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Top 10 EICMA Show Bikes You May Have Missed

Interesting motorcycles you probably didn't see1 of 11Next Last There’s no cave deep, mountain high or rock heavy enough to have thwarted news of Ducati’s 1199 Panigale superbike launch at the 2012 EICMA show in Milan, Italy. And a few models such as Honda’s NC700S and X, Kawasaki’s Versys 1000 and CRP’s Energica were unveiled without heavy prior fanfare, but gasps of surprise weren’t heard when the wraps were taken off Triumph’s Tiger 1200 Explorer, Husqvarna’s Nuda or MV Augusta’s F3 675 among others, whose existences were revealed months in advance of the show. What we’ve comprised below is our list Top 10 Bikes unveiled at EICMA that didn’t receive top billing but are certainly worthy of your attention.

Nicky needs to slide

Following Joe Kopp's historic win on a Ducati in AMA flat track, alarms bells have been going off in the heads of many, "Hey why doesn't Nicky Hayden jump on the Duke flat tracker?" Well the guys at the excellent American publication Road Racer X are running an online petition and a great marketing wake-up call for Ducati to get Nicky on board the bike for the Indy Mile on August 28th. If he won, and it's a big if considering he hasn't raced flat track in a long time, Nicky would complete the AMA Grand Slam which encompasses victories in the following; half-mile dirt track, mile dirt track, short track, TT, and a Superbike race win. It's an exclusive club with only four members, Dick Mann, Kenny Roberts, Doug Chandler and Bubba Shobert.

The future. But we can't have it

It's no secret that we motorcyclists are getting older. We're ageing because less people are passing their bike test each year (roughly 30,000 last year compared to 50,000 for the 10 years before the new two-part test) and so not only is the pool not growing it's not even being replenished and so the average age isn't being diluted down by yoof. When the going gets tough in any situation, you really get to see who's got their shit-sorted and who's light enough on their feet to adapt to change.