I just had to add a new tag to the Asphalt & Rubber WordPress story tagging engine: “performance bagger”. It seems a bit oxymoronic if you ask me, but yet, here we are.
What prompted this…unique…addition is the news that MotoAmerica has announced the 14 teams that will compete in the baggers race scheduled for the Laguna Seca round.
Episode 30 of the Brap Talk podcast is now out for your two-wheeled audio pleasure, and as always, it is packed with some interesting motorcycle discussions.
Every year the motorcycle industry comes to our backyard, as The One Motorcycle Show packs Portland, Oregon with two-wheeled enthusiasts.
Ok universe, you win… For the 2020 season, MotoAmerica will be adding a seventh class to its playlist for the Laguna Seca round, and that class will be comprised of highly modified baggers. Yup, baggers.
While many racing fans will be scratching their heads wondering why MotoAmerica is trying to pull an April Fools joke on us in February (Julian calendar, perhaps?), the American professional racing series seems quite excited about the money entertainment that the event will generate.
For the 2020 racing year, MotoAmerica has announced that it will run a three-round Mini Cup, in an effort to bridge the gap for young racers into professional racing.
The new series, which will race at Road America, The Ridge Motorsports Park, and PittRace, will have four spec-classes, all of which will use Ohvale motorcycles.
The class breakdown is as follow: 110cc (four-speed); 160cc; 190cc (racers aged up to 14 years); and 190 Adult (racers over the age of 15), with all of the races set to take place on karting tracks at the aforementioned race courses.
Episode 27 of the Brap Talk podcast is now out for your two-wheeled audio pleasure, and as always, it is packed with some interesting motorcycle discussions.
In this show, we catch up on lost time, as Jensen got the flu (go get your flu shot, right now), and was in bed for two weeks hoping that death would come and release him from his misery.
While that meant a delay in podcasting shows, the upside is that it means this episode has plenty to talk about!
The MotoAmerica grid continues to dwindle in the superbike class, as rumors of Yoshimura Suzuki’s departure were finally made true this week.
The news is shocking in meaning, but perhaps not shocking in surprise, as there have been murmurs of the factory-backed squad leaving the series for a better part of this year (the most notable coming from Ben Spies).
Now out in the open, the move sees Team Hammer taking over as the official team for Suzuki (now called Team Hammer Suzuki), which helps the Japanese brand save some face in terms of keeping its support in the America series, but the reality is that the MotoAmerica Superbike grid will have one less high-level team on the starting line next year.
For American fans of the WorldSBK Championship, there will once again be a fellow countryman to root for next season, as Garrett Gerloff is set to move from the MotoAmerica series to the World Superbike starting grid.
With an official announcement soon to come, our Bothan spies are tipping to us that Gerloff will take Marco Melandri’s seat at the GRT Yamaha squad.
Photos: © 2019 Andrew Kohn / Asphalt & Rubber – All Rights Reserved
We have already published about the sizable sales trouble that Yamaha is encountering in the United States, seeing its last 12 months of sales drop 19% compared to the 12 months prior.
We have also talked about Yamaha’s plans to move its headquarters from California to Georgia, taking the brand away from the epicenter of the motorcycle industry, and off to cheaper waters for operations.
Today, we continue our news about Yamaha Motor USA, talking about the company’s role in American road racing, as Yamaha is set to shake up its involvement in the MotoAmerica Championship.
When you talk to veterans of motorcycle racing about which American could be the next champion at the international level of the sport, one name is almost always included in that very short list: Cameron Beaubier.
This is not only because of Beaubier’s status as a two-time MotoAmerica Superbike champion, but also his experience abroad.
A promising young rider, Beaubier impressed during the 2007 Red Bull Rookies Cup season, which found him some riders on the international stage before returning to the USA.
Now a proven talent on domestic soil, along with his experience abroad, Beaubier is an easy pick to make when looking for Americans to promote to a paddock like the WorldSBK Championship.
And now that is exactly the case, with the Cameron Beaubier tipped for ride in World Superbike next season.
It’s always good to come home. That’s how I feel every time I return to Laguna Seca.
Driving off of Boundary Road, and onto the perimeter of the track, then cresting the big downhill that descends behind Turn 2, towards the green parking area, I always get a big smile knowing that a great weekend of racing is about to begin.
This weekend was no different, with bright, sunny skies, a good crowd, and lots of great racing in both the World Superbike and the MotoAmerica series.
