Made for just two years between 2002 and 2003, the Ducati 620 Sport was intended as an affordable way into Ducati ownership for riders more interested in the Ducati brand than in actual speed. But Ducati being Ducati, they were unable to build a sporty bike that actually handled badly, and they managed to create…
Update 3.27.2018: Contact Chris with your interest by email: cdavid@wddlegal.com Most of our readers probably think of Bimota as a manufacturer of overpriced two-wheeled status symbols dripping with billet and carbon fiber and Italian style. But Bimota originally took its name from founders Valerio BIanchi, Giuseppe MOrri, and Massimo TAmburini. Yes, that Massimo Tamburini. And…
Prices of the RC30 have gone through the roof, and enthusiasts who want a taste of Honda’s homologation specials have been forced to go elsewhere. Luckily, the less-desirable, less cubically-endowed, and equally exotic VFR400R NC30 manages to provide many of the qualities of its larger sibling at a greatly reduced cost. At a glance, it’s…
Both a flamboyant racer and a cautionary tale, Anthony Gobert was a hugely talented rider who fell from grace after a failed drug test. Several times, actually. Racing today is obviously a far cry from the wild days of the 60s and 70s, where playboy racers partied with stewardesses well into the night before getting…
Although displacement was technically a bit more than a liter, the first generation Suzuki GSX-R1100 really established the modern literbike formula: take a big inline four engine, and squeeze it into a 600 or 750 sized package. The philosophy that created the iconic Gixxer was initially tried out with Suzuki’s GSXR400, and the result was…
Update: A reader reached out to note that, “The forks are missing the compression and rebound clickers, those are R forks.” Seller replied back to us, “I pulled out the books and it looks like the first year for the RS model was a 3XV8 which had the same forks as the standard R model.…
Hmmmmm, the text from the listing for this Ducati 900SS FE looks strangely familiar… One of the surprising things about having been writing these posts for the past few years is how often my words show up in sellers’ listings. I probably shouldn’t be encouraging folks to use my writing for free but, to be…
There are no points for second place. Unbeknownst to Kawasaki and Honda, both manufacturers were developing the Next Big Thing in the 1970s, an affordable, reliable, inline four-cylinder motorcycle displacing 750cc’s. Unfortunately, Honda’s CB750 was first to market by several months, leaving Kawasaki with the unenviable choice: be the also-ran, or delay their machine to…