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October 2010

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Our World Superbike silly season round-up from three weeks ago is now 3 for 3, as Alstare Suzuki has announced the signing of Michel Fabrizio to its “factory” team, replacing the departed Leon Haslam. The announcement is a homecoming for Fabrizio, who raced for Alstare’s European Superstock team back in 2003, but the Italian rider has a ton of work ahead of him as Suzuki’s support for the WSBK team is still highly questionable. Fabrizio got his first taste of the Alstare Suzuki GSX-R1000 World Superbike while testing at Magny-Cours last week, his first time back on an inline-four, after riding an v-twin all these years.

Just a couple weeks after fracturing his collarbone in three places at Motegi, Dani Pedrosa will once again take to his Honda RC212V, as the Spanish rider has indicated he will take part in Friday’s FP1 in Australia. Taking the Malaysian GP off in order to heal his shoulder, Pedrosa may no longer be in the running for the MotoGP Championship, but he’s shown strong improvements on the Honda RC212V the past few races, a trend he’ll be keen to continue through the rest of the season as he fights for second place in the standings.

UPDATE: Ducati USA just sent us a larger version of the photo posted on Facebook (enhanced version above). Check out the key entry for the trunk under the tail, and how the tail lights extend past the tail section to function as turn signals as well.

Ducati has just released the first official images of the 2011 Ducati Diavel on its website and Facebook page, thus beginning the teasing process as we lead up to the EICMA show in Milan in three weeks (and confirming the name Diavel in the process). Showing the ass end of the power cruiser, we get our first good glimpse of the carbon tank on the Diavel (rumors are the Ducati Diavel will come in two trim levels). Ducati has also announced that the Diavel will sport ABS, Ducati Traction Contorl, multiple riding modes, and weigh 456lbs.

Ducati has also confirmed that the 2011 Ducati Diavel will use the Testastretta 11° engine found on the 2010 Ducati Multistrada 1200, but has coyly made no mention of power figures, leading us to take an educated guess that the “Devil” makes a bit more power than its sport-touring cousin.

Smaller details are starting to come out as well, as we see the frame will get some red paint (as inked-in earlier), along with a central racing stripe down the tank and tail. We’ve brightened up the close-up photo after the jump, but don’t expect to see anything more than some pieces from the Ducati parts bin.

Along with the loaded 2011 Ducati Superbike 1198 SP, the Bologna factory is helping sell-out its current Superbike line by offering other Ducati Performance parts on its base model Superbike 1198. Keeping the 2011 Ducati Superbike 1198’s price at $16,495 MSRP, Ducati is throwing in its Ducati Traction Control (DTC), Ducati Data Aquisition (DDA), and Ducati Quick Shifter (DCA) systems in for free. Schwing!

If you were previously in the market for a Ducati Superbike 1198 S, but didn’t necessarily need the Öhlins suspension, this could be the bike you’ve been waiting for (although it is hard to turndown the new SP model and its race-ready parts list).

While Valentino Rossi may have gotten a slap on the wrist from Yamaha Racing Boss Lin Jarvis for over-zealously racing teammate Jorge Lorenzo at Motegi, the Spanish press and Lorenzo have been less reserved with their words about the final laps of the Japanese GP. This hasn’t stopped some cheekiness from the Italian press though, who put together this fake accident report after Rossi and Lorenzo collided on the Twin Ring Circuit. Watch the video above, and make the call if that assigned fault to the right rider after the jump.

One of the great things about Twitter is that it often gives you unfiltered access to people who generally have several layers of public relations officers between them and the fans. No stranger to the interwebs, Jorge Lorenzo is probably one of the most avid Twitter users in the MotoGP paddock, blasting out a steady stream of tweets during a race weekend. So what does the Spanish rider send out to his followers after clinching the MotoGP Championship? Stay classy Jorge.

When we caught our first glimpse of the 2011 Suzuki GSX-R600 & 2011 Suzuki GSX-R 750 motorcycles, one of the things that struck us about the new bikes, besides the redesigned front fairing and 20lbs of missing mass, was the use of Brembo calipers as an OEM part. A premium part that’s usually reserved for premium brand motorcycles, Brembo and Suzuki have signed at three-year agreement that sees the Italian company supplying the Japanese manufacturer with braking bits for its GSX-R line.

Sometimes if you want to know where something is going, it helps to know where it’s been. That seems to be the case as Ducati News Today has esnagged some photos 2011 Ducati Diavel from way back in May of last year. Caught in the United States being fitted with a new swingarm (according to DNT), this version of the Ducati Diavel shows some interesting lines that depart from the photos we’ve seen earlier of the performance cruiser.

But why does this Diavel look so different from the clay models and spy shots we’ve seen? While some will say it’s an earlier model, our eagle eye spots a few parts from the Roland Sands Design parts bin. When we saw the latest spy shots of the Diavel, the bike had some wheels on it that screamed influences from Performance Machines. It’s no secret that PM and RSD have close ties, so we went digging, and our sources tell us that Roland Sands Design has been helping Ducati kit the Diavel with aftermarket parts (note the Öhlins shock which will surely be a Ducati Performance part for the Diavel). More info and photos after the jump.

Although Jorge Lorenzo may be on the pole position at Sepang where many expect that Spaniard to clinch the World Championship, the talk at the Malaysian GP right now is about Nicky Hayden. The American lead most of qualifying, and will start tomorrow second on the grid, after missing the pole spot by only a tenth of a second.

Hayden had an abysmal time last week at Motegi for the Japanese GP, and looked to be on a similar path this weekend, but the Ducati Corse team went back to a setting from testing last year, and Hayden was able to make up the rest of the distance himself.

Further proof that motorcycle advertising can be a fickle beast. We’re getting a weird Children of the Corn meets Blair With Project vibe from this advertisement from Kawasaki that promotes the 2011 Kawasaki Z1000 street bike. Presumably debuting at Intermot, and just in time for Halloween, it’s actually a pretty well-shot and engaging clip, but damn is it creepy (we prefer slasher flicks). Pardon us while we go bathe in vinegar, and cry in the corner of the A&R office.

Source: Kawasaki