1988 Suzuki S40 Boulevard - Studio Motor

It's amazing what you can do with limited resources and a whole bunch of commitment; that's got to be the mantra of Studio Motor's Donny Ariyanto. He's a builder that's based in South Jakarta, and if there's anyone in the world that will be able to make a mountain out of any anonymous, out-of-favour, ill-advised motorcycling mole hill, it's this man. In the past he's worked miracles on Yamaha Scorpios and Suzuki Thunders, but we're thinking that he's really outdone himself this time. Feast your eyes on Studio Motor's latest single cylinder miracle, the “Naughty Red.”

The bike was built for a customer who works as a film director in Jakarta. His brief was decided upon after much surfing and some close study of the city's custom bikes. It was as clear as it was tricky. “I want to have a custom bobber that is simple and practical, but it should also have a bad ass, naughty streak.”

The Studio Motor lads began by stripping, overhauling, and re-assembling the bike, with a follow-up of powder coating and polishing for the core elements. They then fabricated the bike's tank, seat, rear fender, and battery box themselves. As we've learnt in the past, the Studio boys like nothing more than pummelling metal, and will do so at a moment's notice. They finished it off with a Sikkens matt candy apple red.

Next came a new set of forks, custom triple trees, and custom rims paired with a set of inimitable Firestone Duluxes. A bespoke swing arm was added to give the bike a more muscular stance, and a Keihin PWK 41 carby was used to replace the stock fuel atomisation set-up which, when combined with the Flash custom muffler exhaust, apparently makes quite a pleasant roar when so provoked. And, yes, it has pipewrap.

Donny says that there was a lot of lessons learnt from the engine rebuild on the bike, but obviously the end result was well worth all the bother. Apparently the client couldn't wait to ride it to his next shoot. And could you blame him? Lucky bugger.

from Pipeburn

Carlos Checa heads to Monza with questions on shoulder fitness

from Twowheelsblog

The historic Monza circuit will be hosting the fourth round of the World Superbike championship this upcoming weekend, however Ducati Alstare rider Carlos Checa will be heading to the temple of speed with some doubts regarding his fitness and with the knowledge that it will be another tough round, because the Panigale will be struggling against the four cylinders again, even if Ducati will now be allowed to use a 52mm air restrictor.

The former World Champion was banged up pretty badly at Phillip Island first in practice and then in race 1 where he suffered a concussion, and later discovered he discovered he had a pair of cracked bones in his right foot.

Crashing a go-kart during a pre-race event at Assen left him bruised again and to add insult to injury he was also stung by a bee during the race and started to have shoulder problems.

Checa had a medical check-up following the Assen round which revealed that he had an osseous edema on the head of the humerus of the left shoulder, an injury that were probably a result from a previous trauma and which has worsened and become inflamed as a result of effort made during the races.

The Spanish rider has undergone an intense course of physiotherapy treatment to reduce the inflammation and the trauma, in order to be physically fit for this weekend’s races at Monza.

During the last couple of events, especially in the races themselves, I’ve been having some problems with my left shoulder but the evening after the second race in Assen the pain got a lot worse. I went to see a specialist once I got back to Spain after that round and unfortunately he’s told me that I have an osseous edema on the humerus. I will continue to receive treatment in Spain up until Thursday and I hope that that will help me to get through this coming weekend without any problems,’ said Checa.

While team mate Ayrton Badovini seems to have recovered from his previous injuries and can’t wait to race in the first of his ‘home’ rounds:

I’ve always enjoyed the Monza round, it’s always fun to race at home. It will be challenging because of the long straights but we’ll do our best to bring home the best possible result. Being one of two Italian events, I hope that there’ll be a good crowd, fans, sponsors… The support of the people, at an event like Monza, really helps and spurs me on.’

come on ,,,,,,,,,,,,,

Marc Marquez more popular than Dani Pedrosa

Has anyone noticed how many videos Repsol is releasing this season? The above is just another to promote their two MotoGP riders and the team.

The company is capitalizing on the fact that Dani Pedrosa and Marc Marquez are highly popular in Spain, with Marquez’ quotations in the media growing after each race weekend.

Personality Media, is a Spanish company who measures and evaluates the popularity of celebrities, athletes. ect in fourteen different categories to help marketing and advertising companies choose the right star to peddle their products.

And in their latest Q Scores (and this was before the Jerez GP) the MotoGP rookie already rates higher overall than his team mate Pedrosa has always led the most of the categories relative to MotoGP riders, however Marquez’ visibility has fastly grown, from a 20% in 2011 to early 2012, and he is now at 35% in these first months of 2013 season.

Pedrosa continues to be the best known rider rating 91%, followed by Jorge Lorenzo at 87%, while outsider Valentino Rossi comes in at 85%. which continues to testify his popularity is not on the wane. Strangely enough Lorenzo who won last year’s championship contines to trail Marquez, Pedrosa and Rossi in all the categories, and according to the media company they believe that it is due to the fact that reigning world champion isn’t perceived as ‘passionate’ and some seem to have trouble forgetting that chip-on-the-shoulder attitude that he had when he was much younger.