The first round after the summer break is always one that fans and paddock personnel get excited about. The German round of the WorldSBK calendar though hasn’t captured the imagination, because of it’s remote setting and, for the riders, the bumpy track surface. 

With Jonathan Rea easing his way towards the history books, as the first rider in history to win the championship three years in a row, there was a feeling from some quarters that it was merely time for marking cards rather than making a mark.

That being so, once the weekend got underway, it did throw up plenty of excitement in what appears to be the final race at the Lausitzring.

Canada’s premier motorcycle news website is set to close, as Canada Moto Guide‘s publisher Courtney Hay announced the news this week. Hay took over CMG a little over a year ago, after her husband Rob Harris (the Founder of Canada Moto Guide) passed away in a motorcycle accident.

Since then, the struggle of keeping CMG operational and profitable, especially during one of the most difficult times in the motorcycle industry, has been too much for Hay and her family, as she now looks to shut down Canada Moto Guide, unless a new publisher can be found.

This news is unfortunate to hear, as it means that the Canadian motorcycle market seems set to lose one of its most important voices, not to mention the larger implications Hay’s announcement reveals about the online media landscape for the motorcycle industry.

The Aspar Team has announced that it has extended its contract with Karel Abraham. The Czech rider will continue to race for the team in 2018, with Abraham likely to get a Ducati Desmosedici GP16 for next season, while his teammate Alvaro Bautista contests a GP17.

With Abraham confirmed at Aspar, and Taka Nakagami announced at LCR Honda, that leaves only three seats still open.

The second seat at Marc VDS will probably be announced at Silverstone this weekend, with all signs pointing to “a rider with previous MotoGP experience” as the favorite to race alongside Franco Morbidelli.

News from San Francisco tell us that Alta Motors has begun production on its electric supermoto, the Alta Redshift SM. We have been waiting a long time for this powerful electric supermoto to come to reality, ever since we rode the prototype model waaaay back in 2011.

The Redshift SM is Alta’s second model, as the motocross-focused Redshift MX started shipping to customers in late-2015, and was the company’s first electric motorcycle out of the starting blocks. The first street-legal model from Alta, the Redshift SM will cost a pricy $15,495 MSRP.

Rumors of street-legal enduro model, and possibly even a street-tracker bike have been coming from San Francisco as well, as Alta is ramping up its production after closing a $27 million round in funding earlier this year.

Today’s news means that Alta dealers and pre-order customers can expect Redshift supermotos on showroom floors around Labor Day.

Ducati’s Chaz Davies romped to back to back races in Germany, with a superb performance in Race 2 at the Lausitzring.

The Welsh wizard became the King of the ‘Ring, with his third dry weather victory in a row at the circuit. It wasn’t an easy day for the riders however, with spits of rain and the threat of showers hanging in the air. 

“I knew the second race was going to be tighter,” said Davies. “It was hard to come from the third row, I made some good passes out there, and had a lot of fun.”

The MotoGP grid is set to expand to 24 riders for the 2018 season. As had been widely expected, the LCR Honda team is to add a second bike for next season, with Japanese rider Takaaki Nakagami moving up to MotoGP. Nakagami will operate alongside Cal Crutchlow in the LCR Honda team.

Like Crutchlow, Nakagami’s contract is directly with HRC, rather than with Lucio Cecchinello’s LCR squad. Unlike Crutchlow’s deal, however, Nakagami’s contract is only for 2018 at the moment.

Nakagami’s wages will come directly out of Honda’s pockets, but the bike will largely be funded by money from Idemitsu, the Japanese oil company already backing Nakagami in Moto2.

Chaz Davies had kept his cards close to his chest, prior to Race 1 in Germany at the Lausitzring. Starting from the second row of the grid the Ducati rider stormed into second at the first corner and into the lead on Lap 2.

For that point onwards he controlled the race with a well judged ride that showed remarkable consistency.

Grinding out fast lap after fast lap, he turned the screws on Jonathan Rea, until ultimately the Kawasaki rider had to concede the race, and allowed Davies to cruise to the finish line.

For Rea, the 20 points allowed him to extend his championship lead over Tom Sykes, but it was a hard fought and well earned podium.

Times are hard for American racers in the Grand Prix paddock. The series has seen a dearth of riders from the USA, since Nicky Hayden left for the WorldSBK paddock after holding the fort for fourteen season, winning a MotoGP title along the way.

Motorcycle racing in the US is clearly in a rebuilding phase, the MotoAmerica series focused on producing and encouraging new talent.

There are signs that it is working. Cameron Beaubier is taking on multiple champion and veteran racer Josh Hayes and winning. Jake Gagne, JD Beach, and Garrett Gerloff are all promising young racers capable of going places.

But few have taken the leap of faith required to come racing in Europe. Josh Herrin tried in 2014, but never found his feet in the tough Moto2 class.

Now, there is Joe Roberts. The 20-year-old Californian moved to Europe this year after spending three years in MotoAmerica, winning the Superstock 600 title in 2015. He already had some experience, having raced in the Red Bull Rookies for a couple of seasons.

He started the 2017 season racing in the FIM CEV Moto2 championship for the AGR team, alongside fellow American Jayson Uribe. When AGR parted ways with Yonny Hernandez in July, after the Sachsenring, the team asked Roberts to step up the Moto2 world championship.

It was not a particularly hard choice, as that was precisely the reason Roberts had come to Europe in the first place.