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Second, Honda had every reason to believe that the Magna would turn out to be a 10 second bike in Cycle's hands - Mark Homchick (out of real curiosity) had run a pre production V65 through the traps at 11.06 seconds long before the magazine's test unit, a line production bike, showed up for evaluation.
Before Homchick could get our test Magna to the strip, he became the proud owner of an unwanted accessory: a plaster cast running from thumb to armpit. The cast had (and still has) optional features - stainless steel pins to immobilize a left wrist broken in a number of places and pieces. It was a bad break for Honda, too. As explained in February, it takes a deft touch to get a Superbike into the tens; only two or three journalists can, and MH is our quota. Honda had the weapon; Cycle, the broken trigger finger.
On the one hand, Cycle couldn't officially consider any quarter mile times outside the ones turned in by staffers. On the other hand, Mark's performance with 10 second motorcycles is much closer to John Gleason's than to other staff members'.
If Gleason could take our test V65 Magna and put it well into the tens, it would clearly indicate that the V65 would be a 10 second bike in Mark's hands. And that would give our readers a much fairer picture of the Magna's performance than if we published an 11.3 figure generated by Buzz Buzzelli.
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