Kawasaki has announced their new 09 line-up and there is at least one really good bit of news. The ER-6n, which is basically a naked version of the 2 cylinder in-line 650 Ninja is coming to the US. Since Suzuki now has a fully faired version of the SV650, I Read more…
Press Release- Top 1 Oil “Ack Attack” Sets New Absolute Motorcycle Land Speed Record – 360.913 MPH On September 26, 2008, after five days of pushing their streamliner motorcycle to new limits on the salt flats of Bonneville, the Top 1 Ack Attack team achieved what it came to do Read more…
WOW… this is cool. Finally the manufacturers strike back and tell the AMA to take their rules and shove it… Thanks Jerry! This just in from the MIC: Motorcycle Industry Council To Launch The USSB Championship Factory Riders Offered a New National Series IRVINE, Calif., Sep. 10, 2008 – The Read more…
As gas prices keep rising, people are looking for alternative means for commuting and getting around town. Scooters have been popular in Europe and Asia for many years and they are just now starting to really catch on in the US. With the new reality of energy prices, people are Read more…
Victory is celebrating it’s 10th anniversary and created a special edition of the Vision touring bike for the event. While the styling is not for everyone, it is apparently liked by at least 100 people who reserved the special ed. bikes in 7 minutes. At 29,000.00 it is not cheap. Read more…
Well, it’s more of a dual sport, but the basic layout is there- 650cc twin, upright seating, and a decent price (for BMW). I really think this will be a winner and I can see the aftermarket guys salivating over the possibilities if BMW imports enough of them. From BMW- Read more…
Well sort of… Anyways, this is pretty cool. Makes a lot of what we call stunt riding over here look lame.
From a BMW press release-No pictures yet… Woodcliff Lake, NJ – August 12, 2008…Proving good things do come in small packages, Husqvarna Motorcycles is preparing to introduce its highly anticipated 250cc four-stroke engine in the all-new 2009 TC 250 Motocross race bike this year. The ultra light, compact power plant Read more…
One of the most popular bikes on the road today is the Suzuki SV650. They are comfortable, handle well, get great gas mileage and retail for about $6000.00 in the US. Used SV’s are really great deals. It comes in 2 variations- a Sport model with a quarter fairing and Read more…
Check out the video from Jay Leno’s Garage as he gets the royal treatment from Ducati. Thanks Jerry!
From the floor of the dealers meeting in Las Vegas we have these pictures of the new Harley Trike. The first one is obviously a show bike but I think the second one is production. I’d rather have one of the Can Am Polaris built 3 wheelers that have the Read more…
Pretty bike and the engine has a character all its own. Check it out at the Moto Guzzi website– From their Press Release- This newest addition to the Moto Guzzi line, the Griso 1200 8V has been designed to flourish in the realm of two-wheel beauty and performance; a bold Read more…
We have a month for everything, and this month is Women’s Motorcycle Month. To celebrate that, the AMA Museum has put up a display with several women featured. Some of these women are amazing because of the distance traveled. But I’m amazed by the era they did it in. Bikes Read more…
Museums are cool and there are a few really good motorcycle museums- like Barber’s in Birmingham, AL and now the new Harley museum in Milwaukee. It really is amazing how far we have come in 100 years. The museum has the very first Harley- basically a moped, and everything else Read more…
With the price of gas here in Atlanta at about 4.10/gal, people are trying to figure out ways of getting around that they can afford. Atlanta is a big, very spread out city with a lot of people living in the suburbs and commuting to the city for work. When Read more…
Consumer Reports did an survey to see what people are doing or plan to do in light of 4-5.00/gal gasoline and all of the things on the list are predictable except one. Here’s the list- SURVEY HIGHLIGHTS 79 percent of car shoppers intend to buy a vehicle with better fuel Read more…
Check this out- this guy gutted an old motorcycle and installed some car batteries and an electric motor. Don’t have too many details, but he says it will go 50mph and last about 20 miles between charges. Cost equivalent of about 300 mpg. He only uses it for quick trips Read more…
How bad would gas prices have to get before you would be caught on one of these? Autoblog Green has the details, but the pedal/electric bike made by erocit is capable of 50mph and when you pedal you recharge the battery (a little). In addition, you can always get home Read more…
He has a reputation for being somewhat wild and his new helmet upholds that rep. Very funny! It is actually hard to miss on the track [youtube]Prx8ppLIxQ0[/youtube]
A quick little video over at the MotoGP site with Nicky doing a lap at the Indy 500 as a promo for the motoGP series. Thanks Jerry…
We all know about the really famous celeb riders like Jay Leno but there are many more who don’t have their own TV show that enjoy and support motorcycling. Heck, motorcycling has literally created celebrities in the past few years like the OCC crew and Jesse James to name a Read more…
Today’s press release from BMW announced the availability of their new Boxer twin sport bike in the US. I don’t know about you, but for 25,000.00 there are a lot of options out there. In terms of sportbikes, you could buy a GSXR1000, 600 and a lot of upgrades for Read more…
If you have ever wanted to see a classic high side crash in slow motion, check out the video of Jorge Lorenzo crashing in the China MotoGP race. That hurts just watching. Thanks Jerry! [youtube]bE5Pt0DpUHc[/youtube]
Sounds crazy, but Gary Eagan is planning on doing it. He got the invite and chose a Ducati 1098S as the means of conveyance. Personally, I think I would have chosen something a little more comfortable (actually, I would have said NO!), but the 1098 has had a bunch of Read more…
[youtube]L3wyvJXrBFM[/youtube] Well, I was driving around Buckhead in Atlanta this afternoon and I saw a red 848 pulling out into traffic. Such a pretty bike… I am really torn between the red and white bikes. Both look awesome. So here is the 848 press launch for your viewing enjoyment. It Read more…
These bikes were sick fast for their day and the level of tire/suspension/frame technology that they had or didn’t have. They still have a reputation and a rabid following. So it’s no wonder that Motorcyclist is doing a retro issue next month with the H1 and the Honda CB750 featured. Read more…
Yep, 11 days until the AMA doubleheader (April 18-20) at Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, AL. It should be another Mat Mladin show… You can get all the detail at their website as well as order tickets. A couple of years ago, Ducati had their Monster Challenge at this event Read more…
MCN has a nice little video of the Desmosedici riding around the city (not sure which city…) but it is worth watching just to listen to the engine. Lust is a bad thing.
[youtube]K1UlEQtdUGc[/youtube]Check out this video of Colin Edwards picking his bike up from a low side “crash”… except he never really crashed, he just picked the bike back up mid-corner at speed. Crazy. Thanks Jerry for the link!
And they like it… a lot. Well, who wouldn’t. I mean sick horsepower and the resultant speed are really, really addicting. Motive rides and lives to write about it.The flamed out bike they chose is a little gaudy, but hey, they usually have better taste- at least with cars. BTW, Read more…
This is some really cool old footage from the Triumph factory showing how the bikes and engines were produced. When they said “hand-built”, they were not kidding. I noticed that when they were building the engines, there was not a single torque wrench used. Every bolt was just “snugged up”. Read more…
Zero Motorcycles has the distinction of being the only electric dirtbike company that makes a viable alternative to the traditional gas powered dirtbikes we all know and love. Because they are electric, they are zero emissions and that makes the green crowd very happy. But lets face it, dirtbikes and Read more…
One of the biggest problems for motorcyclists is that people in cars just don’t see them. Thus they run into them on a regular basis. The reason is simple- they aren’t looking for them and they are distracted by lots of other things like cell phones, ipods and the food Read more…
If you’ve never taken the time to check out Jay Leno’s Garage, you are missing some cool stuff- and not just bikes either. He has some of the best cars in the world as well. Today, we are looking at his S&S custom built power cruiser. You know you have Read more…
Good post over at Hemmings Auto Blog with some classic Harley ads from the Evel Knievel era. Cool stuff especially if you grew up in that time period. If you like the stunt/show stuff, check out illconduct.com for the Buell Stunt team.
Check out the video of Jay riding his new Can-Am Spyder for the first time. He got serial # 1 because he is, well, Jay Leno! Very cool and it looks like a lot of fun. More info here at the Can-Am page. I’ll have to see if I can Read more…
As Moto GP gets fired up for the 08 season, the big question is if anyone can run with Stoner on the Ducati and Rossi on the Yamaha. The second big question is if Rossi can run with Stoner. Speed has a good article that lays out the facts from Read more…
Yep, that’s right… Tom Cruise is first in line and will pick up his Desmosedici RR in Beverly Hills this week. I wonder who else is on the list? Jay Leno is a well known bike lover, so I would guess that he’s on the list to get one also. Read more…
Motorcycle News has a video of the 1098R intro with a walk-around and riding evaluation. What a sweet bike. Unfortunately, even if you have the approx $50,000.00 to buy one, there won’t be enough to go around so this is as close as most of us will ever get. Ducati’s Read more…
If you haven’t stopped by the Indian website lately, they have some info and pictures of the 2009 Chief. If you like the classic cruiser look, it probably doesn’t get much better than this. Really good looking bike… The website could use a little work, though- not much content, so Read more…
SportRider has an article up on their site with a comparison of a bunch of the top Naked bikes on the market today. Six top Naked Bikes were wrung out- Aprilia Tuono R, Ducati Monster S4R, Kawasaki Z1000, KTM Super Duke, MV Agusta Brutale 910R, and Yamaha FZ1 Why they Read more…
Not exactly a motorcycle, but still classified as one by the government- what is it? Well, a 3 wheeled vehicle. This classification is important since it allows the manufacturers a lot of latitude with all the federal safety and emission regulations. Since most of these are very green, emissions are Read more…
We hope! MCN got to ride it is Spain and apparently really like it. I wonder why I don’t get invited to go to Spain to ride the latest Ducatis… Motorcycle News Senior road tester Michael Neeves has just finished his first session riding Ducati’s new 848 at the Almeria circuit Read more…
Yep, it really is that big. Some Germans with a sense of humor took a Soviet tank engine and built a bike around it. Just don’t drop it. Autoblog has the story… The engine comes from a Soviet T-55 tank (though the article incorrectly says the T-55 was a Panzer Read more…
Led by Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters, the DOT is proposing a new program to help reduce motorcycle crashes, injuries and fatalities. Peters is a rider herself, and knows what is at stake. So it is encouraging that these new initiatives are being filtered by someone who rides and not Read more…
Lots of new pictures on the updated site. The old site had been around since 1998 so it was time to do a little renovation.
I saw this over at Autoblog and wanted to pass it along. The original site that posted the CG image is in Italian, so I’ve copied Autoblog’s translation- Just a little while ago we learned that MV Agusta was working on a 675cc triple engine to compete in the middleweight Read more…
Barber has posted a bunch of pictures from their recent vintage event. No captions or descriptions, but you can look through them and see if anything looks like the bike you used to race way back when. I still want to find an old FJ600 and go have fun on Read more…
Sort of… it is a pre-production model so there are some things that aren’t finalized, but basically this is what will be on sale soon. The Spyder is built by the same folks who make Sea-Doo and Ski-Doo, so this is almost a natural evolutionary product for them. 3 wheels Read more…