Looking very 90’s in Honda’s traditional red, white, and blue (hey, wait a minute..) paint scheme, this Honda NSR250R SP will hopefully mollify the two-stroke fans who didn’t like the older NSR we posted up earlier this week. The MC28 was introduced in 1993 and was up about 10lbs over the previous MC21. It was…
The Ducati 750 Sport was an interim model introduced in 1988 that followed on the heels of the F1. Ducati owners Cagiva hoped to capture the spirit and style of the vaunted 750SS, but buyers weren’t having it, and the bike was replaced by the long-running 900SS of the early 1990’s. The F1 was relatively…
While Honda does have a well-deserved reputation for technical innovation, they sometimes seem to intentionally eschew certain formats or technologies, only to swoop in and produce world-beating bikes late in the game, as if to say, “See? Weren’t kicking your ass using a v-twin because we didn’t want to…” The same is true of two-strokes…
While Ducati’s MHE and 900SS may be collectible and iconic now, they were seriously long in the tooth by the time they were discontinued, and even the Pantah-engined SS didn’t exactly offer cutting-edge performance when new. In order to keep their racing heritage alive in any meaningful sense, Ducati needed a top-shelf sportbike like the…
While Europeans have always been neck-deep in the whole Moto GP-thing as embodied by bikes like the Aprilia RS250, here in the US where flat-track and drag-racing are king, fans of whippy two-stroke race-replicas had to work a bit harder to get their fix, at least before the advent of the internet… But even US…
Just 500 of the classically-proportioned Ducati Paul Smart 1000LE bikes were imported to the US, with silver half-faired bodywork and a blue-green frame intended to recall the bike ridden to victory by Paul Smart at the Imola 200 in 1972, a win without which Ducati might not exist. Modern retro-styled bikes often use their throwback…
Built between 1994 and 2004, the Aprilia RS250 has justifiably developed a cult following among dedicated corner-carvers and track rats. It’s the quintessential “giant killer,” wrapping an impossibly lightweight frame and sleek bodywork around a very compact, 250cc powerplant yanked straight out of Suzuki’s RGV250, with brakes designed to stop a much heavier motorcycle. That…
Introduced in 1987, the 851 was a huge leap forward for Ducati, adding four-valve heads, liquid-cooling, and fuel-injection to their 90° v-twin. The resulting engine was good for a claimed 93hp at the rear wheel and was dubbed the “Desmoquattro” for obvious reasons. The new bike allowed Ducati to again be competitive in racing, and…