05 Honda Cbr600rr (philadelphia) on 2040-motos

Moto blog

2012 Isle of Man TT Kickoff Event Will Stream Live Tomorrow, April 18

The most spectacular, and perhaps dangerous, road race in the world is more than a month away — a painfully long wait for fans! — but the Isle of Man is ramping up activities for the 2012 Isle of Man TT with the official race kickoff event slated for tomorrow, Wednesday, April 18, at Villa Marina in the Isle of Man’s capital, Douglas. The launch event takes place at 7pm [GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) or 4pm EST in the U.S.], and will broadcast live via webstream on the TT’s official site homepage: www.iomtt.com.

Bahrain track days

A few months ago, expat (and ex racer) John Beddall made contact to ask if I fancied doing some track day instruction out in Bahrain.  After thinking about it for two seconds, flights were booked and a plan was put in place to look after around forty riders for a day at the Bahrain International Circuit (BIC).  Young Taylor Mac was also recruited to look after any tasty riders that I couldn’t deal with   The Brits out there love their bikes, however, quite a few locals also turned up plus a few others from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Qatar.  Most were on high end Superbikes, like S1000s, Panigales and RSV4s but there was also a healthy number R6s and new 675Rs.   Although this fabulous Hermann Tilke designed circuit is around ten years old incredibly it has never hosted a bike race.  The highlight of the year there is F1 but being owned by the Bahrainian Royal family, there is no desperate need for the circuit to operate as a profitable business.  The track reminded me of Qatar but much more interesting as some great undulations have been built into its desert location. We shared the track with Supercars on the day (20mins on/20mins off) and as you might imagine it was betty swollocks for seven hours in the 30 plus temperatures.  As usual there was a few offs with poor old RS1000 Aprilia mounted Andy breaking his femur early in the day.  Two other buddies appeared to swap bikes mid air in another incident but fortunately escaped unhurt.In the evening everyone stayed for an al fresco dinner in the paddock with the craic going on for hours as the Fosters kept flowing.   All in all it was a brilliant trip and it has left me thinking there could be cost effective ways of getting Brits out there for track days next winter.  I'll keep you posted.Cape Town next to make my racing comeback at the Killarney 8 hour on a CBR150 Honda.  Hopefully I can manage the beast, I'll post a full report next week.

2014 Pata Honda WSBK and WSS Team Presentation

Honda presented its 2014 World Superbike and Supersport team, including the new CBR1000RR SP racebike in a presentation at the Motor Bike Expo in Verona, Italy. Jonathan Rea and Leon Haslam are returning in the Pata Honda team colors to ride the CBR1000RR SP in the WSBK class while Michael van der Mark and Lorenzo Zanetti will ride the CBR600RR in the WSS championship. Last season was disappointing for Honda, with both Rea and Haslam missing significant time due to leg injuries.