In case you missed the story last week, Kevin Schwantz is preparing to race in this year’s Suzuka 8-Hour endurance race. For the race, Schwantz will be riding on a team formed by Yukio Kagayama, who in addition to having raced in the MotoGP, World Superbike, and British Superbike Championships, is also a previous Suzuka 8-Hour winner with the Suzuki Endurance Race Team (also joining the three-rider team Noriyuki “Nitro” Haga). Releasing a Q&A about his team’s Suzuka 8-Hour entry, Kagayama-san walks us through how the team came together, what equipment the riders will use, and his outlook on the team’s competitiveness.
A single-cylinder hooligan-maker, the KTM 690 Duke is 330 lbs (curbside without fuel) and 67hp of two-wheeled fun, and we hope that the Austrians bring the KTM 690 Duke R our way as well. While we are on the topic of things missing from KTM’s American line-up, a decent supersport is painfully obvious, yet we can’t see the folks at KTM following the paths of other brands. That’s where our friend Luca Bar comes to mind with his latest concept: the KTM RC4. Using the KTM 690 Duke platform and its LC4 engine, Bar has designed a super-single full-fairing sport bike that takes the Austrian company’s “Ready to Race” DNA and applies it to an idea that is not all that disimilar to the Ducati Supermono.
When I sat down with Claudio Domenicali at the Ducati 1199 Panigale R launch, the now-CEO of Ducati Motor Holding was still just the General Manager of the Italian motorcycle company. Four weeks after our interview though, Gabriele del Torchio would leave Ducati for Alitalia; and Domenicali, a 21-year veteran of both the racing and production departments of Ducati, would take his place at the top of Italy’s most prestigious motorcycle brand. After reading our interview from Austin, Texas after the jump, I think you will agree too.
That Yamaha is working on a seamless gearbox is no secret, with Yamaha’s test riders currently racking up the kilometers around tracks in Japan. Recently, however, Spanish magazine SoloMoto published an article suggesting that Yamaha has already been using its new seamless gearbox since the beginning of the season. My own enquiries to check whether Yamaha was using a seamless gearbox or not always received the same answer: no, Yamaha is not using the seamless gearbox. To test this denial, I went out to the side of the track on Friday morning at Jerez to record the bikes as they went by.
After a very public father/son break-up between Paul Teutul Sr. and Paul Teutul Jr., a steroid-ring scandal involving Paul Sr., and finally a bankruptcy proceeding, it appears that Orange County Choppers is the impossible to kill multi-headed hydra of doom that we all knew it was, as the custom chopper shop is once again headed to the small screen and recruiting some talent, on and off the show. Looking for “someone who will work alongside Paul Senior, running the shop and helping build some of the best custom motorcycles in the world,” OCC says it will be back on television with a new show later this month. Please for the love of god, will someone give this man the attention he craves so dearly??! Or, just shoot us in the face.
We love us some concept bikes here at Asphalt & Rubber, and we have featured more than a few pieces of stunning design and imagination on our pages. Though, we can’t remember the last time one of these works of art were brought to us by a legitimate racing team, but that is what we have here with the Team Alstare Superbike Concept. A nod to the former Suzuki team’s return to the World Superbike Championship as the Ducati factory squad with Carlos Checa and Ayrton Badovini, Alstare has enlisted the help of designer Serge Rusak of Rusak Kreaktive Designworks to ink the shape of its futuristic Superbike concept, while Tryptik Studios handled the 3D modeling prowess.
If you didn’t watch Thursday’s pre-event press conference for MotoGP at Jerez, it is worth a viewing right to the end (assuming you have a MotoGP.com account). Building off the news about the NBA’s Jason Collins coming out as gay in a self-written feature in Sport Illustrated, my good colleague David Emmett had the courage to inquire about the culture and acceptance of the MotoGP paddock for homosexual riders. For the sake of accuracy, after the jump is a full transcript of David’s question, as put to riders Cal Crutchlow, Jorge Lorenzo, Marc Marquez, Andrea Dovizioso, Stefan Bradl, and Scott Redding, as well as those riders’ responses to David’s inquiry.
News that Suzuki plans on returning to the MotoGP Championship in 2014 should be old information for dedicated Asphalt & Rubber readers, and the Japanese company’s inline-four race bike was already spotted doing test laps last year by the eager eyes at Cycle World. Well the American print-mag has another set of eyebrow-raising high-quality photos of the 2014 Suzuki GSV-R to mull over from the Motegi race track, along with some technical insights provided by the venerable Kevin Cameron.
A surprise addition to BMW Motorrad’s 2013 model line-up, zie Germans have announced a new middleweight adventure-tourer, the 2013 BMW F800GS Adventure. Like its larger predecessor, the BMW F800GS Adventure is a more travel-ready and off-road capable build of the recently updated BMW F800GS motorcycle. Featuring a larger windscreen, panniers, and a bigger fuel tank capacity (2.1 gallons larger, for a total of 6.3 gallons of fuel), the BMW F800GS Adventure keeps the same 85 hp, liquid-cooled, 798cc, parallel-twin engine found on the F800GS, as well as the same chassis configuration. Pricing in the US will be $13,550 for the base model BWM F800GS Adventure.
Former 500cc World Champion Kevin Schwantz has certainly been in the news a bit these past few months, mostly for his involvement and falling out with the Circuit of the Americas and the Americas GP, but also more recently for his comments regarding Dani Pedrosa — we also sat down with Mr. Schwantz in Austin, and the Texan gave us some sobering insight into the future of American road racing. As if all that wasn’t enough, Schwantz is making a return to two-wheeled racing, and has entered the prestigious Suzuka 8-Hours endurance race with Team Kagayama racing alongside Noriyuki Haga and team owner Yukio Kagayama.
Wow…Just Wow!
Thankfully he is ok!
Amazing, glad to see the guy seemed to walk away unharmed. This is exactly why Diving instructors over here tell you to keep at least a bike-length distance even when standing still, and always keep it in first gear. This way when you spot a car in your mirror coming at you, at least you have a chance.
If he had a rear-view camera, I’d bet a few bucks that the was on the phone, or playing with the navigation, or the radio. Definitely not looking ahead in any way.
Thankfully the Suzuki is a total loss, otherwise some of that energy may have been absorbed by the rider…
Hopefully this serves as a reminder to those who text, eat, apply makeup, etc. while driving to START SEEING MOTORCYCLES
Always, always watch the mirrors, especially when braking hard in a situation like that. Often its better to go around a cage that suddenly slows than to break hard with it as ya never know if the next cage will stop in time. Very glad the rider is ok.
I was hit like that in a stop signal. Was a minor hit, but the car driver began his speech with the typical “I didn’t see you… I belive… I thought…” I hate that. Use your f*cking eyes!
Lucky rider, btw.
Female. At least she said sorry. So many would try to avoid accountability.
This is the intersection of 19th and Lincoln in San Francisco, part of my daily commute. Street is extremely sketchy and the best of times.
“at” the best of times, that is.
Ah
f that, it would be incredibly hard for me to not beat the .s .out of that woman driving the car…
someone on youtube pointed out that she was using something (phone)at :17 and puts it in her pocket at :18
Riding into the sun, stopped in a shadow and stopped pretty quickly because he didn’t have enough distance to brake slowly. Not blaming the rider of course but when riding into the sun we all become much less noticeable. Had she been paying attention though, it would not have happened. Lucky lucky guy. She certainly looked like she was putting something away before she got out of the car. I would request her cellphone records.
I was rear ended when stopped at a STOP sign, by a taxi, he hit me at less than 5mph but it jettisoned me over my R60/5 full tour fairing into the intersection. That was over 30 years ago, car or bike from that day forward a mandatory part of any pull up is a check of my mirrors for the whacko that is NOT reducing speed along with me. Oh, the Passengers in the taxi, whilst I was on the ground they gave me ‘that’ look, like they were looking at scum, very disheartening. Oh my beautiful BMW, new top box, new rear carrier, and horrendous burn to my inner leg with hair roots infected, all of course at my cost. Never, never forget to look in your mirrors!
Part of me after catching my breath and counting my limbs would have knocked grandma out, sorry but the truth, I really dont care who it is at that point, its my life and you fcked with it.
Remember to filter as much as humanly possible and keep up pressure to the states that still havent caught on yet that its not only safter but faster for everyone.
They shouldn’t let the stupid people drive. They need to make the test to get a drivers license much tougher.
That isn’t an accident, it is a collisions with intent.
Sad to see a typical example, but AT LEAST she got out and actually asked if he was okay — I’ve been hit and totally avoided as people literally hid in their cars.
Closest I ever came was a busy 4 lane road, I was turning left I had no mirrors on my bike (I do now) I pulled through a narrow gap in traffic but enough that oncoming didn’t have to touch there brakes, the same instant I pulled away I heard a screech when I cleared the 2 on coming lanes I saw tire smoke and a car pulling away from a panic stop had I not jumped the chance they would have hit me at between 25-45.
Needless to say I bought mirrors that night and I check, check check and in town its rare I don’t know who is beside and behind me.
If it were me, after a “Thank you God!” I would get witness info, contact a lawyer (the slimier the better) and begin the process of financially cleaning her eff’ing clock. The state probably eventually let her off with a BS “defective vehicle” but I’d make damn sure she wouldn’t be able to afford insurance for the next 5 years!
Texting while driving. pure luck he didn’t get killed
take her license