DRZ - Forum

Hi there!

I'm happy to infrom you that on 9th of April 2005 traditional "Season Opening Ceremony" took place in Moscow. So since yesterday we are with you not only in our thoughts, but on and off roads. Plus my heartfull greeting to german riders concerning Alex Hoffman's strong start in MOTOGP season today in Jerez, Spain: 10th in Qualification and 11 in the race - sounds like nice start for Alex this year.

Best Regards,
Alexander

Hi Mike!

Your russian's fair good

Yes, I had a good start this season - the first season on bike for me (I do not take in concideration those spent in my teen-ages on russian 50cc-s and ugly BMW '1939 clones - "Ural"s and "Dnepr"s). So I enjoyed my DRZ fair much.

It was only two riding days for me yet: spent nearly 8 hours on bike on Saturday (hanging round the place + column ride (~2 000+ bikes) on Moscow Garden Ring) and on Sunday it was just 60km long city trip to Eurosport-Russia studio from my home. So as you can see do not have a lot of off-road experience with my DRZ yet (I do not count 3 months of winter rides on MX course).

There's a lot of places for off-road riding nearby Moscow for "private fun" + 3 MX/Enduro polygons. And there's also a company named "BikeLand" - Suzuki and KTM official dealer in Russia - since 2003 they arrange kinda rally raids in Russia for amateures - a wee like "KTM Adventure" course.
The differenca is that riders mostly use their own bikes, but all necessary support provided by "BikeLand". If you are any familiar with Russian I could give you a link to their page re Raid events schedule for 2005 (but you'll have to train your liver good - vodking is a significant part of after race briefing time )). For example, thus year they offer 2 main raids: 4-days long in Karelia (former eastern part of Finland), and 10-days in steppe-desert area near Kaspian sea - Astrakhan' (they did this raid last year). The price of 10-days tour (which includes bikes transportation Moscow-Astrakhan’-Moscow, food, water, fuel + technical support) is 15 000 rubles - which is approximately 420 Euros. Here you can find fotos from the last year trip (I did not participate :
http://www.bikeland.ru/mt_event.php?mt_ ... tion_id=18
http://www.bikeland.ru/mt_event.php?mt_ ... tion_id=19

With my own DRZ there's a whole story: I've ordered one '01 DR-Z with 14000 on Odometer from Japan. The Price was $5 600 (DR-Zs usually do not lose a lot in their price here in Russia). But ocasionaly I managed to get one '03 DRZ-S, bought and serviced in BikeLand in '04 with 2500 on Odometer for just $6 500 with Acerbis Handlebar, 16 l Tank, disc guards, engine guard and pile of that sort of equipment on it. The guy (first owner) used the bike twice for raids with BikeLand team, so it's in a superb condition.

The new stock DR-Z400S costs 266 830 rubles here, which is approx. 7411 Euros or $8 900. The 400E is 246 050 rubles = 6834 Euros = $8201, and I'm not sure about 400SM.

I will to inform you about any Enduro activity or events take place in Russia you are interested in. But for more accurate information use more specific questions, ok? ))

Tchus!
Alexander