2022 KTM 350 SX-F Motorcycle Bike Introduction Test | Racer X Films

[Applause] howdy boys and girls i am chris kiefer welcome to racerxonline.com and what you're staring at right here 2022 edition of the ktm 350 sxf now before you get all stoked and all happy 2022 doesn't boast well for a lot of changes in our motocross world for 2022 the ktm has been unchanged for the most part we have a blue seat we have an orange frame we have some bngs but everything else remains the same that's including the valving and the fork and the shock engine is the same so not a lot of new things to tell you about on the 350 front but that doesn't mean we're not going to create some content and give you some different outlooks on what this bike's about so today we're at glen helen raceway and what we're going to do is grab a couple different types of riders to see the burning question out there is a 350 the perfect size machine lots of emails my way it's all over the message boards and even when i'm at the track they say hey kiefer it's a 350 the right bike for me so we're going to break all that down dive really deep we're going to do a deep dive of this bike and the size of this machine 350 cc is it the right is it the right bike for you stay tuned find out we'll be right back with some opinions and some facts [Music] all right so what we like to do here sometimes randomly we'll just pick some guy out of the area we're at glen hill in the day and i saw a guy his name is guy arnone he's 51 years old he was on a yz450f 2021 edition and we started talking and i was like you know what you'd be a great candidate to ride this bike so he has never been on one correct no never and uh i said hey go ride a little bit because he was complaining that maybe the yamaha is a little bit too much for him so guy you just got off this machine and you said i might have screwed you up because now you might want another bike so tell everybody out there why this bike could be best for you so coming off my yz which is an incredible bike um as i just continue to get older and the stamina and the strength that i try and have this bike has enough power the weight is incredible the handling is incredible and i had ridden a 250f yamaha adjusted a test day a little bit and it just was too needed a little bit more i needed more because of my weight and my size so i just never really thought of this and when i just wrote it it was incredible i was able to go longer i was able to control it and sometimes towards the end of a race certainly end of the day end of a long moto that 450 is a lot right so the point of riding dirt bikes people is to have fun and to me i don't really care about dinos that much i'm i like the human dyno you're a human dino you know what you like you know how fast you want a bike to go you know what you can jump when you can't jump so overall 350 has enough power for you the sticky part about this bike is the air fork but we just talked about that a little bit and you said you don't mind it no not at all because overall in all the handling and again different speeds and what is your agenda where do you ride and if you just want to have fun if you want to be out there stay in shape it's the best exercise and rekindling that love and that fun of riding this is a great bike for bigger vet guys versus the other alternatives and you to choose if do i want to jump that do i want to jump that and to just have the fun and just stay in shape this is incredible there you have it random guy at glen helen loves the ktm 350. so so far 350 could be the perfect size machine stay tuned we got two more opinions coming up [Music] all right to the left of me kenny day 150 pounds he's had the pleasure of riding the 2021 ktm 350 for me uh for quite a while he went back easton road out here in road so he had a wide spectrum on this bike so he's very familiar with it we brought him in again to give you guys an opinion on the smaller guy scale um the last rider that you saw guy he was 195 pounds so a little bit lighter rider a little bit shorter guy here um i like to call my little bilbo baggins so little uh little bilbo how are we doing and uh tell us about the 350 and give us some positives and maybe a couple negatives because not everything's all uh rainbows and cotton candy right yeah that's very accurate so like chris said i actually had quite a bit of time last year on the 350. i rode in california i rode in florida i tried to get like a good you know overall idea of if the thing was good here and if it was good in florida either way so today jumping back on it um i actually haven't ridden a 350 and i'm gonna say five months now so he has been riding an rmz 250 and then a kx450 so this is actually great yeah correct so i've kind of gotten to do everything in the past couple of months so jumping back on this first thing wow this thing rips like it's it's so fast and it's so light and nimble and you just i really took it for granted i think when i had it for a little bit um a ton of ton of power ton of torque and it revs forever like i could go in second gear i could go in third either way i'm never gonna hit like uh rev limit it never size off so i love that aspect of it um the things i'm gonna give you one negative on it the only negative i have about this bike and i it was the same whether i was in california or whether i was in florida was i just struggle with the air force sometimes um just struggle with overall being comfortable and it doesn't feel that planted so yeah what he said to me today while we're out there you mentioned it just never feels like the front knobbies are digging into the terra firma right it's just always really light feeling so that is something that the air fork that's its character so for me i'm the same way i like a lot of lean angle traction spring fork gives me that so that's one caveat for you on this bike yeah correct so that's my thing i always feel like my front end's kind of floating and i ride over the front for the most part so i'm really putting a lot of trust on the front tire hooking up so that's my biggest thing it's just it's inconsistent you know i'm always a little hesitant and i never really realized how hesitant i am until i go get on a spring fork again and then it's like you know i can tell that there's like ah traction yeah attraction and like oh crap i could be coming in so much faster but i'm just you know i'm a little concerned in the front end wash so the question we've been asking everybody here guy you and we'll talk to matt here in a little bit is the 350cc size uh it's all over the message boards rhino's freaking out about it and uh so is the 350 size for you 150 pounds um joyrider soul rider still very good rider like he could probably go race and qualify for a national but he works for fox now so the enjoyment you get out of riding is this size the right size for you would you buy this bike with your own money i would 100 buy this bike so here's the thing is in the past few months i've ridden everything the 250. i've ridden a 450 jumping back on the 350 is i know this is going to sound crazy and people might like judge me for saying this but the power on this is more usable than the 450. i've been riding 450 and if i want to be lazy and lug it sure but i struggle with the weight and some of those other things so jumping on the 350 today having that much power and like how easy i was able to just bounce around the track i prefer this all day over the 250 or the 450. something that's different too if you guys are familiar with the 450 and 350 is we talked about it the 350 is a freer engine revving feel um a little bit more pep excitement than a 450 has like a tractor-like pulling sensation so yeah if it's deep out here at glen helen the 450 is like a tractor it moves really fast from point a to point b this moves fairly fast from point a to point b but a little freer a little lighter feeling a little more peppier so you like that freer uh revving engine feel yeah yeah so like i've always kind of gravitated to a 250f because i like to be aggressive and i want to be able to have to carry my momentum you know jump into a 450 you you kind of don't have to you could just kind of come into the turns and just set in and really easy get out of them because you've got that power where this is like the perfect in between i can i can still charge it like i'm on a 250 f and if i want to i can stop in the turns and get on the gas and it pulls me out it feels stronger than the 450 most of the time so i truly enjoy the power delivery of this bike and i think it works for everybody across the board uh one thing i want to mention too that i talk about a lot is vibration on ktms i know you would have saw a japanese bike the kawasaki and the rm do you notice the vibration at all when you hop on this thing or just don't even notice it uh a little a little but the things that like really stand out for me especially at glen helen today it's it wasn't really bumpy it was just kind of flat is that this chassis works so well on anything hard packed like it's phenomenal you could you know find traction anywhere that's the biggest thing the vibration isn't like a you know i think that would really hurt me deter you okay so when i ride when i ride these ktms especially the 350 i feel like i stand up more for whatever reason and i have no idea and i presented that question to kenny when he was riding his and i'm like do you feel like you stand up more in the corners when you're riding a steel frame bike and and the ktm and he actually said yes so i was surprised because i thought i was the only one but for whatever reason the light weight or the way the power is delivered i seem to stand up more on this so you're the same way i would agree i do stand you know i think we all understand that standing kind of allows you to just point and shoot where you want to go you know sometimes sitting that takes a whole bunch of effort to kind of sit in the turns and foot out all that kind of stuff so standing works really well especially at a place like this where you can kind of go from left to right across the track the bike does feel a little bit smaller to me and i'm small like i'm a small stature so standing i feel tall on the bike and i can really just be light everywhere so i think it does help all right kenny day he said it i got nothing else to say on on to the next rider number three [Music] all right last rider number three to the left of me matt surivagh he helps me at key for ink testing he is like my average test guy he's the blue collar guy goes to work night well not even nine to five it's like five to five 12 hour days and he just purchased one of these things so he's the perfect example of why the 350 size could be the ultimate cc range right so 200 pounds b rider novice rider b b stiffest board so you guys are seeing this these shots that you're watching right now if it just looks like a kite just stiff in the air this is my guy right here so you purchased a 2022 ktm 350 you ride a lot of my test bikes why did you make the decision to buy a 350 and you rode here today on your bike it's barely new you know barely broke in uh is it confirmed that this is the right decision for you for me it is the more i ride this bike the more i just fall in love as much as i'd like to say i'm man enough for a 450 i'm not and it's just it's not intimidating to ride you know it's got plenty of power when you need it but yet it's not overbearing and i tend to ride it a little more aggressively and charge a little harder into the corners with it than i would over you know riding a 450. the thing i get asked a lot about 350 450 is can i lug it this guy to the left of me is the epitome of lugging i try to force him to leave it in second gear he will not do it he will not do it he will shift in the third so if you guys are worried about lugging your bike in third gear vaj tell them about what it does in third gear you can lug it pretty well but as chris made me do today you are greatly rewarded if you just rub rev the crap out of it yeah so it does do both so it's not going to lug as well as a 450 but it can do it you can uh adjust the gearing a little bit go up one two do the jody you guys know what that's about um that'll help you get in the third gear quicker if you guys prefer that style of riding or you can kind of have some fun retrain your brain don't shift so much and let this thing eat so at glen helen here today i told matt come out of the corner just leave it in second all the way up just so you can feel that it will pull that gear all the way up the hill so that's the beauty about this engine it's free revving it can lug it will rev out and uh map one map two map one is more of a linear pulling power map two has a little bit more of aggressive hit which guy are you so right now since i'm actually here early in the morning map two when i come thursday 4 30 it's map one and sometimes even traction control so 200 pounds stock suspension obviously is soft what are the mods that you plan on doing to get it to your weight and again i'm not a huge air fork guy but wp has made a comfortable air fork for the working man here where he can adjust it and have a good time so are you going to go to a spring for i guess that's my first question are you going to go to a spring fort are we going to run air as of right now i'm leaving air my only plan as of now is to go up a spring rate in the rear for my girth i've got carrying on here so but the air fork's nice just because i can adjust it i have a day i'm really not feeling it and it's i think it's beating the crap out of me i can get a little plushness by letting some air out and it may blow through a little bit but i can kind of tailor it to the way i'm feeling that day is one reason i like the air fork but at the same time you know it brings up a great a great question for me is what he's feeling like each day and trust me it's it's crazy it could be great one day and then he's throwing his helmet the next so uh i feel like that's a lot of you guys out there you have great days you have some bad days this bike kind of helps bridge that gap a little bit i feel like it won't be so uh opposite of each i think feel i feel like the 350 size will kind of help you have better days than not so great days yeah that's how i feel too is that i'm able to on my bad days i can still push and feel like i accomplish some good riding that day we're on a 450 if i'm tired after work it's it's pointless i'm frustrated the whole time i'm on the track where the 350 it's more or less i can ride it it's not riding me so my good days are really good but my off days aren't near as bad so you spent 10 g on this thing right it's expensive dirt bikes are expensive right people so are you happy with your purchase knowing that uh hey you're lining up on at some races maybe 100 cc's down from a lot of your guys because obviously the vet class is an open class you're okay with it i'm perfectly fine with it i'm actually excited to see if i do better at some of these races like vet nationals and the other ones we do every year riding a 350. all right guys well that's three different riders very uh sheesh man you couldn't ask for different styles of writing uh abilities um sizes so we have guy we have matt we have kenny i have ridden this thing i will give you my quick opinion like for me i'm still pretty competitive i would like a 450 i i ride a lot so i can hang on to it if i wasn't riding a lot i would love to have this bike some of the best times i've had are on a 250 and a 350 that are built so a couple mods to this thing a muffler ecu your bar spec just those things right there make a huge difference and man it is fun bike to ride if you guys are worried about not having enough power do not worry about it it is uh plentiful i would like to say so the ktm 350 sxf for 2022 like we mentioned is unchanged but it looks beautiful i like the orange frame hopefully ktm seems to go that direction on the last year model hopefully they uh stick with that i don't think they will but you never know um so if you guys can go check them out your ktm dealers or if you want more information at racerx just stay here racerxonline.com for more tests lifestyle stuff racing don't forget to subscribe to the magazine we're giving away a free pair of ethica underwear i mean that's a 50 value 30 bucks for 12 issues very cool so go subscribe there's still print out there and we'll see you back again probably at another track with another 2022 more information for you we'll see on the next go around

Channel: Racer X Motocross & Supercross News

Views: 60,594

Keywords: racer x, dirtbike, motocross, supercross, mx, sx, pro, 2019, 2018, 2017, vault, racer x films, films, 2022, 2022 ktm, 2022 350, 2022 ktm 350, ktm 350, ktm 350cc, 350cc, kris keefer, keefer inc testing, kenny day, glen helen raceway, moto testing, 350 vs 450, 350 v 450

Id: -WPpgeL8Q-k

Length: 17min 42sec (1062 seconds)

Published: Tue Jul 27 2021