Attending the emissions-free TTXGP
I just finished arranging a very last-minute trip to this year’s Isle of Man TT. A loaner Triumph Daytona 675 has been arranged, flights and ferries have been booked, and I’m pretty sure I landed the...
View ArticleFirst TTXGP Qualifying Session on the Books
The TTXGP electric race bikes took the to Isle of Man’s famed Mountain Course for the first time ever on Wednesday, and we know this much for sure—there will be a race come Friday.
View ArticleResults of the first-ever green GP
The world’s first zero-emissions road race, the TTXGP, started with a whirr at this year’s Isle of Man TT. “That sounds like a VCR rewinding,” another journalist next to me stated, as the first...
View ArticleBuell’s Blast discontinued in dramatic fashion
Our September 2009 issue included a short piece lamenting Buell’s entry-level Blast, and its general failure to convert the non-riding public into Buell-blooded bikers.
View ArticleWe’re riding Roberts’ diabolical TZ750 flat tracker at the Indy Mile!
It’s the bike that inspired Kenny Roberts, one of the most fearless motorcycle racers that ever lived, to utter these immortal words: “They don’t pay me enough to ride that thing!”
View ArticleRide Putnam Park with us after the Indy GP!
You’ve heard of the “dog days” of summer—those hot, sultry August afternoons when Sirius, the Dog Star, hovers close to the sun. We’re looking forward to our own variation, called the “Duc days.”
View ArticleFalling flat on my back at the Indy flat-track
The look on the mechanic’s face in the first picture says it all: “If anything goes wrong out there, you better pray to God you don’t survive the crash.”
View ArticleChasing a speed record on a 60-year-old Vincent single
Maxton is a sleepy nowheresville in a dry county along the North and South Carolina border, on a broad coastal plain that stretches to the Atlantic ocean 60 miles away.
View ArticleMotorcyclist attempts to break the outright electric motorcycle speed record!
I’m in Salt Lake City tonight, working my way slowly toward the town of Wendover, on the Nevada/Utah border. Home to Wendover Air Force Base, where the B-29 Superfortress the Enola Gay was housed...
View ArticleCleared for Takeoff.
Talk about cutting it close: technical inspection closed at 5 pm today, and the lead scrutineer signed off on our last bit of wayward safety wire at 4:58 pm. We have our blessed tech approval sticker...
View ArticleA salt virgin no more…
It's difficult to describe the how bizarre it feels speeding along the Bonneville Salt Flats. The flat, utterly featureless landscape, the imperceptible horizon, and the blinding monochrome sameness...
View ArticleLet’s get naked!
OK, so the Ducati fairing/whale tail combo isn't working as well as we hoped. Time to try something completely different:
View ArticleThat’s more like it—166 mph on electricity!
Before we left the salt flats on Friday we pulled the fairing and tail off the Lightning prototype. I was having high-speed stability issues we thought might have been related to aerodynamics....
View ArticleHonda greens up its Kumamoto motorcycle manufacturing facility
“The Factory at the foot of Mount Aso, where humans and nature are as one.” That’s how Honda literature describes the Kumamoto factory, the largest motorcycle manufacturing facility in the world.
View ArticleLet the film legend’s image rest in peace!
To use a phrase inspired by another motorcycle-riding hipster, Arthur “Fonzie” Fonzarelli, Steve McQueen has officially jumped the shark. Still a style icon almost 30 years after his death, McQueen’s...
View ArticleScenes from the Buell Motorcycle Factory Liquidation Sale
The first sign appears a few miles away, stuck into the frozen grass alongside I-43. “Motorcycle Liquidation” it reads, black letters on a yellow background, with an arrow pointing right. I exit at...
View ArticleHarley-Davidson’s Helmet Project
In addition to the main gallery and a restaurant/retail wing, the 130,000 square-foot Harley-Davidson Museum complex in downtown Milwaukee also includes a third structure dubbed “The Garage.” This is...
View ArticleMSF and Caltrans cooperate to improve motorcycle safety
Special thanks to two eagle-eyed, camera-toting readers, Patrick Duffy and Steven Weyrick, for capturing these images of a special motorcycle awareness message appearing recently on the digital signs...
View ArticleScorpion Helmets protects USA Olympic Bobsledder Erin Pac
Watch closely when the Team USA female bobsledders hit the ice on February 24th and motorcyclists will note a familiar, S-shaped logo peeking up from above the windscreen on Erin Pac's sled.
View ArticleHonda CBX V12 Video
Our buddy Justin Fivella over at Super Streetbike magazine turned us on to this radical V12 Honda CBX built by Andreas Georgeades, an ex-pat South African currently residing in Southern California.
View ArticleDedicated fans continue the Buell Homecoming tradition
Despite the dissolution of Buell motorcycles, the popular Buell Homecoming gathering will continue in 2010 thanks to the dedicated efforts of core Buell enthusiasts.
View ArticleDon Brown, 1929-2010
Don Brown was the most influential person in the motorcycle industry that you never heard of. Brown was a public persona in the fifties, when he served a stint as Editor of Cycle magazine, penned the...
View ArticleHabitat, the Movie
Wisconsin Sportriders (WiSpr), a group that I'm lucky enough to ride with on occasion, has released a film documenting their last year of street riding.
View ArticleYes, says The Corporate Library
Harley-Davidson made the news earlier this week at MSN.com, in an inauspicious article titled "5 of the Worst Corporate Boards."
View ArticleBill Warner makes a mind-bending 272 mph standing-mile pass at Maxton!
Last weekend's season opener at North Carolina's Maxton Monster Mile, home of the East Coast Timing Association's land-speed trials was history making. Bill Warner rode his turbocharged Suzuki...
View ArticleMotus, America’s newest motorcycle maker, debuts its MST-01
Pratt & Miller is an engineering powerhouse. Best known for its work with General Motors--the firm developed the LeMans-winning Corvette C5-R and C6.Rs, the SCCA champion Cadillac CTS-V, and so...
View ArticleCustom sportbike builder turns to baggers
Who says the cruiser market is (literally) dying off? Our friend Robert Fisher at Florida’s Roaring Toyz, the nation’s leading outfitter of custom sportbikes, just sent news that he’s opening a new...
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