Continuing to blur the lines between established motorcycle segments, Honda has teased out another pair of unique motorcycles, which will…
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.
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.
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. 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.
Runners-up in the 2012 TT Zero race at the Isle of Man TT, newcomer Team Mugen made quite the stir with its Shinden (神電) 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 (神電弐つ), 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).
The first test of the 2013 MotoGP season is completed, and Dani Pedrosa has completed a clean sweep, topping the…