General Motorcycle News
From BMW- Woodcliff Lake, NJ – August 2, 2006… Once again, BMW motorcycles have earned high-fives from editors of Motorcyclist Magazine. In the publication’s September issue, the BMW R 1200 GS is named Best Adventure Bike for 2006, while the R 1200 RT captured top honors in the Touring category Read more…
Speed is reporting that Motorcyclist has selected Dunlop’s Qualifier “Q” Sportbike tires as their product of the year. This is a really big deal since that award usually goes to a bike of some sort. I talked with my friend at Dunlop who does most of their testing after he Read more…
Cycle World has an article about the new Indian exhibit in Pomona, California. When I say “new” Indian, I am speaking of a new exhibit of old original Indians, not an exhibit of the new revived Indian nameplate. Burt Munro’s “World’s Fastest Indian” is on display also. Some amazing bike Read more…
Honda printed the wrong toll free number in the owners manuals for some of their cars and motorcycles. Pretty funny. From the AP. Honda Motor Co. said it incorrectly published an 800 prefix, rather than an 888, on a toll-free vehicle safety telephone number in 1.2 million manuals for 2006 Read more…
If you are into vintage or retro style bikes, you will probably like Ducati’s new SportClassic. With standard seating position and the big V-twin, it should be a great commuter and day trip bike. From Ducati– The shapes of the GT1000 are modern interpretations of the classic lines of the Read more…
Well, this picture comes all the way from Mexico. Perhaps not a more unique and highly customized bike exists anywhere. I’m actually not sure what it is. I never took the time to look closely at the engine, etc to determine what it started out as. If anyone knows, email Read more…
If you are into the vintage motorcycle scene, 2 of the auctions you really want to go to are the ones at Daytona and Mid-Ohio. The AMA site has the results of this weekend’s auction on their site with the most interesting sale probably being this 1962 MV Agusta GP Read more…
Sport Rider has a couple of good articles on honing your riding skills. One is on braking and the other on downshifting smoothly. Good info even for street riding. Downshifting smoothly on a sportbike, especially while braking hard from high speed, requires a definite measure of skill and dexterity. In Read more…
Ricky Carmichael made an uncharacteristic mistake and Stewart jumped on it to take the win- but Carmichael still has a huge lead in the overall points. The AMA site has all the details. Kawasaki’s James Stewart took advantage of a late-race crash by Ricky Carmichael in the second moto today to Read more…
The AMA site has an article up on the vintage races at Mid-Ohio. This might be the perfect outlet for those of us past our prime (way past) who still have the need for speed. The scary part is that the bikes I used to race a “few” years ago Read more…
“The F.C.C. TSR Honda pairing of Shinichi Ito and Takeshi Tsujimura raced their XX-F Class CBR1000RR to victory at the Suzuka 8 Hours today. The Japanese pairing led the race almost all the way from start to finish completing 210 laps of the 5.821km circuit to take the win by one Read more…
The AMA site has a great article up about a group of guys from Wisconsin who decided to buy an old bike and parts at the swap meet and build it into a race bike for the vintage races. They wanted a Kawasaki GPz 550 but the best they could Read more…
The final grid is set for the 8 hour race at Suzuka with Honda on the pole. SuperbikePlanet has the details- Here is your final grid (top ten) for Sunday’s Suzuka 8-Hour endurance classic, with Takeshi Tsujimura & Shinichi Itoh, riding for the FCC TSR ZIP-FM Racing Team, in pole Read more…
VMD at Mid-Ohio is underway. MV Agusta is the featured marque this year. Here is a snip from the AMA. What are you doing this weekend? If you go to AMA Vintage Motorcycle Days, you can do all this: See perfectly preserved vintage bikes in three bike shows. Revisit the Read more…
blue angel ride.wmvAbout a year ago, I think, there was an article in one of the Motorcycle magazines about the Blue Angels and the fact that they all rode Sportbikes- against the rules at the time. If anyone knows the magazine and issue, let me know. But for now, here Read more…
As long as we are on the topic of flying, check out the video that Sport Rider did while testing the top speed of the Kawasaki ZX-14. It sounds like a jet and is faster than most small airplanes.
Not exactly motorcycle related, but a friend is at Oshkosh for the huge airshow and fly-in (kind of like Daytona for the flying crowd) and he had a chance to sit and listen to Chuck Yeager tell stories about flying during WWII. He took this picture with his cellphone I think. Read more…
Each year Mid-Ohio hosts the AMA Vintage days which includes shows, races and lots of great vintage bikes- everywhere! We have a man there covering the action, and when he gets back, we will sift through the pictures and get an article up with the coverage.
Bikes in the Fast Lane has a couple of good videos up of the Erzberg Enduro which takes place in a copper mine in Austria. Info here. The best riders in the world show up for this test of man and machine. Of the 1500 or so riders that start, Read more…
I ws poking around Ducati’s site, and they have some nice downloadable wallpaper of the new $65,000.00 street legal “MotoGP” bike. I suppose they will sell everyone they make, but us common folks will probably never see one except in the magazines. Speaking of which, Cycle World just happens to Read more…
I just got back from the big salvage auction in Atlanta, and it is amazing what wrecked bike are selling for. With demand for bikes and parts high, the wrecked bikes are bringing record prices. It isn’t unusual to see bikes that are “very wrecked” (as opposed to cosmetically totalled) Read more…
Honda announced today at Oshkosh that they will start production of the light jet they have been testing for the past few years. The press release is here. Now if they would only produce pod racers like in Star Wars, we would all be happy. Honda today announced plans to Read more…
Cycle World online has coverage of the 1st motorcycle concours held at the Ritz-Carlton resort in Half Moon Bay, California. This was billed as the motorcycle version of the Pebble Beach Concours for the auto world, and it looks like it lived up to its hype. There are lots of Read more…
Indian is back in business and is planning on introducing a new Chief in 2007. The Plant will be located in Cleveland county near Charlotte, NC. Here is some info from their press release- Kings Mountain, NC (July 20, 2006) – Indian® Motorcycle Company is pleased to announce that it Read more…
MotoGP wasn’t the only thing happening yesterday. Motocross was running too and Carmichael won again, as usual. From Speed– Lakewood, Colorado – 7/24/2006 Makita Suzuki’s Ricky Carmichael added another win to an almost unbelievable collection of career AMA National victories when he went 1-1 for his 141st career AMA National win and Read more…
Bikes in the Fast Lane has an amazing video of a guy getting hit by a car at a pretty high speed and walking away from it. It is crazy. Thankfully the guy seems OK- at least for the moment. I bet he was hurting the next day.
From the AP– Guys like this are amazing. MIAMI, Okla. (AP) — Motorcycle daredevil Trigger Gumm crashed Sunday while attempting a world-record motorcycle jump at a northeast Oklahoma casino. Gumm, 38, fell far short of his attempted goal of 315 feet. Riding a 450cc Service Honda outfitted with a custom-built Read more…
Well the big weekend is over and some new content is up at various sites. Speed has a recap of the MotoGP race here. There are lots of rider and team members comments that make for some intersting reading. Enjoy.
Nicky Hayden ran away with the US MotoGP at Laguna Seca and extended his points lead to 34 in the championship series. It was extremely hot and the track was less than ideal with the pavement breaking up in places, but Hayden got the job done. Speed has the full story.
From crash.net 1. Nicky Hayden USA Repsol Honda Team 45min 4.867 secs 2. Dani Pedrosa SPA Repsol Honda Team 45min 8.053 secs 3. Marco Melandri ITA Fortuna Honda 45min 15.796 secs 4. Kenny Roberts Jr USA Team Roberts 45min 16.808 secs 5. Chris Vermeulen AUS Rizla Suzuki MotoGP 45min 32.306 Read more…
Yesteday’s Superbike race at Laguna Seca was run in record-breaking heat and Ben Spies added another win for a total of 8 this year. The final finish order was- 1. Ben Spies (Yoshimura Suzuki) 2. Tommy Hayden (Kawasaki) 3. Neil Hodgson (Ducati) 4. Miguel Duhamel (Honda) 5. Aaron Yates (Yoshimura Read more…
One of the things I love about bikes is the acceleration. Admit it- accelerating hard on a fast bike is addicting. But I came across some info on Top Fuel dragsters at Automobile and it is pretty interesting stuff. I think the article is pretty old, but still relevant. One Read more…
The riders racing at Laguna Seca this weekend are all complaining about the newly repaved track claiming that it is ruined and will need to be done over. Cycle News has the whole story. From Yoshimura Suzuki’s Ben Spies: “It’s just a shame to see because it’s such a fun track. Read more…
From the Washington Press– Italy’s Ducati Motor Holding SpA, a storied motorcycle company, will temporarily dismiss 100 workers. The action, which was planned as a response to a seasonal sales dip, begins Sept. 1 and is expected to last four months, Ducati said in a statement Friday. “Lowering production … Read more…
Kenny Roberts Jr. lead the pace on Friday with a best time of 1:23.859 which was considerably faster than the rest of the field by MotoGP standards. All the racers complained about how bumpy the newly repaved track is- which makes it tough to tune the suspension. Nicky Hayden had Read more…
Streetbike sales were up a whopping 30.8% in January compared to the same month in 2005. Overall, streetbike sales for the first quarter were up 8.6% from 2005, with 134,557 sold. Dual-purpose bikes also showed a dramatic increase, up 27.4% from the first quarter of 2005 for sales of 7,185. Read more…
This week we are featuring a 2001 Ducati Monster 900Sie that is owned by Vicki Smith of Ducati.net and was one of the bikes in the Guggenheim “Art of the Motorcycle” show. I know the bike since I owned it and painted it before she bought it. It is black with a Read more…
A friend who watches the Japanese vintage market sent me this link to a rare 1972 Kawasaki H2-MachIV-750 2-stroke triple that was bid up to $14,900.00 on ebay and didn’t meet the reserve. These bike always had a reputation for being fast and semi-exotic for their day, but recently, the Read more…
American Honda has donated two Honda CBR600RR motorcycles to L. A. County based Team Sheriff Racing. The outreach program is designed to reach youth and educate them about the hazards of impaired driving, street racing and gangs. It is staffed by off-duty police officers who make appearances at schools and public Read more…
Wired has an article up on the new Tesla electric sports car. Powered by 6800 Lithium-Ion batteries, it goes 0-60 in under 4 sec and has a top speed of 130mph. It really is worth reading because the car is being built by Lotus and the company execs and capital Read more…
The AMA has a TV schedule on their site outlining when different Superbike and MotoGP coverage will air in the US. While motorcycle roadracing is primetime stuff in many other countries, the airing of a MotoGP race on U.S. network television marks a breakthrough in bringing the sport to a Read more…
Speed has a preview of the AMA Pro race this Saturday at Laguna Seca. They run down the info for the top riders and the points race. Should be some great racing this weekend.
Harley-Davidson announced it’s second quarter financial results and things are good in Milwaukee- “Harley-Davidson, Inc. (NYSE: HDI) today announced record revenue and earnings per share for its second quarter ended June 25, 2006. Revenue for the quarter was $1.38 billion compared to $1.33 billion in the year-ago quarter, a 3.3 Read more…
Garmin has announced a new GPS model designed specifically for motorcycles. The list of features is extensive including Bluetooth for wireless headsets in your helmets and a touchscreen designed to be used with gloves on. Check out all the specs at Garmin’s site. This seems to be the only picture on Read more…
Saw this over at Bikes in the fast Lane and had to post it. For the biker that has everything I suppose. I can think of a few other things I would spend the 700.00 on but still a very creative idea.
I saw this over at autoblog.com and thought it really needed to be seen by the moto world. The original article is at Popular Science and has a cool 3D cutaway video. This might be the ultimate go anywhere vehicle, but I’m guessing they don’t jump very well. Still, imagine Read more…
Tomorrow is the annual AMA Ride to work day. So if you can, take your scooter and save some gas! With the US being in a nationwide heat wave, at least it will be nice and warm in the morning. Read the AMA release here. There is also a good Read more…
If you are into AMA Superbike racing, there is a good interview with Zemke over at Speed. It gives you a little “behind the scenes” stuff and some good background.
Autoblog has a post on the British Car magazine Autocar doing a 1 mile land speed record at the London airport. They give the results for the cars but neglect to include the time for what appears to be a ZX14. So I dug a little and found this video Read more…