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one easy tip to keep hands from cramping and such is to flex your fingers out while riding. I do this every few minutes, just stretch them out either still on the bar or not, then wiggle them a little, this will get blood flowing and help your muscles a bunch.
as far as getting up with less weight on the hands, thats entirely possible. I dont know if you have clipons or a handbar, but either one is changable to something different that can move you back, or forward for that matter. it did take a couple thousand miles to get really comfortable in the saddle of my SVS, but now I can go all day on it. a nice way to keep your back happier is to stop every half hour or less when you're still new to the bike, walk around for a bit, touch your toes, twist your torso, crack your neck, flail your arms around a bit, do a little crazy backwoods hick dance jitter thingy. get moving a bit, get everything realigned and all the blood moving again. another idea is that if you are going far and its not entirely uncomfortable, lay on the tank while riding, wont work on many bikes but does just fine on mine, relieves all lower back tension, increases neck tension. also, I have had some good success holding onto the bar at the end of my thumb and curling my knuckles around, which sits you up higher a bit, only use this while cruising. for some reason my elbows keep loving to bow out and kinda lock while there, if I keep my mind to have them stay in and bent my hands feel so much better. you could also try dry humping the tank a bit while riding, sounds odd, but give it a little love now and then and the movement will help your back adjust itself, get some hip gyrations in there too, do it up right you know.... at stop lights throw her in nuetral and twist up on the bike, grab right ahold of the tank and tail and force your twist into cracking your back or at least a good stretch. shrug your shoulders a bunch too, helps. a good way to restore feeling to your hands is to drop that hand down to your side, elbow straight, spread fingers wide and level to the ground, and shrug your shoulder a few times, you can feel the blood pumping into your fingers. at stop lights you can also bend backwards and see if you can touch the back of your helmet to the tail.
these things have helped me, hopefully they can help you enjoy your new machine tooo

The Crimson Rider® wrote:hahaha

it can get painful.

most i've done straight riding is only a little above 100 miles.

it's already painful after 80 miles straight.

i wanna at least be able to endure 200 miles straight. im halfway there.

i'll be hitting 150 miles straight once i decide to finally go to san diego and try the famous/infamous palomar mountain. but i usually play it safe and get gas before 150 miles. i don't wanna run out of gas and push my bike again.

Yeah, and you only weigh a buck thirty... try holding yourself in that god awful position with an extra 100 lbs on you.

I've taken my VFR on longer trips... I just work on relaxing and holding myself up with my stomach/back. I try to keep as much weight off my wrists as possible. I can usually go a couple hundred miles without stopping (220 is the farthest I've gone before filling up). My riding position is a lot more aggressive than a bandit or fz6, but nothing like an RR.

On an RR bike, that is just what you have to live with. That is why I laugh at all the kids pulled off to the side of the interstate stretching every 50 miles.

If you really like a particular bike, you can always raise the handlebars and get a better seat. That will make the position more comfortable.

Most of my sportbike miles are from guys on cool RR bikes whose backs couldn't take it anymore on weekend rides to the twisties. By the 2nd hundred miles, someone would always be begging to swap bikes with me for awhile.

The sport riding position is great on the track, but it gets old fast when long distances are involved.