After hosting the World Superbike Championship this weekend, the Misano World Circuit “Marco Simoncelli” is happy to report that it will continue hosting WSBK for the next four years.
Dorna and Misano’s agreement means that the historic Italian track will continue to host the pinnacle of production motorcycle racing, adding to its already 23-year history, which makes Misano the venue with the third most WSBK rounds ever held there (behind Phillip Island and Assen).
UPDATE: And it’s off again – Van Der Mark will not be replacing Abraham at Assen after all
Michael van der Mark looks set to make his MotoGP debut at Assen this weekend.
The 22-year-old Dutchman will be swapping his Pata Honda CBR1000RR World Superbike machine for the Open class Honda RC213V-RS of the AB MotoRacing team, where he is set to fill in for the injured Karel Abraham.
Abraham badly injured his foot, severly dislocating his toe, in a fall during FP4 in Barcelona.
Rumors that the Dutchman would get the chance to race a MotoGP machine at his home race started circulating in the Dutch media earlier on Monday.
Several sources close to the situation confirmed that the deal was very close to being sealed. There are just a few final details to be settled, including matters such as covering the cost of damage in case of a crash.
Talking to the Varese News, MV Agusta Executive Vice President Giorgio Girelli let slip a number of interesting tidbits about the Italian company — the biggest news of course concerns another company, Cagiva.
Acknowledging the circulating rumors about the revival of the historic brand, Girelli was quick to point out that it’s not in the company’s current plan, but that the possibility was certainly there.
Going further about the idea, Girelli suggested that Cagiva would make the most sense as a purely off-road brand, which would compliment MV Agusta’s pure on-road offerings.
Max Biaggi will return to the World Superbike Championship, taking on two wild card opportunities at Misano and Sepang with the Aprilia Racing Team – Red Devils team.
The news is another boon to WSBK, which is no stranger to seeing past legends returning to its racing scene — as readers will remember, earlier this year Troy Bayliss raced for Ducati Corse in Australia and Thailand, replacing the injured Davide Giugliano.
The Tooele County Commission is searching for a new operator of the Miller Motorsports Park, according to The Salt Lake Tribune.
With the Miller family set to stop operating the track and its facilities at the end of October this year, the county is keen to find a new business partner to lease the 500 acres of land to.
“Our major interest is to enter into a partnership, whether that be an outright sale or a lease” with an entity whose “core competency” is running a facility like the one the Millers are abandoning, said County Commissioner Sean Milne, while speaking to the The Salt Lake Tribune.
Sunday was a pretty good day for British motorcycle racing fans. The first four finishers in both World Superbike races were British riders, and wildcard Kyle Ryde rode a thrilling and aggressive race to finish on the podium in his first ever World Supersport race.
And yet less than 16,000 spectators turned up to Donington Park to watch the action.
When you factor in the creative mathematics which goes into generating spectator numbers at sporting events (motorcycle racing is not alone in this), and then take a wild stab at the number of attendees on some form of freebie or other, then the actual quantity of punters who handed over cold, hard cash for a ticket is likely to be disappointingly low.
Once upon a time, British fans flocked to Brands Hatch to watch WSBK. Though the claims of 100,000 at the Kent track are almost certainly a wild exaggeration, there is no doubt that the circuit was packed.
Fans thronged at every fence, filling every open patch of ground to watch their heroes in combat. So what went wrong?
It is well known that Britain has not produced a Grand Prix World Champion since Barry Sheene, who was crowned 500cc champ in 1977.
In the late 1990’s, with no sign of that changing, British fans turned their attention to World Superbike in their bid to find someone to cheer for.
In recent years the fans have returned to Grand Prix racing, despite ongoing success in World Superbike. British riders have started to get competitive machinery, and there has even been the occasional 125 podium and race win to celebrate.
In 2012 things really started to look up for British fans with Cal Crutchlow flying the flag in the premier class.
Whilst riding for the Tech 3 Yamaha team he claimed two podium finishes. The following season he improved taking four podium finishes and two pole positions.
At the same time, Scott Redding was winning races in Moto2, and narrowly lost out to Pol Espagaro in the Championship race .
Meanwhile, Danny Kent, once heralded as The Great British hope was having a nightmare debut season in Moto2 on the uncompetitive Tech 3 Mistral.
It is a sad day for motorsports fans near Salt Lake City, as Miller Motorsports Park will cease operations at the end of October this year, the track has announced.
The news comes from the Larry H. Miller Group (LHM), the track operator, which has decided not to renew its lease with Toole County on the property, thus effectively closing the track and ceasing its operations.
This news will not affect the schedule of racing events (including the MotoAmerica round in June), driving schools, public karting access, and other group activities that are currently planned at the facility, but it does raise some question marks regarding what will happen to the space once the LHM is no longer running it.
After first saying it would be business as usual, Team Hero EBR has regrouped and found that it will not be continuing in the 2015 World Superbike Championship.
Though a change in announcements, the news is perhaps unsurprising considering the state of EBR and the economic troubles reportedly faced by Hero MotoCorp.
The team quotes the “recent bankruptcy of EBR and the re-prioritizing of efforts by title sponsor Hero” as the cause of its withdrawal, with Pegram Racing hoping to announce its future racing plans soon.
“This is a really hard pill for us all at Pegram Racing to swallow, as we always live by the philosophy of Never Give Up,” said team owner Larry Pegram.
What are you to do with a set of leathers, once they’ve been retired from protecting your motorcycling hide? The answer to that question is why Dainese has teamed up with Regenesi, an Italian firm known for recycling old products and turning them into new ones.
Taking the crashed leathers of Dainese’s sponsored riders, Regenesi turns the leather pieces into various lifestyle items, like wallets ($139), smartphone sleeves ($79), key fobs ($54), etc.
It’s been a long time since The Netherlands had a rider to cheer for as a nation, but Michael van der Mark is changing that. At just 22-years-old, Van der Mark is not only the reigning World Supersport Champion, but he also currently sits 7th in the World Superbike Championship, with the Pata Honda squad.
Don’t let his young age fool you, the Dutchman is all business on the track, most recently grabbing two podiums at his home round in Assen — an impressive feat for any true WSBK rookie.
Equally impressed with their rider, HRC Europe has put together a nice video that features and introduces the young man beneath the helmet, who will also be Casey Stoner’s teammate at the upcoming Suzuka 8-Hour endurance race.
We expect big things from Michael van der Mark over the course of his two-wheeled racing career. Remember his name, you’ll surely be hearing it more and more often in the winner’s circle.