Young Hayden Gillim rode the...
Young Hayden Gillim rode the Moriwaki MD250H for us at Miller Motorsports Park, and compared it favorably to the Honda RS125 he normally rides.
Moriwaki MD250H
While at Miller Motorsports Park, we also took the opportunity to spin a few laps on a Moriwaki MD250H that Honda brought along. The MD uses a variety of Honda RS125 parts along with a CRF250X engine, all packaged in a frame designed and manufactured by Moriwaki. The result is an RS125-sized racer with four-stroke power (and electric start!) that is available through Honda dealers at a retail price of $11,699. The USGPRU (United States Grand Prix Race Union) sanctions a series specifically for the MD250H, with the Honda Rider's Club of America and Pro Honda Oils offering contingency and support for the program.
Moriwaki designs and fabricates...
Moriwaki designs and fabricates the frame, swingarm and exhaust in-house along with many other parts, while the wheels, suspension and brakes all look to be Honda RS125 parts.
A handful of laps on the MD showed it to be typically tiny and able to carry plenty of cornering speed. Ample power was on hand from approximately 9000 rpm up to 12,500 rpm, with plenty of overrev from there. The 250X motor, borrowed from Honda's off-road bike, which is in turn based on the CRF250F motocrosser, features a wide-ratio transmission that was a bit too wide for the MD's powerband when coupled with the tall gearing necessary for Miller, but otherwise the engine is very user-friendly and offers good grunt off corners compared with the 125s I rode years ago.
Because my experience on GP bikes-and especially 125s-dates back more than 15 years, we enlisted 13-year-old Hayden Gillim to ride the bike for us at Miller. Gillim is a regular in the USGPRU 125 GP and MD250H classes and also competes in this year's Red Bull Rookie's Cup, carding podium finishes in all three series. "It's an awesome bike," raved Gillim after his stint on the MD. "I love it. It's fast in the corners, and it's got a lot of torque so it's fast off the line. It's a little bit slower [on top end] than the 125, but you can outride a 125 in the corners on this bike. And it has engine braking so you can get in a lot deeper and slow it down a lot faster." Gillim also noted that the Moriwaki bike is a bit smaller than an RS125, and its softer suspension requires less attention to set up at a typical track.
The MD250H is slightly smaller...
The MD250H is slightly smaller than an RS125 and is fitted with the four-stroke engine from Honda's CRF250X.
With two-strokes being rapidly phased out the world over (the FIM recently announced its plan to replace 250 Grand Prix with a 600cc four-stroke-based class), 250cc four-strokes are certainly the future of the 125 GP class. And judging from our brief experience on the MD250H, Moriwaki is getting a great head start on the inevitable transition.