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Yamaha Announce 2014 Global Racing Program

Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), 4th February 2014 Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd. held the “2014 Yamaha Motor Sports Press Conference” today at the Sama-Sama Hotel in Sepang, Malaysia. In it, Yamaha Motor announced the newly established basic policies and positioning of its motor sport activities, the race series for the 2014 season and the Yamaha riders and teams that will be competing in them. As well as outlining this season’s direction for MotoGP, the pinnacle of motorcycle road racing, Jorge Lorenzo and Valentino Rossi from the YAMAHA FACTORY RACING team and Bradley Smith and Pol Espargaró from the Monster Yamaha Tech 3 team were in attendance and conveyed their ambitions for this season and their impressions of the 2014 “YZR-M1” machine. Also, as part of the initiative to bring more constructors to the grid and more excitement to MotoGP, Yamaha Motor introduced its YZR-M1 engine leasing agreement. Leasing will begin this season in what is a first for Yamaha Motor, and lessee Team NGM Mobile Forward Racing also made a guest appearance at the event. Takaaki Kimura - Representative Director and Senior Managing Executive Officer “Motorsports are in Yamaha's DNA, and challenging ourselves through them has been an integral part of our corporate culture for over 50 years. Motorsport participation is also a direct embodiment of our brand slogan ‘Revs your Heart.’ The three basic policies of our racing activities are: branding, feedback of technology and promotional activities, and we will put them into action on a global level. To that end, we will aim for success in the premier class of MotoGP to bring Kando* to fans around the world, and work together with our group companies in each region in promotional activities, strengthening race environment and infrastructure, and nurturing the next generation of riders by providing them with more opportunities and putting in place a tiered structure they can work up through to reach greater heights. We hope that everyone will look forward to the results of Yamaha Motor’s ongoing challenge to ‘Rev your Heart’ through motorsports.”

Marquez quickest as testing begins in Malaysia / Márquez prend les devants à l'ouverture du Test de Sepang

Amid dry conditions, the long-awaited pause in track action was over as the Factory Option and Open specification machines looked to share the Sepang International Circuit for the first MotoGP™ test session of 2014.

Starting from this season, all bikes are equipped with the spec ECU hardware, with Factory Options able to run their own software with 20 litres of fuel whereas Opens are obliged to run the spec Dorna software but anything up to 24 litres of fuel across a race distance. All MotoGP™ teams are present in Malaysia with the exception of IodaRacing, which plans to be in action for the first time at the second Sepang test towards the end of the month.

Repsol Honda Team’s Marquez and Yamaha Factory Racing’s Valentino Rossi traded top times across the opening four hours, but as the habitual lunch break arrived it was the former who led the way with a best lap time of 2’00.767, complete with a larger air intake on this year’s Honda RC213V in a bid to increase top speeds and enhance throttle response on the exits of corners. Rossi - continuing work with new Crew Chief Silvano Galbusera - was demoted to third, as team-mate Jorge Lorenzo went second and just over three tenths of a second down on Marquez. LCR Honda MotoGP’s Stefan Bradl and GO&FUN Honda Gresini’s Alvaro Bautista completed the top five. Leading Open rider Aleix Espargaro was sixth on the NGM Mobile Forward Racing FTR-Yamaha, six and a half tenths down and running with full Yamaha factory suspension for the first time.

Following an initial team photo for Yamaha Factory Racing, with Rossi presenting a helmet design portraying eyes in the back of his head, the pit lane was a hive of activity as technicians and mechanics experienced with various fuel load and setup combinations. At Forward Racing, Colin Edwards suffered what the American described as ‘tiny’ technical problems and is hoping to post more significant lap times after the lunch break, having been the only one of the 26 riders to have been on-track without posting a lap time. In 25th spot, Paul Bird Motorsport’s Michael Laverty managed only a handful of shakedown runs and like Edwards will be planning for more laps in the afternoon period.

Perhaps the biggest talking point this week is whether Ducati Team – with Gigi Dall’Igna now at the helm as the new General Manager of Ducati Corse – will elect to switch its bikes to Open specification, with a decision expected after this test. They ended the morning in 11th and 12th places for Andrea Dovizioso and Cal Crutchlow, although the Englishman parked up his bike shortly before half past 12. Although a Sepang marshal attempted to assist in bump-starting the machine, Crutchlow was forced to find alternative means of transport in returning to the pit lane. Gresini’s Bautista had the track to himself on the minutes running up to two o’clock, with others electing to take time out for eating.

Testing now continues for a further four hours, with the same time schedule of 10am-6pm local time (GMT +8) remaining for Wednesday and Thursday.

Le premier Test Officiel de l'année s'est ouvert dans des conditions favorables au Circuit International de Sepang, où prototypes Factory et Open se retrouvent en piste pour la première fois depuis le Test de Valence qui avait lancé la pré-saison 2014 en novembre dernier.

Le premier des deux Tests Officiels qui ont lieu à Sepang ce mois-ci vient de commencer et permet d'observer pour la première fois toutes les motos de la grille équipées de la centrale électronique ECU officielle du MotoGP™. Pour rappel, les prototypes Factory utiliseront cette année cet ECU avec leurs propres logiciels et un maximum de 20 litres de carburant par course alors que les machines inscrites en catégorie Open utiliseront le logiciel ECU fourni par Dorna et pourront embarquer jusqu'à 24 litres de carburant. Tous les teams de la grille MotoGP™ 2014 sont présents cette semaine à Sepang, à l'exception de IodaRacing, qui devrait néanmoins rejoindre la Malaisie à la fin du mois pour le second Test Officiel.

Marc Márquez (Repsol Honda) et Valentino Rossi (Yamaha Factory Racing) ont été les deux premiers pilotes à se disputer la première position sur la feuille de temps mardi matin et c'est le premier, le Champion du Monde en titre, qui avait l'avantage à la mi-journée, avec un chrono de 2'00.767 réalisé sur une Honda RC213V dont l'entrée d'air a été élargie afin d'augmenter ses vitesses de pointe et d'améliorer son comportement à l'accélération en sortie de virage. Rossi était passé à la troisième place aux alentours de 14h, doublé par son coéquipier Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha Factory Racing), deuxième à tout juste plus de trois dixièmes de seconde de Márquez. Stefan Bradl (LCR Honda) et Álvaro Bautista (GO&FUN Honda Gresini) complétaient le Top 5 devant Aleix Espargaró (NGM Mobile Forward Racing), premier pilote Open et qui utilisait pour la première fois les suspensions Yamaha sur son FTR-Yamaha.

Après une première séance photo avec l'ensemble du team Yamaha Factory Racing, dont Rossi a profité pour dévoiler un nouveau casque bien à son image, la voie des stands s'est très vite animée pour l'ouverture des essais. Chez NGM Mobile Forward Racing, Colin Edwards a été victime de petits problèmes techniques et n'a quasiment pas pu rouler. L'Américain a été le seul des vingt-six pilotes présents à ne pas enregistrer de chrono ce matin tandis que Michael Laverty (PBM) s'est classé 25ème, près d'une seconde derrière Mike di Meglio (Avintia Blusens), et que Randy de Puniet, qui poursuit sa mission de pilote d'essais chez Suzuki cette année, était 19ème.

L'une des actualités à suivre cette semaine sera celle du team Ducati, avec Gigi Dall'Igna au poste de Directeur général de Ducati Corse, qui pourrait décider d'abandonner le statut Factory pour courir en Open cette année à l'issue de ce Test Officiel. Andrea Dovizioso et Cal Crutchlow étaient, à la mi-journée, onzième et douzième du classement, derrière Andrea Iannone (Pramac Racing).

La piste est ouverte de 10h à 18h, heure locale (GMT +8) pour les trois journées d'essais.

Cliquez ici pour accéder au Live Timing du Test MotoGP™ de Sepang.

ICONIC HONDA MOTORCYCLES – THE EBAY COLLECTION

It’s difficult to overstate the importance of the Honda Motor Company on the evolution of motorcycles throughout the 20th Century, from the Cub, to the Monkey, to the Gold Wing, to the CB750 – Honda have created paradigm shifting motorcycles in almost every possible genre, or in the case of the CB750, actually created a new genre.

Of all the motorcycles in this particular Collection, the one that grabs attention immediately is the original 1969 CB750 prototype that’s currently in the midst of a bidding war with the current bid at over $120,000 USD. This motorcycle is one of just 4 built before the production line officially began ticking over, Honda engineers hand-machined the parts and often found themselves having to design elements of the drive-train on the fly.

This prototype was shipped to the USA with its 3 siblings and used to display the upcoming production bike’s features, Honda was bearish on the demand they anticipated for the model but allowing the dealers to have some hands on time with the all-new CB750 led to a groundswell of interest behind the bike. Of course, the rest is history. The Honda CB750 would go on to dominate the large capacity sports bike class for a over decade, it was so revolutionary they created a new term just to describe it – they called it the “super bike”.

Click here to see the prototype Honda CB750 and the other motorcycles in the new Iconic Honda Motorcycles – The eBay Collection.

via SILODROME