Honda confirms plans for a road-legal RC213V in 2014

Honda has officially confirmed its intention to put into production a road version of theRC213V for 2014! Takanobu Ito, CEO of the Japanese giant, made the announcement today in Tokyo in a broader discussion about the future of the company, anticipating that the street-legal RC213V will be a very expensive model and will be produced in very limited numbers - along the lines of the Ducati Desmosedici RR - but it will not replace the CBR1000RR Fireblade. Details on the project are currently scarce, and we do not know if the bike in question will have 5 cylinders like the current RC213V or just 4, just like the glorious RC30.

Rumors about the production of a sportsbike based on the Honda MotoGP prototype have been circulating since 2003, when the World Championship dumped the 500 cc two-stroke bikes in favor of the 1000 cc four-stroke ones, and it is known that the Japanese manufacturer was very close to begin producing a 1000cc V5 in 2006, something that actually never happened. Apparently, Honda is now ready to pick up the project once again, and given the source of this news we can rest assured they mean business this time. The decision might actually have something to do with the new MotoGP regulations that will be introduced next year, that will probaly force some dramatic change in the way the engines of the most important GP class are built in order to reduce the gap with CRT machines.

“Since its introduction in 1987, the super sports RC30 (VFR750R) has always been loved by a large number of fans - said Ito during the press conference in Tokyo - and it is with the aim of creating an exciting new story like this that our engineers have joined forces and started the development of a new super sports bike that will exploit the technologies developed in MotoGP.” Other sources from Honda have confirmed that the Honda management has been toying with the idea for quite some time, but only recently they have found the firm intention to actually produced a MotoGP-based bike to show the high level enginnering, passion and enthusiasm for which Honda is known throughout the world.

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Hector Barbera to ride for Avintia Blusens CRT team?

According to Spanish website motocuatro.com, Hector Barbera has signed a two-year deal to ride for Avintia Blusens CRT team.

The Spaniard - who will probably need a bodyguard to defend himself from angry Dani Pedrosa fans in next week’s Motorland Aragaon MotoGP round after what happened at Misano - was left without a ride when Ducati decided to take over the Pramac squad and field Ben Spies and Andrea Iannone in 2013 and his only hope to continue in MotoGP was to turn to a CRT team as there is still only one MotoGP satellite machine left to be assigned, and Barbera was never on Fausto Gresini’s shopping list.

The Spanish website is also reporting that Barbera will be receiving 200,000 euros per season (which is a big jump from the 50,000 he was reportedly receiving from Pramac) and also had the same economic offer from Ioda Racing.

We expect that the official confirmation will be coming next week, and at the moment it isn’t known whether he will replace David Salom, who just joined the team replacing Ivan Silva or Colombian rider Yonny Hernandez.

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WSBK Portimao: Marco Melandri on provisional pole

Marco Melandri has set his sights on tomorrow afternoon’s Superpole at Portimao, the Italian who left Nurburgring with double zero and lost his very brief championship leadership to title rival Max Biaggi, dominated the first qualifying practice (he won race 2 last year) with a best lap of 1.43.196 with 10 minutes left in the session and the rest of the field had to play catch-up.

Eugene Laverty took the second spot but he pushed it in the final minutes to try to close the gap and he was followed by this morning’s front runner and championship title pretender Tom Sykes, who more than half a second slower, but both were much faster than Aprilia’s Max Biaggi who was 7th and eight tenths from the top of the timesheets.

Jonathan Rea was fourth ahead of his next year’s rumored team mate to be Leon Haslam, while Leon Camier and Carlos Checa were 6th and 8th respectively, and the gap separating the four riders was just a little more than one tenth of second.

Michel Fabrizio on the satellite BMW was 9th while Nurburgring winner Chaz Davies rounded out the top ten. Ayrton Badovini dropped back to 11th followed by Pata Aprilia’s Sylvain Guintoli, Loris Baz, David Salom was 14th and back on his Pedercini Kawasaki after his MotoGP CRT debut at Misano where he finished 14th. Davide Giugliano was just 15th and Lorenzo Zanetti closed out the sixteen provisional Superpole riders.

WSBK Portimao QP1 results:

01- Marco Melandri – BMW Motorrad Motorsport – BMW S1000RR – 1’43.196
02- Eugene Laverty – Aprilia Racing Team – Aprilia RSV4 Factory – + 0.384
03- Tom Sykes – Kawasaki Racing Team – Kawasaki ZX-10R – + 0.535
04- Jonathan Rea – Honda World Superbike Team – Honda CBR 1000RR – + 0.690
05- Leon Haslam – BMW Motorrad Motorsport – BMW S1000RR – + 0.725
06- Leon Camier – FIXI Crescent Suzuki – Suzuki GSX-R 1000 – + 0.753
07- Max Biaggi – Aprilia Racing Team – Aprilia RSV4 Factory – + 0.800
08- Carlos Checa – Althea Racing – Ducati 1198 – + 0.803
09- Michel Fabrizio – BMW Motorrad Italia GoldBet – BMW S1000RR – + 1.177
10- Chaz Davies – ParkinGO MTC Racing – Aprilia RSV4 Factory – + 1.194

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The Raiden Files - Portland to Dakar - A Riding Movie

Icon sends it's best riders on an adventure that tests man and machine to the limit in every condition imaginable. There's action, there's adventure, there's romance, there's drama. It's more than a riding video, it's a movie. Sit back and enjoy the show.