Here is a recipe for success: take a slow-motion camera, and film motorcycles doing awesome things with it. Presto! Internet gold. The folks at Red Bull did just that with their Romaniacs series. Enduro bikes taking big drops, crossing obstacles, and generally being bad ass…I feel like I don’t have to explain this video any further.
We have a strange love affair with motorcycle pit stops here at Asphalt & Rubber. Maybe it’s the added spectacle that comes with rider and crew racing to change tires and fuel the machine.
Maybe it’s the carefully planned and choreographed dance that ensues, with an ever mindful eye on the stopwatch. Maybe it’s because any number of things can go wrong in those few precious seconds, which could alter the result of a race.
Whatever the case may be, we are enthralled, and at 120 frames per second, what takes only a handful of seconds to achieve, is drawn out into nearly a minute of precise motions. So without further ado, watch the RoadRace Factory Red Bull team pit their rider Jake Gagne, and help solidify his second place finish in this year’s Daytona 200.
Stop what you’re doing for the next 18 minutes — just stop right now. Take a ride with Michael Dunlop on his Honda CBR600RR during the Isle of Man TT’s second Supersport race.
We enter the race on lap three of four, Michael Dunlop has just finished his pit stop, and is in second place on corrected time — Bruce Anstey is leading. On the course, Michael is behind John McGuinness and Cameron Donald, who serve as his carrot.
At this point in the TT fortnight, Dunlop has already won three races and the nephew of Joey is looking for win number four as he puts the hammer down coming down Bray Hill. This is more than a video of an epic lap around Snaefell Mountain Course, it’s a lap of Michael Dunlop’s determination. There should be no doubt about Michael being a force to be reckond with in 2014.
Did you miss this weekend’s Daytona 200? It wasn’t on TV, but instead was streamed on DMG’s new website: FansChoice.tv. The content was pretty standard, for anyone who has watched AMA Pro Racing’s TV commentary before, though it was without a high-defition feed, which irked video snobs like us.
Some readers reported other technical difficulties with the steam itself, though for the large-part of viewers, things seemed to work ok. The only probably up until now, is how to watch the Daytona 200 and other races if you didn’t catch them live. DMG has a fix for that now as well: YouTube.
Yamaha has setup a teaser website, complete with countdown clock, for a new motorcycle(s) that should break cover next week. With just over eight days on the clock, at the time of this writing, we won’t have to wait long as we speculate to what Yamaha is brewing for us.
The general consensus so far is that we will see the Yamaha YZF-R25 and Yamaha YZF-R3 twin-cylinder sport bikes, which should come in either 250cc or 300cc formats, depending on which country we are talking about. Yamaha teased us with the YZR-R25 concept at the Tokyo Motor Show, and recent trademark filings in the United States and Europe have tipped off the YZF-R3 model.
From Yamaha’s teaser video we get a quick line drawing and head-on render of a sport bike, which looks very close to the R25 model we saw in Tokyo, which helps fuel the small-displacement sport bike fire further. Also seen in the video is some sort of urban maxi-scooter, along with its presumably accompanying engine. More details as we get it.
In honor of fallen off-road legend Kurt Caselli, the foundation named after him in conjunction with Red Tide Pictures, has decided to produce a movie about his life and stellar racing career.
Taken tragically on November 15, 2013 while competing in the Baja 1000, Caselli is a rider who will not quickly be forgotten, leaving behind a legacy and a stamp on the hearts of those who knew him.
You don’t need a good excuse to watch a motorcycle pit crew practice their pit stop maneuvers, but the upcoming Daytona 200 certainly helps.
Common place in the four-wheeled realm, the pit stop is still a bit of a novelty in two-wheeled racing. Outside of the Endurance World Championship and Isle of Man TT, you would be hard pressed to see a team refuel and change tires on a bike mid-race.
Of course at Phillip Island last year, MotoGP riders had to try their hand at a pit stop. Though the GP riders had a simpler go of things than most, only having to switch bikes instead of servicing one.
Even with that relatively easy task, that Australian pit lane was like armageddon for the MotoGP paddock — so much so, photographers were banned from entering pit lane for that race, and we’ll say nothing about Marc Marquez’s snafu.
So with that all said, enjoy our yearly “pit stop practice video” for the Daytona 200. This year, Benny Solis and his crew show us how it’s done. Looking good boys.
The start of the AMA Pro Road Racing calendar is just around the corner, and that means manufacturers, teams, and riders are getting their PR machines in full swing. Unfortunately, it’s hard to get excited about our venerable national racing series (DMG’s shenanigans aside), but duds like this don’t help in whetting our two-wheeled racing appetite here at Asphalt & Rubber.
Just when we were about to lose all hope though, Triumph shows up and saves the day…with a little help from Jason DiSalvo and Elena Myers. Kneedragging, wheelie popping, backwheel drifting two-wheeled fun, all packaged in a well-done YouTube video that even manages to show a little personality from the riders.
We dig it, we dig it hard. A quick warning though: several orange cones were hurt during the filming of this video. Some footage may not be suitable for adult-sized children with a history of brrraaappptitus. Thanks for the tip Matt!
Keith Code is right, riding a motorcycle is all about learning the art of cornering. Any idiot can grip a ton of throttle, and blast down a straightaway; but when it comes to tipping a bike over into the corner entry, hitting the apex, and gassing out of the exit, a bit more finesse is required.
That is why the California Superbike School curriculum focuses so much on taking a motorcycle through a race track corner. Making a short video at the Willow Springs Raceway, Code gives a preview into his classroom and two-wheeled philosophy.
It’s an interesting watch, even if it is a glorified commercial. After all, we are pretty sure the “Twist of the Wrist” author has forgotten more about motorcycle control than we will ever learn.
We knew at some point that the eight-part “TT Legends” documentary would have to come to an end, and today is that day. For the last seven Wednesday’s, we have been enjoying the racing antics of the Honda TT Legends team, as they compete in road racing and endurance events.
Our final installment comes from the 24 Hours of Le Mans, which also happens to be the final stop on the FIM Endurance World Championship calendar. The Honda TT Legends crew is mathematically in the hunt for the Championship victory, but they need a solid result at Le Mans to solidify a Top 3 position.
The Austrians refer to the KTM 1290 Super Duke R as “The Beast” whenever possible, and as our trained crash test dummy Iwan found out first hand, the name is appropriate for the 180hp streetfighter. The first motorcycle from KTM with traction control, the new Super Duke R is mighty, but pliable…and for good reason: KTM designed it that way.
It may not have as robust of an electronics package as the Aprilia Tuono V4 R APRC ABS, but the 1290 Super Duke R has unsettled the Italian bike as the sport-naked to have in your garage…that is, if you can afford it.
How did The Beast come to be from its RC8 R roots though? Never fret, KTM has put together a short video, which tells the genesis story of this monster machine.