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I’m Ducati Superbike 1199 Superquadrata, Bitch.

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The tale that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s business card at one point read “I’m CEO, Bitch” is in fact true. Perhaps tired of dealing with investors and businessmen that didn’t take him seriously, or perhaps the young entrepreneur faced a tough time telling industry specialists twice or three times his age how the world was about to change, ol’Zuck was surely responding to the titles others had placed on him. Enervated at hearing phrases like “that kid” or “the Harvard dropout”, Zuckerberg’s “I’m CEO, Bitch” business card was not only about the young CEO having an equal seat at the table, but also about his personal brand, and reminded whomever held the card that were talking to the creator of one of most popular websites ever on the internet.

If we can stretch that metaphor a bit further, the new Ducati Superbike has its own identity crisis in the eyes of the public. Like the Ducati Vyper and Ducati Cayenne that came before it, we were first introduced to Ducati’s new flagship with its internal name: Xtreme. Whether out of the desire to drive webpage hits by creating controversy, or just actually being that gullible/naive about the story, mainstream outlets began using the nomenclature as if the Bologna brand had adopted product names that tugged on a common heart strings from the Twilight faithful.

Cleverly deciphering Ducati’s secret model numbering scheme, more educated publications latched onto the more likely Superbike 1199 verbiage. There was over course precedent for this +1 trend, after watching the Superbike 998 become the 999. Knowing that Ducati would be releasing a ridiculously over-square v-twin motor with the new Superbike, we also learned early on that the new power plant would be known as the Superquadrata, which sounds far more clever in Italian than its translated English. With all these different names being banded about for the same machine, we wanted to definitely put the business card wars to bed, and say conclusively that the new flagship from Bologna will be called the Ducati Superbike 1199 Superquadrata.

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Banter

Why Can’t All Motorcycle Videos Be Shot This Well?

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If I didn’t already know that this video was made by some guys in their spare time, I could have sworn that this short film was one of the better efforts by Ducati or Dainese (or anyone in motorcycling for that matter) at some cool videography. The brainchild of , this short video is the work product of several A/V industry professionals who just wanted to mess around with some cameras, a bike, and the open road on their days off from working for the man. Shot around the San Francisco Bay Area, astute eyes will see scenes from San Francisco, Altamont Pass, the Pacific Coast Highway, and other Nor Cal staples.

When you consider how much time, money, and effort went into Ducati’s Diavel ad spot, and the product that came out of that production, it sort of baffles your mind about what’s going on in the motorcycle industry (at least they didn’t hire “a publication of record” to produce it for them). There’s clearly a need in the market for better motorcycle videos, and there’s clearly a market of talented videographers out there to fill the need, Oh, did we mention Barry is looking for a job?

Source: Vimeo

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News

Ducati Superbike 1199 Spotted Again

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The 2012 Ducati Superbike 1199 is shaping up to be the school yard tease, giving us a glimpse of its still unfinished form seemingly on a regular basis now. Spotted with another cameraphone “spy photo” somewhere on the streets of Italy, we get a fairly clear side profile of the new 1199. The underslung exhaust is perhaps the focal point of this unofficial teaser shot, which is interesting as we hear Bologna has recently been having internal meetings about its final design.

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News

2012 Ducati Streetfighter 848 & Ducati Streetfighter 1198 Coming in September

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Yelling at the top of our lungs words like “Scoop!” and “Exlclusive!” or the now more trendy “OMGLOLWTFBBQ” really isn’t our style, and let’s be honest, anyone with half a latte for a brain who had been paying attention to Ducati’s line-up the past few years could easily predict the Italian company’s next move with the Streetfighter line. That being said, we’ve gotten details from several highly credible sources that Ducati will debut to the public two new Streetfighters in September.

Replacing the Streetfighter 1098 is the 2012 Ducati Streetfighter 1198, which as the name suggests, will get a 100cc displacement increase (full disclosure: an example of this motorcycle sits in my garage (said bike is shown above from a cool light-painting photo shoot that Scott Jones did), thus making me forever biased towards the original liquid-cooled v-twin wheelie monster from Bologna).

The catch however is that the new motor will not come from the leftover Superbike 1198 mills, and instead Ducati is using the Testastretta 11° motor (as seen in the Multistrada 1200 and Diavel) in the new Streetfighter 1198, meaning the motorcycle will by pass the bi-yearly Ducati tax (a valve job around here is roughly $1,000), and instead get hit with a perhaps more yearly 15,000 mile valve adjustment intervals (thank you Jesus!).

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News

Ducati Posts 61% Q2 Sales Increase in North America

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Ducati North America has posted its Q2 2011 sales figures, and business is apparently booming for the Italian company in the US, Mexican, and Canadian markets, as sales are up 61% in the second quarter of this year. Selling over 5,200 bikes to customers so far this year, Ducati North America’s year-to-date sales are also up an outstanding 63%. Helping drive the sales increases are the extremely popular Multistrada 1200 models and the new Diavel. Along with the already sales-topping Superbike 848 EVO and Monster 796, these models account for most of Ducati’s sales growth.

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News

Best Shots of the Ducati Superbike 1199 So Far

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Though still small in resoltuion, these are the best shots of the upcoming 2012 Ducati Superbike 1199 that we’ve seen to-date. Testing at the Mugello circuit in Italy a few months ago (alongside Ducati Corse and the Ducati Desmosedici GP12), Ducati is slowly progressing on the Superbike 1199‘s final design, which sees the flagship motorcycle ditching its trellis frame for a MotoGP-inspired stressed airbox front end.

The Superquadrata v-twin motor is built overly-square, and should produce nearly 200hp in its max trim. Other features are the LED headlight system, a horizontally-mounted rear shock, and a unicorn tears lubrication system (we’re not so sure about one of these three features). Expect more photos and info to “leak” out of Ducati as we get closer to EICMA, where the Ducati Superbike 1199 will debut. Thanks for the tip Geoffry!

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Rumors

Ducati Considering SuperSport Model

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One of the cooler parts that comes from running Asphalt & Rubber is the feedback we get from our Bothan spy network that read the site. No sooner did we publish Luca Bar’s renders of his Ducati SuperSport concept, did we get tips that Ducati was actually currently considering such a model for its future model road map. There’s no doubt that the SS line had a cult following in its day, and the fact still remains that Ducati does not have a “tamer sport bike” in its line that would appeal to the veteran Ducatisti.

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Bikes

Ducati Supersport Concept by Luca Bar

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Tracing back to when Ducati made the SS line, Luca Bar has put pen to pad again, rendering a modern-day version of the Ducati Supersport. Envisioning a motorcycle based off Ducati’s popular Monster 1100 EVO platform, the Supersport would feature the same 1,078cc air-cooled two-valve v-twin motor of the Monster, which should provide plenty of power and take some design cues from the top-spec naked bike. Bar also points out that using the Monster as the basis for the Supersport could help keep costs down as well, and keep the MSRP close to the Monster 1100 EVO (we’d imagine pricing would have the SS as slightly pricier than the Monster).

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News

Videos: The Ducati Diavel Explained

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We’ve already talked at length at how much we liked riding the Ducati Diavel, as the Italian company’s take on the American power cruiser is a peppy and fun machine to ride on the streets and in the canyons. While there’s been plenty of reservations prior to the Diavel’s launch, Ducati seemingly has a winner on its hands as many dealerships in the US are sold-out on the machine, and the Bologna factory just reported that 5,000 units have been sold worldwide already this year (about 1,000 or so of those ending up in the United States).

There’s also a strong business case as to why Ducati had to build the Diavel, and by most journalists’ accounts, the company has successfully walked the line between staying true to the Ducati brand and extending the Italian company’s reach onto riders in other demographics. Shedding some insight onto the development and features of the Ducati Diavel, the Italian company put together a series of videos that expound further on perhaps one of the hottest bikes for 2011.

They’re obviously marketing materials and an overview of some of the Diavel’s core features, but for someone on the fence about buying a new Ducati Diavel, there’s a bit of edutainment to be had here. Find all five videos after the jump.

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News

Roland Sands Desmo Tracker Begins to Take Form

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We’ve had our fair share of controversial articles here on Asphalt & Rubber, with some posts dealing with hot-button topics, while others were designed to stir the pot a bit. Usually though we know what sort of trouble we’re getting ourselves into, even before the first comment is left by a reader, but no article caught us by surprise more than our initial coverage of Roland Sands’s latest custom project: the RSD Desmo Tracker. A flat track bike with a Desmosedici RR heart, there’s something about taking the MotoGP replica and turning it into a steel-shoe racer that elicits a very visceral response from Ducatisti and flat trackers alike.

Maybe it’s because those two parts of the motorcycle world are just that far apart — one is reserved for dentists having a mid-life crisis, and the other for back-woods hillbillies that can only turn left. Maybe it’s because people think that if you own a $40,000 Desmosedici RR, the last thing you should be doing with the machine is making it something else. There’s no doubt that Desmo is the sort of thing little boys put posters of on their bedroom wall, so does tampering with Bologna’s GP opus change that childhood fantasy?

We could delve into this topic further, but I doubt we’d get very far in the conversation. I will say this though, just like you can’t judge a book by its cover, you can’t judge a bike by its build progress. That being said, this post is one of those articles that we see trouble brewing a mile away. A friendly reminder: the comments section is below, near the bottom of the page.

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