How Not to Test Ride a Motorcycle: Five Mistakes People Make

It seems like most non-Japanese dealers are up for offering at least short test rides, which are way better than no ride at all. But the advent of more motorcycle rental services means you have the opportunity now to give nearly any motorcycle you’re interested in a more thorough shakedown before you pull the ownership trigger. Ride-sharing companies like Twisted Road and Riders Share give you the chance to rent all kinds of bikes from their owners for a day or three. And now even Hertz is branching out into motorcycles (just BMWs for now), like EagleRider has been doing for years with Harleys – but now also a smattering of BMW, Ducati, Yamaha, etc… Having test-ridden more than our share over the years, here’s our best advice about how not to do it.

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Video: The Short, Hard Life Of A MotoGP Front Tire

You don’t see this camera angle very often, and it’s really informative about the stresses a front tire undergoes on a MotoGP bike. What we have here is a testing session with  Danilo Petrucci riding his  Pramac Racing Team Ducati at Jerez with a forward-facing camera mounted to the bike’s belly pan. While viewing a video that consists of just a single shot may sound boring, seeing the tire squirm under braking and cornering is nothing short of awe-inspiring. Watching the suspension work is pretty cool, too. Go ahead, you’ve got 10 minutes to spend wishing you were as talented a rider as Petrucci.

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Bell Helmets DOME R&D Lab Tour

Bell Powersports invited us to tour its American R&D and design facility this week so we could see with our own eyes the care and dedication that goes into the creation and testing of its head-protection efforts. It was enlightening to learn all that goes on behind the scenes at its Scotts Valley, California, location.

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BMW Motorrad Rider Equipment Testing

Watch as BMW Motorrad engineers subject the company’s riding gear to a variety of tests including abrasion resistance, water resistance, tear resistance, and shock absorption. There’s no commentary or explanation, but it’s interesting to see the different devices used to conduct the tests.

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Casey Stoner Given Green Light To Race - If He Wants To

Two-time MotoGP champion Casey Stoner has said repeatedly that he has no desire to race in the 2016 MotoGP season, sticking with the line that he’s a test rider and brand ambassador. However, Motorsport.com is reporting that should he change his mind for whatever reason, “you can’t tell him no,” said Ducati Corse team boss Gigi Dall’Igna.

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Tomfoolery - Rossi's 2016 Title Chances

MotoGP’s season finale at Valencia was a better nail-biting cliffhanger than Game of Thrones, albeit not quite as erotic. The he-said-he-said soap opera of 2015 ended when the season-long heroics from the sport’s golden boy (pictured above) came to no avail when the come-from-behind win failed to materialize. The 2015 championship is now in the record books, but the underlying drama of accusations, mistrust and treachery continue percolating below the surface, waiting to rear in 2016 given the opportunity.

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Trizzle's Take – All That Glitters Is Not Gold

To summarize: a back-to-stock Grom was only marginally slower than the race winner… Tells you how much good a pile of expensive aftermarket parts do.. Think twice before you modify your bike.. It’s unlikely you’re more qualified than 100 Japanese engineers..

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