Here’s an awesome collector quality example of the highly sought after OW02 R7. Just 500 of these specially homologated examples exist worldwide and only a couple surface for sale each year. Produced specifically for World Superbike racing, these didn’t originally sell with street titles. But with headlights and signals stock, many found their way to…
If you’re shopping for a rare homologation Honda from the 80s or 90s, it’s usually not that hard to be sure you’ve got the real McCoy. Does it have a V4 and a single-sided swingarm? It’s probably the real thing. But Ducati was a much smaller organization, with much less in the way of financial…
After languishing in infamy for a few years, Ducati’s 999 is finally getting a bit of respect for being the impressive machine it has always been. If the 999 had been built by anyone other than Ducati, and it had been the follow up to pretty much any bike but the 916, its praises would…
If you’re a sportbike fan, bikes like the Ducati 748R might seem like the poor cousin to the 916/996/998, a bike you only bought because your funds wouldn’t stretch to the more expensive, larger-displacement version. But no “R” model Ducati really takes a back seat to anything: they were homologation specials, and the 748R was…
The Ducati 888 filled the gap between the brand-redefining 851 and the legendary 916, bumping the 851’s fuel-injected, liquid-cooled, four-valve L-twin to 888cc. The inbetweener status didn’t phase the bike much, though, as it was enough for Doug Polen to net back-to-back World Superbike championships in ’91 and ’92. Production ended in ’94 as the…
Yamaha’s R7 was among the last in a long line of machines from the Age of Homologation Specials, where the manufacturers competing in AMA and World Superbike racing created limited runs of insanely expensive bikes that looked like production models, but were chock full of trick bits like adjustable steering heads and exotic engine internals.…
The 2003 Aprilia RS250GP-1 represents the absolute pinnacle of two-stroke technology and the final gasp of the format’s street-legal heyday. Quite simply, these are the most advanced mass-produced street two strokes that ever roamed the Earth. Since they were never sold in this country officially, finding a decent one is a feat. 2003 Aprilia RS250GP-1…
The 1974 Laverda SFC is the high-water mark for 1970s Italian sportbikes, representing the pinnacle of Laverda’s race bike development and the final SFC offered in the states, as the US mandated left-side shift after September of ’74. The Laverda’s big parallel twin made about 75 horsepower, heady grunt for an era where 100 ponies…
