The original Moto Guzzi V7 Sport was ground zero for a line of Italian sportbikes that stretches in a continuous line to the current day. Yes, it has shaft drive. And yes, the rumors are true: the engine started its life powering an odd, three-wheeled military tractor. But if ever there was a machine that…
Known colloquially as the “Mark IV Le Mans”, the Moto Guzzi Le Mans 1000 was an evolution of the company’s big sporting v-twin motorcycle. By the mid-1980s, Guzzi was definitely struggling against the Japanese manufacturers, and the new bike soldiered on with the same basic frame design the company had been using since the mid-1970s…
Today’s Suzuki RGV250Γ VJ22A is still a rare sight here in the USA, in spite of them now being eligible for import. 250cc two-stroke sportbikes have a small but fierce following here and all share a similar template: two cylinder liquid-cooled powerplants, six-speed gearboxes, stiff aluminum frames, and triple disc brakes. But the devil, as…
If you’re looking at this Ghezzi-Brian Furia thinking, “what the hell is a Ghezzi-Brian Furia,” you’re definitely not alone. The engine should look pretty familiar to anyone into Italian motorcycles though: those sticky-outy cylinders should be a dead giveaway that this is Moto Guzzi’s venerable two-valve v-twin. So what’s going on here? Moto Guzzi is…
I feel like the Buell S3 Thunderbolt is a bike that generates controversy here on RSBFS. Something about it not being a “real sportbike.” Sure, it’s a bit of a mongrel, a hodgepodge of top-shelf components, garden shed bodywork, and a torquey Harley Davidson lump all mixed up, with incongruous Harley clocks staring you in…
If grey-market Japanese two-strokes are your thing, head on over to check out this eBay listing for a clean 1994 Honda NSR250 SP in the classic Rothmans livery. It looks like the seller is unloading his entire collection that includes two more MC28s with different liveries and a pair of Suzuki RGV250s, both with Lucky…
Introduced in 1999, the Ducati 996 was the successor to the 916 and was obviously more evolutionary than revolutionary. But while Ducati didn’t want to mess with success in the looks department, the new bike featured a host of subtle but significant changes to the frame, fuel injection, and engine that led to improvements in…
In the early 90s, Ducati took the motorcycle world by storm when they introduced the Monster, a groundbreaking model that combined a sporty frame with a straightforward engine design. This innovative concept would go on to define the naked bike segment for years to come. Fast forward to 2008, and Ducati took the Monster to…