77 Yamaha 750 Tripple on 2040-motos

Moto blog

New Rossi AGVs: Investments for the future

Valentino Rossi is edging towards the twilight of his career and anything that has been attached to the biggest star to come out of MotoGP is destined to be worthy of a collector’s treasure trove. Whenever Rossi has raced at a track that has some kind of importance to the Italian his AGV often gets coated with a one-off Aldo Drudi special, this year has seen the Wake Up! and Faces designs.

2014 AMA Supercross – Detroit Results

Yoshimura Suzuki‘s James Stewart captured his third win of the 2014 AMA Supercross season and 48th 450 class victory of his career, tying him with Ricky Carmichael for second on the all-time win list behind Jeremy McGrath‘s 72. Racing before a crowd of 50,856 fans at Ford Field in Detroit, Stewart took the lead from holeshot-taker Cole Seely shortly before the end of the second lap and led the rest of the 20-lap race for the win. Stewart led by as much as 7.1 second but eased off at the end, crossing the finish less than two seconds ahead of Kawasaki‘s Ryan Villopoto.

I can die happy!

As an eighteen year old Kenny Roberts was my bike racing God.  I loved Barry Sheene but as a Yamaha FS1E rider I always wanted the little American to win simply because his bike resembled mine.  The coverage of Grand Prix in the late seventies was sketchy but I clearly remember watching the epic Sheene/Roberts battle unfold at the Silverstone GP on my council estate telly.  The Dutchman, Wil Hartog was hanging in there for a while but as the laps unfolded it became a two way battle with Sheene looking favourite to win.  Sheene lost the most time as the pair lapped a certain George Fogarty so my hero Roberts eventually won by just three hundredths of a second.  I’m not sure what happened next but being a Sunday we would no doubt be skidding around later in the day at the Pines chippie pretending to be Roberts and Sheene.  Fast forward thirty four years and a boyhood fantasy came true as I headed out on Chris Wilson’s 1980 Roberts machine for the Barry Sheene tribute laps at last weekend’s Moto GP.  It crackled into life instantly and felt as sharp as any of the more modern 500s I used to race.  The temperature gauge had a maximum marker on 60 degrees so to begin with I was nervous as it didn’t move but being a hot day (although still keeping my hand on the clutch) I convinced myself it wasn’t working.    The bike felt tiny, not helped by the fact I only just squeezed into my 1989 Marlboro Yamaha leathers.  It still felt rapid though as I played out the 1979 classic in my head while getting tucked in down the Hanger straight.  Steve Parrish was also out there on one of Barry’s 500cc Heron Suzukis so we did our best to copy the famous last lap at Woodcote Corner where Sheene came so close to winning his home GP. As a lad I would have said the chances of me riding round Silverstone on a GP winning Kenny Roberts machine were zero, but in the words of Gabrielle, dreams can come true!