Ducati’s Superbike homologation special in 2001 was the 996R, and received the first narrow head testastretta engine, thinner 320mm front brake disks, and bodywork with almost no vents. One place it didn’t scrimp was MSRP, and along with its factory-new appearance, this example sports an ask which is virtually the same as in 2001. 2001…
Update 5.8.2019: Back on eBay and price dropped again. Good luck to buyers and seller! Links updated. -dc Made for just a couple years between 2007 and 2009, the Ducati 1098 was a more conservative approach to their top-flight superbike after the radically-styled 999 threatened to upset Ducati’s apple cart. It’s almost like the bikes…
Update 5.10.2019: SOLD IN 4 DAYS! Congratulations to buyer and seller! -dc In the heady days of the late-1990s, people were buying sportbikes left, right and center and roadracing was so popular that there were two all-in series in the U.S. alone. If you couldn’t get a superbike ride in AMA, you could turn your…
Update 8.25.2019: This bike has sold to an RSBFS reader! Congratulations to buyer and seller! -dc Our luck that Ducati was compelled to prove that their WSBK race machines weren’t too special, and a few hundred were made as homologation specials and offered to the cogniscenti. This 1990 851 SP3 can be displayed immediately, and…
Ducati’s two-valve “Desmodue” may not be the most powerful engine, or the lowest-maintenance, but there’s a reason it’s stuck around from the 1980 Pantah all the way through to today. Besides the obvious budgetary reasons: some of that tooling is probably long paid off… Joking aside, today’s Desmodue is heavily evolved, compared to the original…
If there is a bike that needs no introduction, it must certainly be the Ducati 916. Raising the performance game to a level not seen by manufacturers before, Ducati created a powerhouse that punched like Mike Tyson, had the speed of Usain Bolt, and the looks of Kate Moss. As gorgeous as it was functional,…
With the general level of competence from modern sportbikes, along with rules that don’t seem to favor limited-production homologation bikes, it’s easy to forget just how special some of them are. Bikes like the Yamaha OW01 might have looked nearly identical to the regular production machines from ten feet, but were often hand-built to a…
Update 4.27.2019: Sold in just two days to an RSBFS reader. Congratulations to buyer and seller! -dc The Ducati 851 is the father of modern Ducatis, from the world-changing 916 to the astonishing Panigale V4R. Without this boxy, lithe very red machine, those bikes would not be. The 851 arrived in 1987, with a very…