Last year, Mitch did a promotion where he sent out some free pads to racers, and all he asked for in return was an honest review. I was among those selected to try them out. Unfortunately, a combination of mechanical problems, crashes, cancelled track days, and terrible weather meant that I didn't have the chance to actually use them until recently. So, here are my thoughts:
The pads were phenomenal. I used them for the first time at Harris Hill. I did a few back-and-forths in the pits to try to bed them in, and was pleasantly surprised by the feel I got right out of the box. Then when I initially pulled the lever on track, my response was something along the lines of "wooooOOOAHH!" I was coming from EBC HH pads, too, which I had considered to be decent mid-range pads. But the Vesrah pads were really next level. They differed from the EBC pads in two ways. The first is that there was a lot more feel and control at <20% braking pressure. This was fantastic for trail braking and those times where you just needed to scrub off a little speed or slightly adjust your line. I really noticed the lack of fork rebound when coming off the brakes. On the EBC pads, there would be a "jump" where the pads effectively released, pogoing my forks and causing me to run wide a little bit. I'd always considered it to be something I'd fix through suspension. But the Vesrah pads released much more smoothly and almost completely eliminated the problem. The second advantage came when I was hard on the brakes, at 70% or more braking pressure. On the EBC pads, you'd lose feel once you really started squeezing in on the lever, and I had to judge how hard I was on the brakes just by how hard I felt myself being pressed into the tank and the bars. This, of course, meant that it was very hard for me to judge braking when going up- or downhill. The Vesrah pads kept a consistent feel gradient, which was extremely useful at a track like Harris Hill, where almost every braking zone has an elevation change. The performance during moderate braking was rather similar between the EBC and the Vesrah pads, but the difference under light and heavy braking was remarkable, and really not something I even knew you could get just by changing the pads. I felt like I had better control over my brakes on my stock CBR600RR than I did on my Ducati street bike with Brembo everything.
For the last few months, I've been prepping a ZX6R to replace the CBR. I officially christened it at Hallett by completing two laps before someone noticed that an engine plug used for viewing the timing chain had fallen out, and my bike was now pouring oil out of its side. So the first "necessary" purchase for that bike will be a new plug and an economy sized tube of Lock Tite. But rest assured that the second one will be a set of Vesrah pads. You can get yours, too, at bdracing.com. A big thanks to Mitch for running the program. Like most of you, I race on a budget, and $120+ for a set of pads seemed extravagant because I figured the pads were one of the less variable components of the braking system. Now I know better.
