MRCycles Blog

Dual sport shenanigans

Motorcycle USA reminds riders everywhere to check their helmets in April

Essential tips for purchasing parts internationally

"the five American bikers who will take part in the 2016 Dakar met recently at a ranch in the Mojave Desert for a weekend of training, pep talk and strategy."

Red Bull gives us 6 new things to look for

A common misconception about Kawasaki parts diagrams explained.

International Six Days Enduro, an incredible race for incredible riders. 

Could this be a RZR killer?

"If there was a female version of Mathew Broderick in “Ferris Bueler’s Day Off” that’s me!"

What does it mean when your parts are on back order? How does the process work? And more

“I’d become quite terrified, trembling in my boots,” he said. “But I made my bed and it was time to lie in it.”

Robbie surfs his motorcycle! Plus info on how he did it

Check out Kawasaki's 50th anniversary celebratory spin on its branding. Still classic Kawasaki but with a much more striking blacked out look to it with the unmistakeable lime green we all know and love from Kawi. 

Remember, MR Cycles is your go to source for Kawasaki OEM parts and accessories! 

sourced from Top Speed

Valentino Rossi comes out on top after an AMAZING duel with Marc Marquez.

Read more on motoGP.com

Motorcycle racing is one of the highest adrenaline sports to watch, and there's absolutely no telling what will happen. That's what makes them so appealing! The only single constant is that riders will inevitably need new motorcycle parts before and after races. MRCycles.com has proudly supplied motocross racers everywhere with the motorcycle parts they need to position machine and mind for victory on the race course.

For those that have never tuned in, motocross (MX) is heart pounding off-road racing of varying elevation around a closed circuit course of grass, dirt, mud, fast turns and gnarly jumps.

Professionals have for years shocked us with some pretty cool motorcycle stunts, but with the advent of Youtube, we can now zoom in on stunts produced by everyday daredevils. Here are a few below we thought you would enjoy...

If you care about your fellow riders you'll share this post. It's that important. Read on to find out why...

The highway has always been a wild place, but it's gotten worse. Look at the people going by in automobiles and you'll see something scarier than a truck driver drinking moonshine and eating a triple cheese burger at the same time: texting and driving.

With the truck driver example, at least it's only one irresponsible driver on the road, but compared to everyone out there who are texting, it's only a drop of poison in the...

When were motorcycles and films ever separate?

Never.

Since the dawn of the world of film, a motorcycle has ridden through the set. Mad Max, Easy Rider, On Any Sunday, Terminator 2, Stone, Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade, Mission: Impossible 2, The Matrix Reloaded, Batman, etc...need we say more. If MRCycles.com made a film, the storyline would be this:

Everyday, a kid sees an unknown motorcycle figure roar past the yard along a long stretch of black asphalt. A few years later that same kid has graduated highschool or college and saved up for the best starter bike to begin the riding quest of a lifetime, something like a...

Think back for a moment to remember why you bought a bike in the first place. Were you wanting more from life, a deeper experience, something sublime, unexplainable?

Romanticizing about what it means to be master of a motorcycle, and the journey of a lifetime that follows, is the #1 reason people get a bike, but...

In our last blog, we discussed how social motorcycle riders are. There are hundreds of motorcycle communities around the web, so in this blog, we'll highlight some of the many popular motorcycle parts forums. This is by no means an exhaustive list, just the top ones on our traffic radar. We literally get thousands upon thousands of visits from each of these below forums, mostly from riders looking for OEM motorcycle parts.

Motorcyclists are often depicted as lone riders, cranking up the bike one day
and riding off into the sunset for years without saying a word to anyone.

"Motorcycle riders are introverted, the quiet types, the loner, the hero, even the villain..."

These archetypes may have been first drawn from the hundreds of post world war mavericks who on return from battle, cranked up, headed out of town for a period of soul searching that would...

If you've been tuning in to MRCycles.com's blog, you'll remember our post on Honda motorcycle's epic history, starting back in 1949.

A long time has passed since then, but Honda motorcycles are still awesome. In fact, if you read
recent 2015 Honda motorcycle reviews, you'll find that riders are pleased with their new Honda bikes.

Months ago, many motorcycle blogs and online magazines began featuring...

If Daytona Beach Bike Week is cancelled, we'd all be super pissed. Every biker in the USA would
be drying a sad moisture from around their eyes and slumping in a stupor about when the motorcycle riding season actually begins. 

If there were an epic story of origin for one of MRCycles.com's most popular brands--Polaris--it might be something like this:

In the early dawn of man, there was a Viking that followed Polaris, the North Star, all the way
 over the North Pole, and finally settled in what is today, Minnesota. There this viking found snow so deep and mysterious that no matter how hard he tried he couldn't wade through it to hunt the great buffalo herds who stood but only half a mile away watching him struggle. Months passed with the warrior shriveling in size until in desparation he pled with the Norse god Odin to help him through the snow.

A roaring trumpet broke through the white snowy silence, and out of the ancient sky fell a
1000 lb snow mobile complete with spears, axes, and a few cans of survival grade baked beans.

Centuries later, the world's first sno-mobile, along with a short note was discovered in 1950 by a few country boys digging around in a subterranean glacial cave. The note provided exact instructions on how to rebuild the world's first snow mobile, and Polaris was born.  

The truth is that Polaris has a rich but more mundane history, that does indeed start over half a century ago, but as a snow mobile production shop, making machines that were hands-down the first of their kind.

The first one was made using parts from an old Chevy and a grain silo, fashioning skis from the bumper and tracks from the silo's conveyor belt. It was sold for $465 to pay the bills, and generally viewed as a disappointment. But, soon enough the second model, the Polaris Sno, came out, weighing around 1000 lbs and maxing out at nearly 20 mph.

The whole idea was to build these machines to help hunters position themselves well in big snow country. In fact, early on the snow machines proved themselves on a three week long, 1200 mile journey through Alaskan wilderness, slogging along at 10 mph.

What's more is that Polaris stands in stark contrast to Honda, Yamaha, Kawasaki,
and Suzuki (all Japanese brands) in that it was historically 100% American-made. Only recently in 2010 did Polaris move some assembly work to Mexico. But, that doesn't mean Polaris has lost it's patriotism for the USA. It's expected to hire some 1700 employees to man a new Polaris facility in Alabama.

And, though Polaris may have started as a sno-mobile company, it is now more well known in the less frigid places on Earth for its ATVs, which weren't introduced until the 1980s. If you have a Polaris ATV, you know it comes with a lot of Polaris motorcycle parts needs, which you can easily take care of here at MRCycles.com !

Content development by Yiveo.com

If you ride a Suzuki motorcycle, you may have at some point wondered about the history of Suzuki, especially if you really love the way it handles.

MRCycles.com knows Suzuki inside and out, down to every single one of the thousands of associated parts.

So, being the Suzuki enthusiasts we are, would you believe it if we told you that the founder of Suzuki, Michio Suzuki, was a mystical weaving ninja from Japan; a man who from the fibers of the reeds growing by the ancient Kamo River wove the first Suzuki motorcycle.

Powered by the pristine waters pouring from Mount Sajikigatake, Suzuki cranked his bike and at 500 mph blazed past the 10,000 ft. tall trees in Tadasu-no-mori forest until he reached the Shimogamo Shrine. Here he prayed to the iron god to transform his fibrous bike to an invicible stainless red steel, and three days later it was done.

Tall tale, yes. But, not totally untrue...

There’s a reason MRCycles.com sells OEM motorcycle parts from Yamaha and Honda—they are among the most popular motorcycle brands out there.

YAMAHA 

It’s easy to imagine a history of Yamaha motorcycles as some legendary phenomenon, founded by some Japanese samurai risen from the dust of a thousand battles. A hardened warrior, smoke pouring from his eyes, wanted to experience modern battle, so he summoned the elements into a steel steed that would tirelessly tear through hundreds of miles of territory without a water break. This legendary creation would breed millions of it’s kind over the next century. 

But, in an unexpected turn Yamaha’s motorcycle history was, alas, borne among urbanite music lovers, forged in Japan by Genichi Kawakami

When most people think about a motorcycle parts store, they may assume tons of motorcycle tires, Kawasaki batteries, and hulking Honda engines are flying out of the warehouse by the minute.

It's true, MRCycles.com does sell a ton of the big stuff, but what really makes an online motorcycle parts store unique is the vast amount of small parts that are cataloged on the website under a parts search tool, concurrently held in inventory, and curated by our deeply knowledgeable motorcycle parts specialists. These guys can tell a customer whether or not they need an O-Ring or whether with their order they better buy a bolt flange or screw, just in case. Put them in a game of motorcycle parts trivia, and you know where...

The international motorcycle parts business is absolutely exploding! But, it wasn't always like that. Years ago, MRCycles.com started its mail order motorcycle parts business to primarily serve the U.S. motorcycle parts market. Then over time, motorcycle riding trends slowly expanded around the world.

Fast forward to today, and a major part of MRCycles.com's time is spent translating international orders, working with motorcycle parts customers from nearly every country on Earth, and taking extra steps to make sure VIP global customers get their motorcycle parts on time, and intact.

Customers shopping for motorcycle parts on the Internet come across so many promises, if only half of them were true...

The other day, MRCycles.com blew wide open the myth of "free shipping". Today we talk about another commonly seen online promise that is promoted as "fast shipping". Rapid shipping for motorcycle parts is so important because you want those parts fast. Why? So you can get back on your motorcycle right away--of course! There's either that big race or that long highway ride with friends coming up, and that motorcycle part better get there on time, or you're going to blow steam, right?!

There's an old saying that out of the following three: great prices, great customer service, and great quality; you can have only two. It's just impossible for a business to offer all three and come out profitable.

Fast shipping falls in the category of great customer service, so if you see the rock bottom lowest prices on OEM motorcycle parts (which you know are great quality), and then you see a fast shipping guarantee, think twice about that order, especially when you absolutely must get that part right away.

It takes years of training for a shipping team to perfect this concept we have of "fast shipping."
Under a "fast shipping" guarantee, your motorcycle parts must not only be mailed on time, but with nearly 100% accuracy. You know what we're talking about here if you've gotten an order shipped fast, but then opened the box only to find missing parts, wrong parts, or even--God forbid--used parts (when you bought them new).

At MRCycles.com, we have a shipping team that has been working together for years. They move like a well-oiled clock, and have even won awards for hitting the lowest error rates in the industry!

In fact, research shows that it takes a team at least four years to work well together, to be in the "zone". (Four years my friends is longer than most people keep a job these days!) It's like a basketball team that has been playing with each other for so long that each player intuitively knows what other teammates are about to do, before any physical indication even flashes. So, right before the ball is passed, another player is already making moves to receive it. That's how the OEM shipping team flow is at MRCycles.com, a natural wonder of precision and coordination, honed over years of experience.

Creative content development by Yiveo.com

Shoppers love a deal, the cheaper the better. The two words, “Free shipping” has become on the internet one of the most powerful marketing hooks of all time, but how does it work?
The anatomy of a sales promotion is generally straightforward---discounts mean that the merchant is taking a loss to sell product. That logic should follow with “free shipping” deals too, right?