Shockwaves from the Japanese earthquake and tsunami continue to spread. Today the FIM announced that the April 24 round of the MotoGp championship at Motegi will be postponed till later in the year, being sandwiched in between the Aragon round and the Australian one (October 2nd).
The Tokyo Motor Show, one of the most prestigious and influential in the world, was scheduled to open on the 25th March. However, traffic chaos, fuel shortages and rolling blackouts have placed the event in jeopardy and it was announced today that the show will not be held this year.
HRC are trying to get on with things, especially with the season opening this weekend. Their president has said that the company is not directly affected but staff are finding it very difficult to keep the work rate up, what with fuel shortages, aftershocks and only 50% of Tokyo’s public transport functioning.
Remember some time ago I published a Youtube video about the “crashproof bike” ? It featured a bike supposedly fitted with all sorts of clever technology to prevent accidents. However, when the time came to demonstrate the system, the rider pulled out onto the road and got himself collected by a truck. At the time I expressed the opinion that it was a carefully-staged event, although I did leave just the slightest doubt in the back of my mind as the video was so professionally done. Well, yesterday the truth came out. The video WAS faked, albeit for the right reasons. The Thames Valley Safer Roads Partnership in England put the video together as a graphic demonstration of the fact that, it doesn’t matter how many gadgets your bike has, in the end, the rider’s safety depends entirely on the rider. And so say all of us. If you’d like to see the original again, here it is.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTg7PUSVidI[/youtube]
Finally, to prove that Youtube is useful for other things than watching other riders crash, this “teaser” from famed fashion house, Chanel, illustrates better than anything I’ve seen for a long while that beige CAN be beautiful.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6OSxeYojo7o&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]
Try not to drool on your keyboard.