Lol, ya know, I don't know if he took them off, or didn't put them on. He was sending us all these unboxing teaser pics and I should have paid attention. I know when I got my first 1997 CR500 in Oct of 1996 (second one sold on early release from El Cajon Honda/Yamaha where I kind of grew up), stickers were first things that came off or parts got swapped, and pipe/silencer/sprockets as soon as I got it home. You are right, much better look!
He, too, is awaiting road tires. I also saw at my local shop, AZ Turn n Burn yesterday, that they had stocked all sort of parts already which is nice to see on new releases.
Oh and what about that 30 seconds or so of turbine sounding wind up on the gyro! Wild!