Another motorcycle safety commercial…  This one is original at least.  It was created by The Motor Accident Commission of South Australia, the TV AD utilizes real MotoGP footage and has an appearance by Mick Doohan.

Hit the jump and check it out for yourself.

Unlike with most athletes, motorcycle racers’ faces remain hidden during competition. Except for promotional events or pre- and post-race interviews, the faces of our racing heroes are shielded under protective helmets with tinted visors. You don’t see the same human emotion in their faces like you can when soccer players score a goal or baseball players hit a home run.

But one thing helmets provide is a canvas for racers to express their creativity and personality.

The 2009 MotoGP Championship is almost complete, so we thought we’d take a look at some of the top helmet designs from the season. Here’s our list of the most interesting helmet designs for 2009. Let us know what you think about our choices or suggest ones we missed.

The Star Motorcycles VMax is the most powerful production streetbike in mass production. On October 25, 2009, a few VMax enthusiasts will be tearing up the dragstrip at Sacramento Raceway Park. The event is open to all www.starVmax.com and www.rswarrior.com members.

With a new contract with Ducati in hand, Nicky Hayden returned to his home in Owensboro, Ky., for the MotoGP’s mid-season break. So what has the Kentucky Kid been doing on his time off? Riding his own Ducati 848 Nicky Hayden edition bike, of course!

Check out the clip as Hayden takes his first ride on his namesake 848.

If you missed it the first time around, the National Geographic Channel will be airing the Motorcycle Crash Tech show again tomorrow (Thurs, Sept 24th).

An extraordinary behind-the-scenes look at the remarkable new technologies being used to avoid motorcycle crashes, and prevent injuries or even death when a racer or rider does go down.

Hit the jump to watch the preview.

You’ll realize how cheesy that headline is after watching the pretty rad video that Yamaha has released.

Yamaha’s new motocross bike has taken a radical new approach.  The engine is backwards.

Yamaha’s reason for doing this is to shift the heavy end of the motor more to the center of the motorcycle to make it more agile and responsive.  Slanting the cylinder also made for a straighter pathway for the air intake at the front of the bike.

Of course you can read about many more details and features of Yamaha’s YZ on Motorcycle.com where they just wrote a preview for it this week!  There’s also a bunch of photos to go through if you just don’t feel like doing any reading.

Check out the rest of the post for Yamaha’s official video on the 2010 YZ450F and also why I mention sketching (also, see if you can understand any of the equations that are scribbled down throughout the video)

BMW’s new S1000RR is one of the mostly highly anticipated sportbikes to come along in years. Its four-cylinder motor has a larger bore than anything else in its 1000cc class, plus all the latest racetrack goodies like a slipper clutch, variable-height intake manifolds and traction control.

We’re still a few months away from testing it for ourselves, but we can across this great video that will give you a little insight into how this Beemer howls at top speed. This was shot at the infamous Nordschleife course at Germany’s Nürburgring, a 14-mile road circuit built in the 1920s that is perhaps the grandest and most challenging racetrack ever built.

Check out the S1000RR on the track along with four other videos after the jump.

In the world of motocross, this year’s most highly anticipated machine is Yamaha’s all-new YZ450F. All kinds of crazy rumors about the bike have spread across the internet, and there’s some real doozies out there. In this video from Yamaha, multi-time motocross and supercross champ James Stewart debunks some of the crazier rumors, with special guest appearances by Valentino Rossi, Ben Spies, Colin Edwards, James Toseland, Jorge Lorenzo and TV personality Erin Bates.

What, you mean it’s not powered by a 1.2-gigawatt flux capacitor?

Motorcycle.com will get a chance to see the new YZ this week in a private unveiling, and we’ll unleash full details when the embargo ends on September 8. Stay tuned!

Hit the jump, watch and learn.

Ever wonder what it’s like to drive the world famous Laguna Seca race track?  Apparently the folks at Google were curious and so they sent out one of the Google street view cars onto the track.

For some reason the Google street view doesn’t include a whole lap of the track, just from around turn five to turn 10.  That portion does include the famous Corkscrew but the Google street view car doesn’t seem to capture it, which does make sense to anyone who’s taken the corkscrew before.  One of the things that makes the Corkscrew so challenging is the fact that it’s so steep you don’t even know where the road is until you’re going down it (or, if you’re unlucky, driving down the dirt).  Likely the Google street view camera was filming the sky at that point.

The filming appears to have been done during a practice session at last year’s ALMS race, as you can see the black and yellow GT1 Corvette and one of the Flying Lizzard Motorsports Porsches.  Ride along with the Google street view car at Laguna Seca here:

Google Streetview Drives Laguna Seca

There’s a great series running on Motorcycle.com all about getting you and your motorcycle ready for road racing.  If you are interested at all getting out on the track to be just like those MotoGP racers, you have some very interesting reading ahead of you.

The series is very extensive, it starts off with just you and your motorcycle and proceeds all the way to what you should expect, learn, know and bring to the track.  Any expenses made are highlighted in each article so you can get an idea just how much it will cost to get you on your way with this addiction.  The author, Jeremiah Knupp, took his 2000 Ducati 748 along on this journey.

Here’s 9 handy guides to help you start motorcycle road racing:

1. Introduction: Leaving the lawn chair

2. Geoff May: one man show to AMA pro – Pointers and Interview with Pro Geoff May

3. Prepping your bike for track school

4. Cleared for Take-Off: Getting Your Race License

5. Building a Supersport racer – the minimum

6. Building a Supersport racer – the priorities

7. Advanced Supersport modifications

8. Building a Supersport Racer – Stage III, the Finishing Touches

9. Preparing for your first race weekend

Even if you don’t plan on ever getting into road racing, I found the articles to be quite fascinating as to how Jeremiah Knupp (the author) got prepared for his new hobby.

Give the articles a skim at least, there’s some great pictures from photographer Holly Marcus to check out.  I’ve included a few shots below that I pulled from some of the photo galleries.