KTM has radically changed the 450 Rally for the Dakar and is now relying on a motocross frame, as Matthias Walkner explained to Motorsport.com.
Between 2001 and 2007, the Austrian manufacturer won the Rally Raid in Africa and from 2009 to 2019 it remained unbeaten in the South American editions. Then the event moved to Saudi Arabia and in 2020-2021 Honda ousted it from the throne, achieving two successes.
In January 2022, KTM will be looking to regain overall victory with a completely revamped 450 Rally.
“The idea was to build a bike that is easier to manage,” Walkner told our magazine.
With the new 450 Rally, KTM wanted to improve handling.
“The bike should also be easier to ride on gravel and stone roads, in poor conditions and on dunes. However, we shouldn’t lose anything in terms of stability.”
2021 gewann Matthias Walkner zum zweiten Mal die Rallye-Weltmeisterschaft
Photo: KTM
The new development was dictated by a reaction to Honda successes.
“There are new conditions in Saudi Arabia and we have suffered more than in South America. Honda seems to be dealing with the situation better.”
The heart of the renewed bike is a new steel frame that takes design cues from motocross bikes. This is a complete change of philosophy.
“We pushed in the direction of motocross frames. My basic idea was that as KTM’s motocross department has become huge by now, they could leverage their knowledge. We as a ‘small’ rally department have to discover and try everything for ourselves.” .
“Often there is no time and not even enough personal. With motocross you can count on a lot of experience, because they have already tested and tried 99% of everything at least once. That’s why we can better exchange ideas in the future.”
The 2018 Dakar winner reveals that KTM has been working on the new bike for some time.
“I rode this chassis for the first time in testing in March 2020. Then we continued adding new components and changing something. Unfortunately everything was delayed and postponed due to Covid.”
“The biggest change is mainly the chassis. The tanks are also different. You always try to center the masses so that the center of gravity is more in the middle or as low as possible. The front tank has become much larger and the rear one a little bit bigger. ‘ smaller”.
“We also worked on the swingarm, linkage, WP shock absorbers and many technical details. Different setups and configurations were tested during the various test laps throughout the year.”
KTM hat die 450 Rally grundlegend überarbeitet
Photo: KTM
Walkner became cross-country world champion for the second time in 2021. However, he has not yet achieved that success with the new bike. The 450 Rally has not in fact been used yet and the decision to do so in the Dakar came at the last moment.
“KTM gave me the choice of whether to ride the old or the new bike. The last test was at the beginning of December. But the decision had to be made earlier, because the bikes had already been shipped to Saudi Arabia in November. “.
“It was difficult, but I’m happy now, in hindsight. It’s been a long and tough 10 days of testing. We tested the new bike with all possible set-ups and configurations. I’m happy it works well.”
However, development of the new 450 Rally is not yet complete and will continue next year, as Walkner explains at the end.
“We went back on some things because we didn’t have enough time to do the tests. But in 2022 we will recover some things in view of the Dakar 2023”.
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