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All through 2002, and possibly earlier, I had the idea of getting a 125 again. The Honda
being out of commission for a while in the middle of my stretch run, lead to the rather
hurried decision to “go small”. I managed to get the “2 bike overlap” plan past the
family budget committee and was going to keep the 250 as a back-up, while getting the
125 set-up. After that relatively short period of time, the 250 would be sold. At least
that’s how I remember the “plan”. I ran the last 2 or 3 races of 2002 that year, capping
my glorious run to 9th place in 40+ B.
As it turned out, 2003 started and I still had both. I preferred the 250 on certain
tracks so I kind of switched back and forth between them with more being on the 250 than
the 125. The bike had a five-speed and the gaps were pretty big, so you really had to
shift precisely. I had really gotten used to being able to leave it in third and clutch
out of a tight corner, and that didn’t cut it on the 125. Going down a tooth on the
countershaft helped, but a six-speed would have helped more.
Fun as the bike was at certain tracks, or sections of tracks, it was tough to go up
against 250s and (an increasing number of) four-strokes on the start, especially in a
4-5 lap race. About a year after buying it, I sold it, without losing too much if I
remember right, and the third 125-era was complete.
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