New Rear Sets!

Jan

I've been looking for a better foot position on the 749R lately. The stock pegs just haven't been able to get my feet up high enough for my liking. Having shorter legs, I don't feel like I'm able to get the leverage I'd like with the lower peg position of the stock pegs. They also aren't as grippy as I'd like either. Faced with these deficiencies, I set a few guidelines for rear sets for the bike when it came time to purchase.

Durable
Availabilty of replacement parts
Reverse Shift (GP) option
Nylon slider on the end of the foot peg
Pegs with enough grip, but not so much that I tear up boots.

Initially, I had wanted folding pegs. My thought here was that in the event of a slide, the pegs would be spared. However, I had an incident on track that made me change my mind. I removed my foot from the peg to reposition it, a common occurance I might add. In the process, I caught the peg just right and lifted it with my boot. THIS wasn't a common occurance. In doing so, I thought to myself how it would be nice to have a solid mounted peg so that something like this wouldn't happen in the future.

I didn't want foot pegs that would end up tearing up the souls of my boots after just a few rides. I did want pegs that would prevent my foot from slipping though. Up until our trip to Barber, I hadn't had any issues with this. However, for the first time at Barber, I ran into this issue. I also ran into issues where my legs were fatiguing come the end of the second day. Being able to apply my weight as needed into the pegs and not worry about my foot sliding off in the middle of a corner at lean and at speed, makes a HUGE difference. These new rear sets appear to strike a great balance. We won't know until I actually get a chance to ride with them though!

I was also looking for that all mighty GP shift. I have ridden on the track with it once thus far and loved it. It didn't take long to adjust, but I noticed immediately where it came in handy. Out at Barber I found myself wishing I had it in a number of corners. Being in the middle of a corner and needing to shift with a standard shift pattern can result in some unsettling moves. If I had been able to upshift by pressing down on the lever instead of up, it would have made things a bit more smooth and I feel that I would have been able to carry more corner speed. In any case, as anyone who rides on the track knows, having confidence in your machine equates to faster lap times.

I ordered these from Motowheels.com, a site that specializes in parts for Ducati motorcycles. They are an in house set. I had researched a number of different options and initially hadn't even really considered these. However, the Sunday before leaving for Barber, I was surfing their site, as I do on a regular basis, and I stumbled upon these on sale. They're normally $349.99, but were on sale for $199.00, shift and brake levers included. I couldn't pass this up. Sure, there's a chance that they're on clerance and parts will become scarce, but at that price, I can stand to replace them entirely down the road. I went with the silver set and GP shift.

We arrived home from Barber and the next day I promptly installed them. While I haven't had a chance to ride with them yet, I have had a chance to sit on the bike and hang off with he bike up on it's stands. So far, I like the new position and I feel that it will help. Hoping to try them out this coming Monday at Cresson, provided the weather holds off!

Aftermarket_Shifter