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Aprilia Very Quietly Teases the New Tuareg 660 at EICMA

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No press releases. No social media hype-posts. No big fancy displays. In fact, it was very easy to miss that Aprilia was giving us a glimpse at its next middleweight motorcycle at EICMA at all. But, it was there if you were careful to look at your surroundings.

Now granted, it is very hard to tell what is going on with the Aprilia Tuareg 660, since…well, the Italians covered it in shrubbery. Such is the state of their display at the Milan trade show, as they try to tease us with this ADV model.

But, we can pick out some details between the vines, bushes, and leafs…and they are intriguing.

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Bikes

The KTM 390 Adventure Is Finally, Finally Here

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It has taken a long time to wrangle this bike into existence, but the KTM 390 Adventure is officially a thing now and coming in 2020.

I could look back through the pages of Asphalt & Rubber, and see when we first started talking about this small-sized ADV bike, but it would be downright depressing for the Austrian brand. It has been…a while in the making, let’s just say that.

The good news though is that the KTM 390 Adventure arrives with an exclamation point, and it is certain to dominate in markets where the  373cc engine is considered quite large and peppy. It should be fun in the western markets too.

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Bikes

The Husqvarna Norden 901 Concept Is Ready for Adventure

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Every year, for the past five years, Husqvarna has worked like clockwork at the EIMCA show in Milan. This is because the Swedish variant from KTM has been steady in its approach of releasing one new street bike in Milan, and one new concept model for possible future production. For 2019, this trend continues.

Behold the Husqvarna Norden 901 concept, a uniquely styled adventure-tourer, with an 899cc parallel-twin engine, and plenty of styling cues to keep your pouring over the high-resolution photos below.

As the name suggests, the Norden 901 gets the upgraded “890” engine from the KTM 890 Duke R, but fit into a package that is similar to the KTM 790 Adventure platform.

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Rumors

Moto Morini Teases New Adventure Bike for EICMA

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A brand we often don’t hear too much about, Moto Morini is showing some interesting prospects that are set to debut at the upcoming EICMA show in Milan.

The biggest comes in the form of this teaser concept sketch (see above), which outlines the lines of an adventure-touring model from the Italian brand.

Now under Chinese ownership, Moto Morini is actually looking like it will have robust set of bikes debuting for the 2020 model year, with this ADV machine joined by both a scrambler and naked model.

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Dirt

Dunlop Finally Steps Up Its ADV Tire Game

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It has always surprised me that while Dunlop is a huge player in the US motorcycle tire market, the American brand hasn’t really latched onto one of its domestic market’s biggest trends on two wheels: adventure-touring.

I am sure that if you asked the tire gurus at Dunlop if they had an ADV tire in their arsenal, they would reply with several models to choose from. The graphic near the bottom of this story seems to support this notion.

But, diving deeper into Dunlop’s lineup shows really a strong showing of DOT-legal dirt bikes tire, but with plenty of white space on the board when it comes to the sizes and expectations common with today’s big ADV bikes.

Well, that needle is moving a bit today, with Dunlop’s latest news in the adventure-touring space. This is because Dunlop has two big announcement for its ADV tire offerings.

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Dirt

This GSX-R1000 Dirt Bike Is Helping Keep Finland Weird

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I will let you in on a little Scandinavian secret. We don’t really include Finland in the crowd. No party invites, no secret handshakes, and certainly no reindeer jerky Christmas baskets.

Sure, it might seem like the Finns are part of the viking neighborhood, but the Finnish are a bit…different from rest of their Nordic neighbors.

Culturally, Finland has more influence from its Russian border, and the Finnish language sounds nothing like the East Nordic languages of Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish, which are almost interchangeable with each other.

This has left Finland as the odd ball in the region, and it spills over into their culture. For exhibit A, I bring you this two-wheeled example. Behold what may possibly the most powerful dirt bike ever created.

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Bikes

Sunday Motors Shows Itself as the Ohvale of Flat Track Racing

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We have already talked about what the pint-sized Ohvale is doing for road racing, with the 24hp race bike lighting up go-kart tracks around the world.

Now, source again the 187cc single-cylinder engine from Daytona, and use that same “built for kids (but really adults)” form-factor, except this time build this creation for the flat tracking realm, and what you have is the Sunday Motors S187.

While the concept is pretty simple, it is the price point that really caught our attention, with the French outfit having two affordable models for consumption – the S187 ($3,300) and the S147 ($2,300).

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Dirt

This KTM-Powered Power Wheels Is All Giggles

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Children of the 1990s will surely remember the Power Wheels line of electric cars for kids.

For the adolescents who had one, it was their first foray into America’s automotive culture, and surely the sight of one today evokes strong memories of dead batteries and slow crashes.

Now 35 years after their debut, Power Wheels is finding a new life in this generation’s collective heart. Take for example this KTM-powered Power Wheels Porsche build, with its 450cc of four-stroke fury and good intentions.

Putting the 911 in emergency phone calls, this Porsche might be tiny, but it is mighty.

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Bikes

Suzuki SV650 Rally Concept by Oberdan Bezzi

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What can one say about the Suzuki SV650 motorcycle? The bike is in its 20th year of production, and though the model has changed a little by little over time, the same basic formula has stayed the same.

Here, we have a special idea from Oberdan Bezzi, who takes the venerable SV650 and turns it into large-format off-roader.

Dubbed the Suzuki SV650 Rally, the concept looks quite convincing, and it plays into the strategy that Suzuki seems to be building off of.

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Dirt

Rumors of the Ducati Multistrada V4 Are Heating Up

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We have heard rumors that Ducati would jam its new V4 engine into a Multistrada-type for quite some time now.

But, most of those rumors seemed to confuse the high-powered adventure-sport for the upcoming Ducati Streetfighter V4, so we dismissed them. And yet, talk of a Ducati Multistrada V4 continues.

Now, the rumors are getting more palatable, and even more credible. One reasons for this is a report from Germany’s Motorrad Magazine, which says that they even saw the Multistrada V4 out testing in Bologna.

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