A big thank you to Jeff Ware, editor of Rapid Bikes magazine, for reprinting my article on the Shadowfax from a previous issue of UCBE. I provide the link below in case you haven’t bought the magazine and do want to read it.
Rapid Bikes Shadowfax Article.
In other news, rumblings about the parlous state of WSBK grids have been going on for some time. The link below provides a very provocative point of view that the new owners of WSBK are, in fact, trying to lever the factories out of WSBK altogether and take it back to a privateer’s game.
Do DORNA want to get the factories out of WSBK?
Now there is no doubt that WSBK is becoming hideously expensive. As detailed in my interview with Chris Vermeulen on MotoPod last week, the bikes are now so far beyond being production-derived bikes that it’s not even funny. In fact, Chris went so far as to say that, if the scrutineers wanted to rigidly apply the technical regulations to the bikes presented for scrutineering, then the vast majority of them would fail. The Honda Fireblade isn’t really anything like one that you and I can buy from the shop, and the same applies to all the other brands as well. From Day 1 it has been a gripe by all the entrants (except for those running the RSV4) that the Aprilia isn’t a production bike at all as run in WSBK and is, in fact, a thinly disguised MotoGp bike. Add the success that the Aprilia-engined bikes have had in CRT and it does make you wonder.
If DORNA were to force the factories out altogether it would score a couple of goals for their long-term plan. The first is to make WSBK cheaper and therefore more attractive for more entrants, which equals full grids and good racing. I am sure that we would applaud that goal, especially if it meant that the return to more production-realisitic bikes would translate to more sales and more spectator involvement. Again, as Chris the V said the other night, he can foresee the time in the very near future when the WSBK bikes will return to running treaded tyres without a huge decrease in lap times and with a more interesting form of racing as a consequence. If you haven’t listened to Chris’s interview, I recommend that you do and I provide the link again in case you missed it.
MotoPod Listen to Episode #374
Now, read the above in conjunction with the link below and I am pretty sure that you will see where this is heading.
New WSBK Technical Regulations.
Moving along from here it seems that the Grand Plan is unfolding.
1. Push the factories out of WSBK and make it a Superstock 1000 formula with much more closely production-based bikes. This will reduce costs, encourage more private teams and add to the appeal for Joe motorcyclist.
2. That will free up the factories’ money to be spent somewhere else. Guess where?
You got it. DORNA never do anything without an ulterior motive, or so it seems.
As I often say, you read it here first.