Grab some popcorn, because this video from Ducati North America is over 14 minutes long. Telling the story of Ducati at the 2011 Pikes Peak International Hill Climb (PPIHC), DNA has put together a great video that really captures how special the racing is at Pikes Peak, and how gorgeous the scenery is of the Colorado Mountains. With Santa Barbara Ducati’s Carlin Dunne winning the overall motorcycle category on his dealership’s Multistrada 1200 demo model, Alexander Smith from the Spider Grips Ducati Team made it a double podium for Ducati in the 1205cc class. If you’re new to racing at Pikes Peak, or wanted a quick re-cap of last year’s race, Ducati’s video pretty accurately sums up racing on the mountain and the anxiety around last year’s race.
Ducati has announced its factory team for the 2012 Pikes Peak International Hill Climb (PPIHC), and the Italian company has secured the services of last-year’s winner and Rookie of the Year Carlin Dunne as well as six-time PPIHC winner Greg Tracy. Ducati has also partnered with the Spider Grips team, who will help prepare the teams Ducati Multistrada 1200 for the “Race to the Clouds” on July 8th. For 2012, the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb will be fully-paved to the top of the mountain, which will surely see the speeds of competitors increase, and lap times drop on the 12.42 mile long course that ends at 14,110 feet.
I was flipping through some photos from the 2011 EICMA show, and found these shots of the Ducati 1199 Panigale’s Superquadro engine. Unfortunately at the show, Ducati had its 1199cc v-twin motor behind a Lexan case, which created a bit of a glare, reflections, and of course had smudges from the touchy-feely Italian crowd. But still, the photos give a good idea of what’s going on in Ducati’s most-advanced production engine to date, and are better than just looking at the CAD renders. If you look at the shots very closely, you can almost see where the 195hp and 98 lbs•ft of torque is lurking inside.
In addition to testing the factory Ducati Desmosedici GP12 “Phoenix” this week at Sepang, Valentino Rossi is also trying out a new lid from AGV. Aside from the carbon fiber goodness, and of course the Rossi stickers (which add 5hp & $200), AGV’s prototype helmet sports a noticably pronounced rear spoiler. Tucked in behind the windscreen, it is obvious why the Italian helmet manufacturer designed such a large protrusion off the back of the prototype helmet, as it looks to be clearly helping the flow off the back of the helmet, across the rider’s hump, and down his backside.
While Ducati Corse is busy playing hide-the-Desmosedici at Sepang, HRC is all business in Malaysia this week, and has debuted its 2012 Honda RC213V MotoGP-contender. Honda isn’t saying too much about the RC213V, simply stating that the race bike is all new, but is also a continuation of the company’s design with the 800cc Honda RC212V. Testing the Honda RC213V over the course of last season, reigning-World Champion Casey rode the new 1,000cc machine three times in 2011, while teammate Dani Pedrosa swung a leg over the RC213V twice (missing one test because of injury).
You may have been misled by some eager journalists today and yesterday, if you saw a Ducati Corse livery-clad Ducati Desmosedici GP12 that some sites were passing off as the first shots of the “90% new” GP12. With the alleged new GP12 looking surprisingly similar to the aluminum-framed “GP0″ that was tested at Valencia, Valentino Rossi’s mechanic has now Alex Briggs confirmed that the photos taken were not of the all new “GP12 Phoenix” that the factory team will race this season. While the Ducati lords can taketh away, they can also giveth, and Valentino Rossi himself has posted the first photo of the factory Desmosedici GP12, and the bike is clearly different.
Zero Motorcycles has announced the full-commencement of production for its 2012 model line, which is expected to hit dealers in February & March of this year. First off the line was the 2012 Zero DS back in December, though the electric motorcycle company has recently started building the Zero S, Zero XU, Zero X, and Zero MX at its Scotts Valley facility as well. A story we broke back in November, Zero Motorcycles debuted its important 2012 electric motorcycle line up at the 2011 EICMA show in Milan, with the 2012 range being a substantial improvement upon the company’s previous offerings.
Getting a look at Dainese & AGV’s 2012 collection, Asphalt & Rubber was down in Orange County earlier this week to see the highly anticipated Dainese D-Air Racing leather suit, which has a four liter airbag system that helps reduce the risk of injury during a motorcycle crash. Dainese has been working on the D-Air Racing system for 10 years now, and after soft-launching the airbag suit in Europe, the Italian company is ready to bring the game-changing technology to American soil.
Us Danes, we’re a strange breed. From the culture that taught you how to rape and pillage, Scandinavia is making yet another contribution to the motorcycling world with this latest video. Featuring Danish Supermoto Champion Andreas Mikkelsen, we get a RoToR camera-esque perspective (this rig is actually home made) on the Dane’s practice session at the Als Supermotard Club in Denmark. It’s videos like this that are slowly eroding my will-power to resist getting into supermotard riding. Also, I don’t know who was in charge of the music selection on this thing, but my hat is off to him/her. I love the nightlife. I’ve come to boogie.
Our friends over at IndianCarsBikes.in were in attendance at the KTM 200 Duke launch in India this week, as the Austrian brand launched its somewhat bigger-displacement version of the popular KTM Duke 125. During the press event, KTM talked about the future of the mini-Duke line and its product roadmap for the emerging country, as well as abroad. With the Austrian brand confirming/clarifying that KTM would release a KTM 350 Duke for India in 2013, zie Austrians also confirmed that the KTM 350 Duke would be built locally in India by Bajaj, but would be exported worldwide — allaying fears that the KTM 350 Duke would be an India-only model.
DOH! Even for a rookie that pretty bad. It can’t be a total surprise that there might be a cop around every bend. sheesh.. he’d be off a cliff if he’d been at Deals Gap.
I know I’ve done it, grabbing an instant handful when getting suprised by a cop up there, its just your first reaction sometimes (yes even though bad practice). To be honest I think its pretty wrong to be waiting at the end like that. I would think the highway patrol would rather just give a ticket than cause an accident too. There is no doubt in my mind that cop caused that crash by his position and intent.
The cop “caused that crash by his position and intent.” Really? The rider had nothing whatsoever to do with it?
By the way, doesn’t it seem kinda fishy that someone was there, catching this all on video?
Ai… I know the feeling, never grabbed my front brake thought. Just got an OH F*ck feeling inside, also because I know I was speeding. It didn’t look like he was going fast so he didn’t have anything to worry about. I do agree It’s partly do to the position of the cop he went down, on a straight he’d be fine.
Do you remember a few years back there was the video of the sport bike rider crashing on Mulholland? There was a lot of press and it made the national news. A few weeks later it came out that it was staged by insurance company. I think itwas part of a campaign to limit sport bike capabilities. This video makes me wonder who’s behind it and what agenda they might have. The video seems well shot. Not a cheapo handled.
it does look a little staged, good camera quality, sound no sound from the camera guy. the cop is not even parked, he is just on the brakes, and starts moving forward 1sec after the he hits the ground.
if not staged it the cops fault for parking on a tight curve, provoking a driver to react fast.
It’s not staged, this is a curve in Mulholland called “the snake” where a photography studio often plants themselves on sat and sun and takes pics of the riders going by, which are of course available for purchase later. There has been increased CHP activity in recent years and I’m sure the camera crew sees a lot of this sort of thing so they were expecting it to happen.
Personally I know the cop didnt “cause” the accident but it seems unfair of him to sit in the middle of the turn, at a point where the motorcyclist is most prone to crashing. They should sit back a few hundred yards to wait until the bike accelerates out of the turn, i think there would be less chance of a crash in that situation.
guys are up on the hill every weekend filming and taking photos, not staged… Check out one of the dudes flickr account rockstorephotos.com or something pretty close to it
Saying the LEO “caused” this guy to go down is not so far removed from blaming flies for garbage trucks and pencils for spelling mistakes.
Coming around a blind turn like that and seeing a chp cruiser opposite can target fixation. I’m surprised the rider did go straight to the car.
This is the rider’s fault—he either overreacted to the turn, the CHP, or, more likely, both and grabbed a handful of brake. What he should have done is slowed down BEFORE going into the turn, i.e Slow-in, fast-out. If he wanted to speed-racer through the turn he should have stayed off the brake (he’d need to pick a better line to make this work) or applied the tiniest bit of trail braking.
Live and learn.
OUCH! http://bit.ly/cRSOx9 (VIDEO) via @Asphalt_Rubber #crashtestdummy #soundofthepolice
#RT PopSciGuy
OUCH! http://bit.ly/cRSOx9 (VIDEO) via @Asphalt_Rubber #crashtestdummy #soundofthepolice Good show…LOL
Cops suck. Go fight some real crime, you glorified tax collector.
…perhaps the CHP did not cause the accident, but did he/she “precipitate” it? Was that officer culpable? It is reasonable to think that if the CHP vehicle was not there then the crash would not have happened. I’m sure there are lots of places for the officer to set up and lots of speeding riders to write tickets to. I bet CHP officers are well trained about how to pull a vehicle over to minimize potential accidents with road traffic. I know I would not want to do anything that would increase the likely-hood of any motorcycle accident.
rnickeymouse is the videographer. if you check out youtube he has already captured dozens of incident on this corner over the past year.
not staged. not some kind of scam
just lots of squids…