Those boys in Southern California are at it again, as Roland Sands Design has taken on building a customer’s Ducati Desmosedici RR into a custom street tracker. According to RSD the lucky owner is Justyn Amstutz, and this zero miles Desmosedici RR is one of three in his stable. With 989cc 200+ hp V4 motor that revs to 16,000 rpm, RSD hopes to take Ducati’s beast of a street bike, and turn it into something that requires a steel boot to ride.
Though it no longer quite stands as the international judge of motorcycle road racing that it once was, the Daytona 200 is still one of the last races where motorcycles require the spectacle of refueling and tire changes. Recent years have been marked by attempts at night racing and growing pains as DMG took over running the event and the AMA Pro Racing series. While many long for “the good ol’days,” these photographs from 35 years ago, at the 1976 Daytona 200, give one a sense of what once was, and might be again.
It seemed John Hopkins’s return to MotoGP was well underway, as reports earlier this year said the Anglo-American would be testing at MotoGP’s last pre-season test being held at Qatar this week; however Hopper’s stint on the GSV-R seems to have been relegated to merely doing some laps on the Suzuki MotoGP bike as part of a PR video campaign for the Rizla squad.
Hopper’s test originally was supposed to assess the former-MotoGP rider’s ability to apex a GP machine, and give Paul Denning’s squad an option should Alvaro Bautista become injured in the 2011 season. After Saturday’s filming though, Hopper’s return seems less likely, but the now British Superbike rider remains hopeful.
MotoGP was under the lights of the Losail International Circuit out here in Qatar on Sunday night. With the weather staying warm, but the humidity coming on in the latter stages of the night, it was the Hondas once again who were setting the pace for MotoGP’s pre-season testing sessions. With four Hondas within half a second of each other, it seemed only the Yamahas were capable of getting in-between the RC212Vs of Pedrosa, Stoner, Aoyama, and Dovizioso (Simoncelli would finish farther down the time sheet as 11th fastest).
Leading the tuning fork charge was Ben Spies, who bested his current teammate Jorge Lorenzo by just over a tenth of second. Spies also would lead former teammate Colin Edwards by just under two tenths of a second, as the three Yamahas rounded out what would be the second row if this was race qualifying. Meanwhile the Ducatis all landed in the slower half of the field, clearly struggling with the desert track.
We’re live here in Doha for the next 10 days, covering the last pre-season MotoGP test and the Qatar GP. The skies seem perpetually hazy, with the sun poking through every now and then. That’s just fine by us, as it’s keeping daytime temperatures in the low 80F’s, with nights being a pleasant 60-70F. As usual we’ll have our Twitter feed going on the site, keeping you up-to-date with the latest happenings in the MotoGP paddock.
[twitter-widget username=”Asphalt_Rubber” title=” ” items=”5″ hiderss=”true” targetBlank=”true”]
Photo Feed from MotoGP’s Warm-up at the Qatar GP:
Here’s a video that was sent to us that we think sums up fairly well why we ride motorcycles. Your exact circumstances will surely vary, but ultimately the feeling of the open road and actually living life is bond that connects motorcyclists to each other. Here a group of elderly Taiwanese men reform the biker gang of their youth, each with a different cause to swing the leg over the saddle. One rides for the man who can’t, another for lost love. Several of the men have heart disease, while another finds out he has cancer. Check it out, and let us know what causes you to ride. Thanks for the tip Victor!
Source:
Despite rain early in the weekend, the weather was clear and sunny for the running of the 2011 Daytona 200. The historically important race featured entries from the AMA Pro Racing Daytona Sportbike class, as it was decided a few years ago that the Superbikes were traveling at too dangerous of speeds through the turns and onto the banking of the Daytona International Speedway.
However these concerns seemed to be overshadowed by the issues 2011, as the race distance was ultimately not to be 200 miles, as today’s race saw a mid-race red flag for safety issues regarding the Dunlop front tires forcing a long delay, a second red flag with a multi-rider crash on the restart, and a third red flag caused by a crash at the checkered flag.
Perennial rider Jake Zemke won pole (1:49.775) for the race on his final lap of qualifying Friday, taking the first starting position from Jason DiSalvo, with Danny Eslick and rookie Daytona Sportbike rider JD Beach completing the front row. Of thouse four, only DiSalvo was quick in the Saturday morning warm-up, second fastest behind PJ Jacobsen. Josh Herrin, Dane Westby, and Cory West were the fastest five in the morning.
While here in The United States of America the buzz is all about the new Motus MST sport-tourer and the Erik Buell Racing 1190RS sportbike, in Germany the talk of the town is the new Horex VR6 street bike, which began its road testing today. Horex released a photo of the supercharged 200+hp 1,200cc machine testing on a closed circuit, with Hennes Fischer, the man in charge of the VR6’s development, stating that “in this phase of the test series we mainly wanted to determine whether the current suspension configuration, basic geometry and engine tuning are correctly matched. It’s a big step from computer calculations and engine tuning on the dynamometer to a perfectly functioning bike.”
If you’re just starting your routine this Friday morning, you’ve likely already seen that a massive earthquake struck Japan about 230 miles offshore from Tokyo. The 8.9 magnitude earthquake is one of the top seven most powerful quakes in recorded history, and the largest to hit Japan in over 100 years. Occurring relatively close to the surface, the Sendai Earthquake, as it’s being called, triggered a tsunami, with waves as tall as 30 feet. Since the initial quake, a series of aftershocks have hit Japan as well, with many of those having a magnitude of 5.0 or greater on the Richter scale.
While Japan has more serious issues to contend with at the moment, the immediate ramifications for the motorcycle industry appear to be the now expected delays in shipping motorcycles from Japan to other countries. So far Honda has confirmed that it has shutdown production at its Saitama factory, while production at its Suzuka factory has resumed. Honda has also confirmed that one worker died and 30 others were injured when a wall collapsed in its research and development facility in Tochigi.
We just showed you the first video that Motus has shot while down at Daytona launching the company’s new sport-tourer to the Bike Week crowd. We’re clearly not on our A-game today (I’m suffering from a nasty head cold, and have to fly in 24 hours to Qatar for the MotoGP test), but luckily our readers are, as one commenter has spotted the fact that Motus switches bikes mid-way through the Daytona video.
Sans fairings, and adorned with Öhlins forks (along with a carbon fiber front fender), it looks like Motus has snuck in the Motus MST-R into the shot without anyone noticing. Still not convinced? Well the rider in the video has a clearly labeled “MST-R” logo on his helmet as well. We’ve reached out to Brian and Lee to see what they can confirm or deny on this. Stay tuned.