12.13.2017: Bob has decided to upgrade to a Featured Listing after we first posted this bike on November 30th. Links updated to latest auction. Good luck to buyers and seller! -dc When Yamaha and Suzuki dropped their 500cc two-stroke race replicas in the middle of the 1980s, the bikes effectively stopped the oil-burning horsepower wars…
1.15.2018: The owner has informed me that this bike has sold! Congratulations to buyer and seller! -dc What could have been the Bimota BB-2 was called the V-Due and had Bimota’s own engine, a modern two-stroke, fuel-injected 500cc twin. However the army of engineers Bimota didn’t have allowed the project to proceed with a faulty…
The waning light of the two-stroke era really brought out the best Japan had to offer, with a spate of lightweight 250cc road racers with DOT concessions that would pull the front wheel more or less at will. Suzuki’s RGV250 v-twin topped the heap, with prodigious power, decent reliability and years of development to keep…
Honda’s two-stroke NS400R was ostensibly intended to capitalize on their Grand Prix racing efforts, but with less displacement and one fewer cylinder than rivals from Suzuki and Yamaha, it got lost in the shuffle at the time and suffered from a perceived lack of hairy-chestedness, compared to its 500cc competition. So why did Honda go with…
Things were coming up Max Biaggi in 1996, as the Roman was in the middle of a string of three 250cc Grand Prix world titles and his storied rivalry with Valentino Rossi was still nearly half a decade in the future. The Italian claimed his trophies aboard Aprilia’s fantastic RS250GP, so the factory threw some…
The Japanese home market for sport motorcycles is the stuff of dreams for those of us based in the US. Some of the best and most extreme examples of high-tech performance sadly never makes it out of the country of origin when it comes to the Big Four. Take the V4 two-stroke RZ500 from Yamaha.…
There were a lot of things that led to the Bimota V-Due’s inauspicious fall from grace, mostly related to costs and hype that would ultimately spell disappointment when the bike finally broke cover. But by far the bike’s worst flaw was its positively heinous fuel injection system, which was designed to keep the bike in…
It has often been said that riding a slow bike fast is far more enjoyable than riding a fast bike slowly. Most of the hyper-super-mega cycles listed on these pages can exceed national speed limits in seconds – and first gear. But with a smaller bike, you need to work much harder to maximize your…
