Bike + trackday = Insurance. Suggestions?

[Pug]

Contemplating doing a trackday or two this year and a friend has bought a snotty 600 to use instead of his new road bike. I've got an 08 Fireblade, and would love to unleash it on track - and so dont really see the point of buying an inferior machine to use at cost.

Therefore i'd be quite happy using my Blade (mechanically speaking) but wouold want some insurance if the worst does happen. i suspect my road policy wouldnt cover me, so that leaves me with specialist insurance.

How much would i be looking at for a days riding? I'd want as much cover as is reasonable - plastics through to total loss, but wouldnt mind an excess of a few hundred.

Any tips/suggestions or ideas i may have missed?

Cheers

 

[Fireskull]

Never used any personally, google trackday insurance but from what I can remember they only pay out for total loss or engine damage, the premiums would be huuuge if they paid out all the time for low slide damage which happens a hell of a lot.

Much cheaper in the long run to get some cheap ebay track fairings and rearsets.

 

[Pug]

so what do you do mate? Take a track bike, or just not bother insuring?

So far seen £125 with £500 excess and covers cosmetic through to total loss...

 

[Fireskull]

I dont bother insuring, I managed to get full set of track fairings for £100, and I had gilles rearsets and they survived two low slides on track with no damage at all.

That seems a lot, well if you just had a lowslide it would, as if you were to get fairings brand new from honda then yea fair enough a whole new side would prob be £500-700, but fairing panels go on ebay all the time from guys who are selling original plastics for a track bike, never had to myself but a friend who had a lowslide and managed to pick up brand new OE fairings for hundred odd pounds on ebay.

It all comes down to how you want to risk it, Ive never even thought about insurance as I will always want to try and fix it myself if I throw it down the track.
But if I had a brand new bike I would put some track fairings on it and kit it out with RnG gear, engine covers the lot, as I would plan on taking it on track a lot so it works out better that way.

 

[kidloco]

tis a tricky one, I have always taken my road bikes on the track, sometimes I have gone to the trouble of fitting cheap race fairings, crash bungs etc, other times the only prep I did was to remove my plate and tape up the lights. Ive never seen Track Day insurance to be honest, but I would imagine its pretty costly with very interesting small print. I would say you have have 3 options;

• Just take the blade as is, accept that if you have an off then it could be pretty costly.
  
• Spend a bit prepping you blade for the track, plastics, bungs etc. Its not going to totally save your bike if you bin it, but you 'should' be fine on most low speed slides.
  
• Buy a trackday bike, you can get a quick enough 600cc trackday bike with tatty fairings etc for not much cash these days, sure it wouldnt be as quick in a straight line as you blade but you wont be constantly panicing about 'what if I bin it'. Fit some slicks, stick it in a van and enjoy.

Im in the same boat, really wanna take my new one on a track day but its so mint at the moment I really dont want to risk ruining it. Think im just going to by a cheap early R1 next yeat just for track days.

 

[Wyvern971]

I'm contemplating buying a track bike for that exact reason.

I don't want to risk buggering my road bike up, and the cost of insurance seems very high for what it is.

 

[Pug]

i dunno... I dont have a van, so transporting a track bike would be tricky, plus the cost of buying the thing, and "running" it might actually work out more costly than just insuring my blade (assuming the small print is ok) for the number of events i'm likely to attend (easily <3/year i'd say).

Dunno. If i did buy a track bike i'd have to go GSXR750 minimum really though.

 

[Fireskull]

Cheaper to hire a van for a few days than that TD insurance

 

[Pug]

maybe, but more hassle too, and not cheaper by much...

I appreciate peoples suggestions, not sure i want to buy a knackered track abused bike, thats probably stolen, when i could be on my blade, but i REALLY dont want to bin my blade :/

Need to ponder some more me thinks.

 

[kidloco]

It is a swine a decision mate. Ive done dozens of trackdays, I have only ever came off on one, and when I did it was a 50mph lowside and the bike just had light cosmetic damage, I was still able to ride it home (all be ii painfully!). The thing is, even with light damage, I still dented a £340 akro can, bent levers, scratched panels, footpegs, barends and wore dowe crashbungs. So you can see that little spill was quite expensive.

There really is nothing like taking your own bike round a track at full pelt but you have to be willing to accept the consequences should the worst happen.

Have you looked into some of the track days where you use their bikes. most of them use CBR600s and Blades

 

[Ghosteh]

This thread has totally thrown me in to two worlds about a track day lol. Really want to get one done, but don't want to wreck my bike. Know it's a possibility, and I'm sort of willing to accept it, but dunno yet haha. Maybe I'll wait a bit, as I want to get a new bike sometime in the next 10 months or so, ready for next summer, but may keep my current GSX-R and make it into a track bike.

First thing I will be doing though is a track instruction day/advanced riding course with the Suzuki Crescent motorcycle team, which isn't far from where I am, and I can get it though with a guy who does training for the military.

 

[CatMangler]

For total piece of mind then a track day bike is the way to go. That said there are other considerations. You don't necessarily need a to hire a van but could buy/share a bike trailer. Can work if you have mate(s) to share it with and the associated cost and storage.