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Francisco “Chaleco” López Out for 2015 Dakar Rally

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The start of the 2015 Dakar Rally is just about a week away now, and already we have news of a retirement: local favorite Francisco “Chaleco” López.

The Chilean rider has been one of the top contenders at The Dakar, but he has clarified his intentions to switch from two-wheels to four, after his name was found missing from the 2015 entry list.

As such, Chaleco plans on returning to the Dakar rally-raid come 2016, though he will be with the Rally Mobile car team, which he will race with the rest of this season as well.

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Racing

Video: Luc1 Motorsports’ 2014 Supermoto Season

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One of the winningest supermoto teams on the FIM circuit, Luc1 Motorsport also happens to be one of the most talented teams at promoting itself on the internet.

While 2014 was a difficult year for Luc1, especially in the FIM S1 class, the team draws some positives from the season. For us, it means some awesome supermoto footage of racers backing it in, clearing jumps, and banging handlebars. Enjoy, after the jump!

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Racing

Photos of the Top World Endurance Race Bike of 2014

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The 2014 World Endurance Championship was action-packed from round-to-round, and at the end of the season, it was Yamaha Racing GMT 94 Michelin Yamalube team with that surprised the field with 141 championship points (SERT: 104pts, Bollinger 100pts), for the Championship win.

Team riders David Checa, Kenny Foray, and Mathieu Gines finished second at the series opener at Bol d’Or. The team also had a strong 9th place finish at Suzuka, the third fastest full-time team at the Japanese race. At both Germany and Le Mans, Yamaha Racing GMT 94 team podiumed in second place — solidifying its Championship position through consistency.

Left uncleaned from its Le Mans finish, GMT 94’s endurance-spec Yamaha YZF-R1 is off to the museum…the French take the EWC very seriously. You can believe that Honda, Kawasaki, and Suzuki will be looking to give Yamaha a proper run at the Championship defense in 2015.

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Racing

Video Preview the 2015 Isle of Man TT

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We are six months away from the start of the 2015 Isle of Man TT, which for fans and media seems like an eternal amount of time, but for the organizers and competitors, the waiving of the green flag must surely seem like the event is rapidly approaching.

The off-season posturing is already in full-swing, with Michael Dunlop and BMW Motorrad seemingly parting ways, despite a very productive 2014 season. Instead Guy Martin will be on the German brand, perhaps giving him his best shot at a TT race win ever.

No one can count out John McGuinness, of course, as he looks to top Joey Dunlop’s outright TT race-win record. McPint is a contender in every class he enters, though his best hopes are surely in the electric class, where Team Mugen is the outfit to beat.

The electric bikes will be looking to lap 120 mph on the Isle this year, which is proper fast — no matter what standard you use — and puts those top competitors will be in supersport-pace territory.

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News

KTM’s Austrian Factory Hits 100,000+ Bikes for 2014

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KTM has been the highest volume producing European motorcycle company for the past two years running, and zie Austrians are looking to make that a trend in 2014.

As such, the Austrian brand will has some stiff competition this year, seeing as BMW Motorrad already broke last year’s sales figure in the first 11 months of this year — an impressive feat, to be certain.

KTM has the advantage of dabbling in small-displacement machines, with KTM-branded bike coming out of India, courtesy of its minority owner Bajaj. The Indian market has been a larger contributor to KTM’s sales success, but things have been growing in Austria as well.

Announcing that the company’s Mattighofen factory reach 100,000 units this year, for the first time ever, KTM is already celebrating some sales success.

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Bikes

Ducati Scrambler Concept by Gannet Design

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The Ducati Scrambler is certainly the talk of the internet right now, no surprise there since Ducati just hosted its international press launch and the bike reviews are starting to roll out from various publications. You can read ours, right here.

All this press, aided by Ducati’s extensive marketing rollout ahead of the launch, has caused the Scrambler to catch the imaginations of many riders. This is of course to design, as Ducati would love to see the Scrambler become a favorite platform for modders and customizers.

The Ducati Scrambler also caught the eye of concept artist Gannet Design, whose work we have shown on a number of occasions.

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Racing

2015 MotoAmerica Rules Posted Online

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Plans for the inaugural MotoAmerica season continue to move forward, and after KRAVE posted the basic guidelines for its 2015 class structure, the company behind America’s road racing revival has announced its full rules package for the Superbike, Superstock 1000, Supersport and Superstock 600 classes, note the KTM RC390 spec-class rules have not been finalized and are not included.

The full rulebook can be read online here, and as expected the rules bring MotoAmerica’s class structure and technical aspects very much in line with the World Superbike Championship’s new class structure and rules. A such there are few surprises for race teams and fans in the rulebook.

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News

Honda Begins to Hype Its “True Adventure”

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We were a bit dismayed when Honda didn’t debut its new “Africa Twin” at the 2014 EICMA show, as a proper ADV machine from the Japanese had been well-rumored prior to the show.

To its credit, Honda did show us the “True Adventure” concept, which fit the bill quite nicely, though no technical aspects were made public, and no production date was mentioned.

Looking like a near-production machine though, we had hopes of seeing the Africa Twin / True Adventure / Whatever debuting officially soon, especially since the concept had some intriguing aspects to it (namely, no clutch lever).

Honda seems to be warming up to that release date though, after posting two videos to its European YouTube channel. The first video plays on Honda’s history in the Dakar Rally, an event that is rapidly approaching us; and the second video depicts various long-distance Honda explorers — both key elements to the ADV culture.

Could Big Red be readying its proper ADV for a last-model year release? It’s certainly acting like it.

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Products

Buy a WSBK Race Bike, Just in Time for Christmas

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Are you still racking your brain over what to get that special motorcyclist in your life for Christmas (or Chanukah, for our Jewish readers)? Was the Paul Bird Motorsports MotoGP race bikes that are for sale a bit too spendy for your holiday budget?

Then we have a more budget friend proposition for you: the Bimota BB3 WSBK-Spec race bikes that were raced by Team Alstare in the 2014 World Superbike Championship.

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