction-controlled machine it would evolve into. Surprising fact? The 2002 M1 ran on old-fashioned carburettors, despite the fact that the concurrent R1 and R7 road bikes were injected. It was the machine that, in the hands of an on-form Max Biaggi, managed to stop Honda from getting a clean sweep of wins in 2002, breaking the RCV’s stranglehold with victories at Brno and Sepang on his way to second in the championship. With over 200bhp, up from 190bhp for the 500, its performance was far higher than its predecessor’s but the M1 initially struggled to come to terms with the clean-sheet design from Honda, the RC211V. ![]() The swingarm and bodywork were all but identical to the old stroker. As such, the first generation of M1 had a very similar chassis to that of the two-stroke a notch was cut into it to make space for the wider new engine’s cylinder head. While the engine was completely new, Yamaha didn’t want to throw away the years of development it had put into the YZR500. Following Yamaha’s favoured practice at the time, the motor used five valves per cylinder rather than four, with three intakes and two exhaust valves. For the first half of 2002, the engine was only 942cc, only stretching to the 990cc maximum in a mid-year update. Ridden at tests throughout 2001 by former world superbike champion John Kocinski, the M1 was quickly proved to be more powerful and faster than the outgoing two-stroke YZR500 racer.Īlthough Yamaha wouldn’t spill the beans at the time, it’s since emerged that the first YZF-M1 racers didn’t actually use the full 990cc capacity that the rules allowed. Since the reason for the four-stroke switch was to provide greater R&D and marketing links between road and race machines, that connection can’t be ignored. The conventional layout also gave the bike a useful family link to the firm’s R6 and R1 road bikes. Yamaha also confirmed that it had considered five or six-cylinder engines, but shied away due to the extra weight. While official pictures of an unpainted M1 were released in mid-2001, confirming its inline-four layout, the firm explored all its options before settling on the same general configuration as its existing YZF-R1 road bike and R7 world superbike machine.Īlthough a V4 was another option, the firm’s experience with racing inline-fours meant that it stood a better chance of being competitive out of the box. Like every other competitor, Yamaha had plenty of notice of the change to four-strokes in 2002, so the M1 was actually ready for serious testing a full year before it would be needed to compete. ![]()
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