Episode 108 of the Paddock Pass Podcast is out, and this one is a WorldSBK show. As such, this means that we see Steve English joined by Gordon Ritchie on the mics, as they are now our WorldSBK reporting duo for the 2019 season.
Recording straight from the United Kingdom, the guys talk about the on-track action at Donington Park, where we saw some big movement in the championship standings, after a miserable weekend of riding for Alvaro Bautista.
Ever since Harley-Davidson told us that it would be bringing the electric-powered Livewire motorcycle to market, the Bar & Shield brand has been vague on details.
Surprisingly, as production was confirmed for the 2020 Harley-Davidson Livewire, detailed tech specs were still hard to come by, with Milwaukee choosing to talk more in experiential terms, rather than hard figures.
And even the night before the international press was set to ride the Livewire for the first time, Harley-Davidson wouldn’t talk spec sheets with us…until now.
From this we learn some critical numbers about the Harley-Davidson Livewire. 105hp / 86 lbs•ft of torque; 15.5 kWh (13.6 kWh nominal) of battery; 549 lbs of heft at the curb; and much, much more. Don’t worry, we’ve got all the technical details for you.
In what has to be the shortest commute for an international press launch, our hometown of Portland, Oregon is playing host to the first riding of the Harley-Davidson Livewire.
This is our first press launch with the Bar & Shield brand, and it is a big one at that. The Livewire is a mammoth shift for the motorcycle industry, as Harley-Davidson becomes the first major manufacturer to debut a full-sized electric motorcycle for the street.
The Livewire is a big deal for the American brand as well, as Harley-Davidson is pivoting its business model towards new horizons, new markets, new riders, and most importantly for today’s purpose: new drivetrains.
The Harley-Davidson Livewire is a halo product from Milwaukee, but it shows how far the marque is willing to go in order to ensure its future. The question before us now though, is the bike any good?
Tomorrow we will be among the first to ride the Harley-Davidson Livewire, the Bar & Shield brand’s first electric motorcycle.
The model marks a paradigm shift for the American company, as well as the motorcycle industry as a whole, so you can imagine that a great deal of attention will be on the machine’s debut.
Before we get our own first-hand experience with the bike, there is some talk about Harley-Davidson’s pre-sales activity on the Livewire.
BMO Capital Markets analyst Gerrick Johnson has tipped to Powersports Business that roughly 50% of Harley-Davidson’s initial batch of Livewire deliveries have deposits on them.
It was perhaps an inevitable move for the young South African, but Brad Binder has finally secured a ride in the MotoGP Championship, signing today a contract with the Red Bull KTM Tech 3 team for the 2020 season.
The move makes Binder the fourth rider to move all the way from Red Bull Rookies Cup to the MotoGP class, a feat previously completed by Miguel Olivera, Johann Zarco, and Joan Mir.
Of course, this good news for Binder means bad news for Tech 3’s other rider, Hafizh Syahrin, who will most surely be without a KTM rider for next season, and very possibly no longer in the MotoGP Championship after this year’s dismal results.
Tech 3 boss Herve Poncharal has made it quite clear publicly that he has been disappointed with Syahrin’s results this year, as the Malaysian rider sits with only three championship points, in a three-way tie for second-to-last place in the series.
We broke the news two days ago that Ducati was working on a special edition of the Panigale V4, to help commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Ducati 916 Superbike. Now, we have some official details on that news to share with you.
Helping Ducati celebrate one of its most iconic bikes is one of the men who raced on them – quite successfully, we might add – Carl Fogarty.
As such, the Ducati Panigale V4 25° Anniversario 916 model will come with some nods to Fogarty’s racing legacy, while also reminding two-wheeled fans of Ducati’s rich history in the WorldSBK paddock.
I would start with some grandiose phrase – “this weekend we witnessed history in the making” – but the reality is that there have been several attempts already to achieve what the MotoE World Cup sets to undertake.
Electric motorcycle racing has been in the nexus for almost a decade now, and if we are frank, the progress has been tough.
TTXGP, FIM ePower, TT Zero – there are achievements to each of these efforts, but none have been able to create a product that is on par with their petrol-powered counterparts.
So while we have been here before, with a new series dedicated to racing electric motorcycles, there is a chance that we have seen history in the making, because the MotoE World Cup shows signs of life…and it shows how a new racing series can be launched in the 21st century.
This bike has been burning a hole in my to-do list for far too long, partially because I first saw it late last year, but also because of how radial the design is…especially when you consider that it started life as a subdued BMW R nineT roadster.
The work of Austrian designer Blechmann, the bike is called Giggerl and well…it is hard to say which genre of style it fits into exactly. Blechmann has obvious modern cues and ideas for how a motorcycle should look, but Giggerl also has lines from the past, due in part to its air-cooled R nineT roots.
Confirming the news we reported yesterday, Marco Melandri has made his retirement announcement official. As such, the 36-year-old Italian will hang up his leathers for good, at the end of this year’s WorldSBK Championship season.
Melandri’s career spans three decades of racing, and includes some impressive feats, but his results this season have surely been the deciding factor on today’s announcement.
Currently ninth in the WorldSBK Championship standings, Melandri’s season has seen high points at Phillip Island and Jerez, but has otherwise been a forgettable affair. This surely has been the cause for Melandri’s lack of motivation to continue racing.
Episode 18 of the Brap Talk podcast is now out for your two-wheeled audio pleasure, and this is another topic-packed show that runs the gamut of the motorcycling experience.
Before we get into the show’s details, it should be noted that this episode was recorded during the practice week of the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb.
So, we talk a bit about Carlin Dunne during the show, and are of course unaware of what would happen later that weekend. We deeply miss our friend Carlin, and plan to talk about his amazing life in our next podcast.
I am not sure about this one, but the word out of Italy is that Marco Melandri is set this week to announce his retirement from motorcycle racing. Naturally, we are intrigued.
The rumor comes from La Gazzetta dello Sport (the same publication that’s also currently saying – quite dubiously, we might add – that this will be Jorge Lorenzo’s last season racing in MotoGP), and now the sports magazine suggests that Melandri is ready to hang up his leathers after a tough year back in WorldSBK.