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February 2013

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SPEED Still without TV Contracts for WSBK & MotoGP??!

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With the World Superbike season-opener now less than two weeks away, bad news looms for motorcycle race fans in the United States, as the SPEED Channel (now a part of FOX Sports), does not have a television contract to air WSBK and MotoGP for their 2013 seasons.

An issue that has been hanging in limbo since the start of the year, Superbike Planet yesterday suggested that American motorcycle racing fans could be without the World Superbike Championship on their televisions sets this year (we have heard similar murmurings regarding AMA Pro Racing as well).

Now today, Roadracing World confirmed with SPEED that the network still does not have any contracts with Dorna for the TV rights to WSBK and MotoGP. What’s worse, SPEED’s Vice President of Media Relations Erik Arneson gave no indication that the TV channel was any closer to finishing a deal with Dorna than it was earlier this year.

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Rumors

KTM RC25 – A KTM 250cc Sport Bike Coming from India?

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Rumors of a 250cc KTM sport bike have been around ever since the Austrian brand’s product road map for the American market leaked to the internet.

Expected to draw inspiration from the company’s successful Moto3 race bike, the KTM 250cc street bike is now coming to the forefront of rumors again, as news from India reconfirms its production for 2014.

However, the new rumors from India suggest that the dubbed “KTM RC25” will take after the KTM 1190 RC8 R, rather than the company’s Moto3 machine.

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Bikes

2013 Moto Morini Granpasso & Scrambler Get Price Cuts

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After a tumultuous bankruptcy, Moto Morini is alive an kicking in 2013, albeit with a very familiar model lineup. Touching some new paint to its models, and adding some “human components” accessory pieces, Moto Morini has created three special offerings so far for the new year.

Calling its new pieces the 2013 Moto Morini Scrambler 1200 Military Green, 2013 Moto Morini Scrambler 1200 White Queen, and 2013 Moto Morini Granpasso 1200 Travel Yellow, Moto Morini is obviously trying to move some bikes and clear out its inventory with some factory specials.

While you will either love or hate what Moto Morini has going on with the aesthetics of its Scrambler and Granpasso bikes, the bevy of free gear (both for the bike and the rider), along with the new lower price points (€12,500 for the Granpasso and €10,900 for the Scramblers), are two points that are certainly going to be attractive to would-be owners.

Will the fresh paint and low prices help get Moto Morini back in black? Only time will tell. However, leave a note in the comments if you think the Italian brand should bring its wares across the pond.

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News

Report: KTM 390 Duke Coming to the USA in 2014

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Speaking to India’s Business Standard, KTM CEO Stefan Pierer has confirmed that the KTM 390 Duke will be coming to the US market in 2014 — a full year later than the company’s leaked road map slide projected.

A noticeable absence from this year’s USA model lineup, the KTM 390 Duke is the biggest sibling in KTM’s new entry-level street bike offerings, with the company already seeing the KTM 125 Duke and KTM 200 Duke as successes in the marketplace.

Helping push KTM beyond BMW Motorrad’s yearly sales totals for 2012, the Austrian company is reaping significant benefits from its partnership with Bajaj, which owns a minority stake in KTM. Producing the smaller Duke machines in Bajaj’s Chakan plant, KTM has been able to create a capable, affordable, and enticing motorcycle for new and current motorcyclists alike.

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Racing

Videos: Alstare Says Goodbye to Suzuki and Hello to Ducati

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Ending a 14 year relationship, the 2013 World Superbike Championship season sees Team Alstare under the flag of a new manufacturer, as the Belgian squad closes its story with Suzuki Racing, and begin a new one with Ducati Corse. An adjustment for many in the paddock, the name Alstare has always been synonymous with Suzuki, though the team’s absence this last season was a noticeable one, as Team Alstare has always been one of the top crews in WSBK.

In that regard, it seems fitting then that Alstare should find a partnership with another great name in World Superbike racing, and so while the name Team Ducati Alstare sounds a bit strange to the ear, it makes sense in the head. Bidding goodbye to Suzuki, and hello to Ducati, Team Alstare has put together two videos, which have more than a touch of bittersweet to them. Clearly, this is a wound that will still require some time to heal.

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Racing

MotoGP’s Sepang Test: Joy, Determination, & Despair

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Joy, determination and despair. If you had to choose three words to describe the first test of the 2013 MotoGP season, these are the words you would choose. Joy: for Valentino Rossi and his crew at finally having a bike that Rossi can ride and his team understand how to work with; for HRC, at seeing both their hopes and their expectations of Marc Marquez’ ability confirmed; for Bradley Smith and Michael Laverty, at making such rapid progress on their early days in the class.

Determination: for Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo, both working hard at preparing for their assault at a title, which either could win. For Marc Marquez, focused on learning everything he can to add the consistency he needs to his raw speed, if he is to match Pedrosa and Lorenzo.

Despair: for the factory Ducati riders. Sepang showed the bike is uncompetitive, and with few avenues left to explore with the machine in its present state, despair at knowing they have many months of hard, dispiriting work ahead of them before they can even start to turn the situation around.

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Bikes

2014 Honda CTX700 & CTX700N Coming Soon

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Continuing to blur the lines between established motorcycle segments, Honda has teased out another pair of unique motorcycles, which will formally go-down as 2014 model year machines. Available in Spring 2013. The 2014 Honda CTX700 & 2014 Honda CTX700N use the same 670cc parallel-twin engine found in the NC700 series, which was an engine designed to be a sensible and practical urban power plant for city bikers.

Building something that looks the cross between a street-standard and a cruiser, Honda is offering ABS brakes and an automatic dual-clutch transmission (DCT) as an available $1,000 option. The hope is clearly that the Honda CTX700N & Honda CTX700 will be an approachable and affordable motorcycle for new motorcyclists, and with prices at $6,999 & $7,799 respectively ($7,999 & $8,799 with DCT and ABS), Honda seems to have achieved that goal.

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Racing

2013 Aprilia RSV4 Factory WSBK Race Bike Debuts

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Fresh from Italy, we get our first glimpse of the 2013 Aprilia RSV4 Factory WSBK race bike in its new livery. While the uniforms may look the same, the men wearing them have changed to some extent, and in many ways so has the Italian brand’s racing strategy.

Building its previous team around Max Biaggi, the previous incarnation of Aprilia Racing catered to every whim of The Roman Emperor — read into that as you will. But now with Biaggi’s retirement from motorcycle racing, Aprilia is forced to replace tried-and-true talent with two up-and-coming stars.

Out from behind Max’s shadow, Eugene Laverty is expected to impress this year, having shown himself a formidable rider on the RSV4 Factory last season with his sixth-place Championship finish. Seventh in the Championship himself, Sylvain Guintoli will join the Irishmen, after coming off a tumultuous season with Liberty Racing. With three race wins and six podiums, Guintoli made a definite impression, especially when he was on the slower Ducati.

With both of Aprilia Racing’s WSBK riders starting to come into their own, the Italian brand is showing a lot of growth potential in the premier production-motorcycle racing series. Time will tell on the results, but we expect a bevy of podiums from the Aprilia riders this year, and maybe a win or two. Mas photos after the jump.

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Racing

Correction: Ducati 1199 Panigale RS13 Priced at €134,900

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Numbers are tough, and depending on where you leave a digit off, they can mean very different things. Such is the case with the price we reported on the Ducati 1199 Panigale RS13.

Available only to professional race teams for €134,900, and not €34,900 (Seriously, you people need to stop calling Ducati Corse thinking you can buy one — that’s just cray), the RS13 is the building block bike that you’ll see racing in superbike classes around the world, but most notably in WSBK with Carlos Checa onboard.

So again the take-home message here is you can’t buy the RS13, you probably can’t afford it, and don’t trust everything you read on the internet. Mea culpa.

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Racing

HRC Boss Reveals Details of Honda’s Production Racer: Conventional Valves, Standard Gearbox, & 1 Million Euros

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The production racer version of Honda’s RC213V is another step closer to reality. At Sepang, HRC Vice President Shuhei Nakamoto spoke to reporters and the MotoGP.com website about the new bike, and the progress being made on the machine, which will take the place of the CRT machines from 2014 onwards. The bike is delayed, Nakamoto said, but it will be ready in time for the tests at Valencia, after the final race of the season in November.

Nakamoto gave a brief rundown of the specifications of the production RC213V – a bike which, given the amount of publicity it is going to be generating over the next few months, badly needs a new name – though the list contained few surprises.

The bike will have conventional valve springs, as opposed to pneumatic valves on the factory machine. It will not have the seamless gearbox used by the prototypes – again, not a surprise, as maintenance on the gearbox is still an HRC-only affair. This was not a matter of cost, Nakamoto said, claiming the seamless gearbox now costs almost the same as a standard unit.

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Racing

IOMTT: Team Mugen is Back for the 2013 TT Zero – New Lighter “Shinden 2” & Same-Sized John McGuinness

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Runners-up in the 2012 TT Zero race at the Isle of Man TT, newcomer Team Mugen made quite the stir with its Shinden (??) electric race bike, which was piloted by none other than TT great John McGuinness.

Announcing its intention to return for the 2013 TT Zero event, Mugen again confirms McPint as the team’s rider, and boasts of an even lighter and more refined Shinden Ni (????), or Shinden 2, electric motorcycle.

Light on details with its new race bike, Mugen only mentions that the team has developed the Shinden Ni from the original Shinden, which has resulted in the weight of the motorcycle body and electric systems being reduced (read: less battery mass).

Mugen also says that the electric motor and aerodynamics of the motorcycle have also been analyzed and modified to make the Shinden Ni a more potent adversary.

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