#racing

Lucky us/we/I got the invite up to Buttonwillow Raceway in California to get a look at what Chuck Graves and Yamaha have in store to conquer MotoAmerica’s new Junior Cup series, which replaces last season’s KTM 390 class. KTM s are still welcome, but now they’ll be duking it out with Kawasaki Ninja 300s and 400s, Honda CBR500Rs, Suzuki GSX250Rs – and nine teenagers receiving factory-ish support from Graves Motorsports.

Dorna Sports officially introduced the FIM Enel MotoE World Cup, a new electric Grand Prix racing class set to begin in 2019 as part of the MotoGP tour. Dorna also unveiled the Energica EvoGP, a race-tuned version of the Ego that will be the used for the MotoE World Cup.

The MotoGP season is months away but that hasn’t stopped Ducati from presenting its 2018 Desmosedici GP racebikes and returning riders Andrea Dovizioso and Jorge Lorenzo.

It’s a new year which means it’s time once again for the world’s most grueling off-road endurance race, the Dakar Rally. Celebrating its 40th edition, the 2018 Dakar Rally runs Jan. 6-20, starting in Lima, Peru, crossing into Bolivia with a rest day in La Paz, and then entering Argentina for the finish line at Cordoba.

It’s not unusual to hear a Yamaha R1 engine screaming its cross-plane-crank howl down a racetrack, but it is odd to hear eight of them in chorus on a dirt-track course in cars. That was the combo of odd sights and sounds we witnessed at Perris Auto Speedway during an exhibition event at the Budweiser Oval Nationals sprint-car race on November 11.

This news slipped under our radar last month, but when the Kawasaki Ninja 400‘s European debuted at EICMA, the World Superbike Championship announced the new model will be eligible to race in the series’ relatively new World Supersport 300 class.

Privateer Superbike/Superstock 1000 racer Hayden Gillim suffered a horrifying crash last August at MotoAmerica’s race event at the new Pittsburgh International Race Complex, culminating in Gillim ragdoll-tumbling into a tire barrier at high speed while his GSX-R1000 cartwheeled and bounced all the way over the fence. The race was immediately red-flagged, as Gillim surely would be requiring prompt medical attention.

The final installment of this year’s diatribe should, one thinks, start with an examination of the season preview from back in February. Heading into Qatar, the conventional thinking was that Maverick Viñales, newly and firmly ensconced on the factory Yamaha, the best bike on earth of late, would challenge triple world champion Marc Marquez and his Repsol Honda – you remember, the one with the acceleration issues – for the world championship.

Dear MOby,

All season long, we at MO have been chanting the mantra, “Let Valencia Decide.” With the title unsettled heading into the weekend, the opportunity for a riveting finale existed (if only mathematically), Marc Marquez holding a 21 point lead over Ducati pilot Andrea Dovizioso as the riders lined up on the grid. The math caught up with Dovi on Lap 25 when, desperate to get past insubordinate teammate Jorge Lorenzo, he ran hot into Turn 8, ultimately laying his GP17 down gently in the gravel. And so the 2017 title was awarded at Valencia, having been decided some weeks earlier.

So, 2017 has all come down to this – a technical showdown between Repsol Honda studmuffin Marc Marquez, gripping a 21-point lead, and a determined Andrea Dovizioso, virtually hopeless onboard the Ducati GP17, for all the marbles on Sunday. Even if Dovi wins, Marquez has to finish worse than 11th in order to choke this one away. To clarify, it is a showdown in only the most technical, theoretical sense. It will take a Dovizioso win and direct intervention by the racing gods to keep Marc Marquez from MotoGP title #4 on Sunday.

So, you’ve got a 2017 (or are planning on buying a 2018) Aprilia RSV4 in an RR or RF configuration and you know what it really needs is more performance. Well, Aprilia’s got just the thing for you in the form of the Aprilia Racing Factory Works Kit. The special parts are developed by Aprilia Racing in conjunction with superstock and superbike championships around the world to assure their compliance to series rules. Racers (or riders with deep pockets and a disregard for street legality) who want to take their RSV4s to the next level should take a gander at these parts which are directed towards “maximizing engine performance, reducing overall weight, and improving aerodynamics.”

Factory Ducati #1 rider Andrea Dovizioso could hope for but one thing as the starting lights went out at the wet Sepang circuit – win the race and keep the title chase alive heading back to Spain for the finale. Trailing defending champ Marc Marquez by 33 points entering the day, he needed to cut the deficit to less than 25 to avoid having to endure another nauseating Marquez title celebration. By winning the race, and with Marquez off the podium, the 2017 title will be decided in two weeks at Valencia, and is more likely to end with a whimper than a bang.

The Island Classic is an annual vintage motorcycle festival held at the iconic Phillip Island circuit in Australia, and its headlining event is the International Challenge teams competition for bikes manufactured between 1973 and 1984. In years past, the event has been dominated by British and Australian teams, as American efforts have been thus far only modestly supported.

For the fourth time in five premier class seasons, Honda’s remarkable Marc Marquez stands on the cusp of a championship. His win in Australia last week left him with a short to-do list this week in Malaysia: 1) Try to finish no worse than second. 2) Try to finish ahead of Andrea Dovizioso. 3) If both #1 and #2 fail, lose to Dovizioso by seven points or less. Otherwise, he will have to return to Valencia in two weeks for some kind of decider. Probably the best thing for #93 would be to euthanize this title chase Sunday under the cover of darkness, many time zones removed from home, setting up a triumphal fait accompli return to Spain. We couldn’t disagree more.