#superbike

Much as there is a difference between the performance of an Aprilia V4 and a Royal Enfield single, donning the proper timepiece is a necessity in the world of professional motorsports. Certain watch elements are handy for spectators wishing to monitor laptimes, including accuracy, durability and readability. Stopwatch functions (which most non-moon phase chronographs have integrated), sapphire crystals (for the scratch resistance necessary in harsh trackside environments) and reliable illumination (for night and/or endurance races) are critical. Whether sprinting the quarter mile or tackling a 24-hour attempt, here are the top 10 watches for motorsport enthusiasts.

Ducati sent out a “save the date” notice alerting of an upcoming launch event and indications are it will be related to the company’s new V-4 superbike. The notice teases a Sept. 7 launch at the Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli, promising “the sound of a new era is coming”. We’ve already seen spy photos of Ducati’s V-4 prototype undergoing testing and it appears we’ll see the first official signs of it soon.

Be a Facebook hater if you must, but if you’re involved in any sort of information-gathering work, FB is amazing. Case in point, somebody turned me onto the 1970’s Motorcycle Road Racing page on FB, where I stumbled onto some great old images I’d never seen before.

Ducati released a video teasing a new model to be unveiled at the July 7 World Superbike round at Laguna Seca. The video, titled “When the End Tells the Whole Story,” offers a few tantalizing glimpses of the new model which we suspect to be a final edition version of the Ducati Panigale R.

As Bob Dylan wrote, the times, they are a’changing. All you need to do is take a look at our latest superbike shootout to see that technology is playing an ever-increasing role in how we ride motorcycles. What about simpler things, like instruments? Well, superbike instrumentation has been changing, too. Of our seven superbike contestants, only one has an old-school, swept needle tachometer. The remaining six count on some kind of bar graph. Three of the bikes have LCD screens delivering at least some of their information while the remaining four utilize color on TFT screens. So, we thought we’d ask our loyal *MO*rons what they thought about the instruments. Vote for all the instruments you like, and we’ll figure out which is the best.

We’re getting a little giddy around here as we begin to gather the gamut of new superbikes for our most intensive shootout of the year! We’ve got a fabulous two-day street ride to begin our testing, stringing together some of our favorite twisty roads on an overnight trip to begin our superbike shootout. And then the hardcore performance testing will take place over two days at Auto Club Speedway with our friends at Fastrack Riders. If you can be near Fontana, California, May 26-27, you should sign yourself up for a fun day at the track with us!

As expected, BMW introduced the production version of the carbon fiber HP4 RACE at the 2017 Auto Shanghai show. To be produced in a limited run of 750 units, the BMW HP4 RACE claims a fully-fueled weight of just 378 pounds while its S1000RR-based inline-Four claims a maximum output of 212 hp when rated at its crankshaft.

As far as 2017 is concerned, this might be the year we remember as the one that saw the entire liter-class field go electric. No, I don’t mean like that. I mean electronic rider aids – every major player in the field has them now. Honda and Suzuki, with their CBR1000RR and GSX-R1000, respectively, had held out on introducing riding aids (beyond differing power modes in the Suzuki’s case) until this year. Meanwhile, the rest of the competition has leap-frogged ahead, introducing highly advanced traction control, wheelie control, launch control, slide control, and all kinds of other controls previously only seen on MotoGP machines.

No, it’s not quite a full factory effort again, but the fact the surprise announcement took place in the hallowed halls of American Honda’s old race shop behind Door #10 in Torrance shows Big Red is back and seriously behind the effort.

We recently sat down with two-time MotoAmerica Superbike champ Cameron Beaubier at the bLU cRU’s headquarters in Cypress, California. Besides a little disappointment at not having his 2016 championship-winning bike parked underneath the Christmas tree, Beaubier has been busy sliding a YZ450F around his new flat track and is anxiously awaiting the chance to defend his title in 2017.

Just as we suspected, Honda today unveiled its much anticipated 2017 CBR1000RR at Intermot in Germany. We first reported on the new CBR last month as spy photos started to come out, but Honda still had a few surprises in store with this announcement. Two, actually. First, Honda decided to release its up-spec model, the CBR1000RR SP, ahead of the standard edition (Honda says to expect an announcement on that one come November). And second, there would be a second, limited-edition model, the CBR1000RR SP2, homologated strictly for racing purposes (more on that later).

Well, we knew a new Suzuki GSX-R1000 was on the way, but I don’t know if we were expecting two of them? The one with one “R” is for riding, the one with two – GSX-R1000R – is for racing and packed with lots of things Suzuki says make it ready for Superstock competition right out of the box, oh drool… Both bikes of course are lighter, more powerful and meaner than any GSX-R heretofore. And it’s about time, because it’s been since 2009.

The 2016 MotoAmerica season has now come to a close, and American Cameron Beaubier is the king of the Superbike class for another year. However, his path to the championship was anything but easy. Herein is a brief overall breakdown of the 2016 MotoAmerica season.

Dear MOby,

Companies that go racing love to promote how the lessons learned at the racetrack trickle down to the products we use on the street. Besides being great marketing fodder, the idea behind racing is to develop products that will benefit the everyday consumer. We generally think of sportbikes (and liter-class sportbikes in particular) as being direct translations of racetrack development trickling down to production models, but we sometimes forget about the only part of the motorcycle in continuous contact with the road: its tires.