Erik Buell Racing and India's Hero MotoCorp - A Joint Venture

Again, another one late to be posted, but it remains significant:

Now that Erik Buell is free from the traditionalists at The Motor Company, he can fully explore his imagination, and that of the incredible engineers employed by his marque. Erik Buell Racing can also look to the future, and take on a partnership with the largest motorcycle manufacturer in the world - Hero MotoCorp. For their part, Hero will become a minority owner of EBR; this will secure a "free-flowing relationship" between the two companies with an emphasis on research and development and sharing of technology. Under HD, Buell could have never done this, and Hero may not have even tried; Hero may have only taken this step since they dissolved their technology agreement with Honda (BTW: it did not "collapse" as they say). EBR should gain access to an amazing amount of engineering knowledge and technology, and Hero will learn so much from what Buell has always done - excel at the new and better.

http://tinyurl.com/d6ojmeo

http://tinyurl.com/d2p9nqo

Thursday Morning Moto News - Erik Buell & WSBK Valencia Testing

An exclusive interview with Buell man Erik comes to us via MotorcycleUSA, and it is rather long. If there are any burning questions you have about Buell's demise or the reasoning behind the whole thing, you might find an answer or two here. Otherwise, Buell is as much in the dark as the rest of us - only H-D knows some of the answers, and they won't talk about it until people start retiring.

http://tinyurl.com/yz3bmfr

At the second testing session for which the Aprilia World Superbike team has traveled to Valencia, a heavy downpour has caused them to stop their testing. They have nearly lost a full day's worth of information due to the unexpected storm. It looks like they will only have the Phillip Island test to finalize settings for Camier and Biaggi.

http://tinyurl.com/ylqtnbz

It wasn't only Aprilia's team having a hard time, we also see that the BMW WSBK team was 'washed out' of practice due to the heavy rain.

http://tinyurl.com/yz3jphe

Friday Afternoon Moto News - H-D Loss, Erik Buell & Derbi

Harley-Davidson posted their first quarterly loss in 16 years at the end of 2009. It is a sad representation of what this economy is doing to the industry. To help fight this, they have created another entry-market motorcycle, the Forty-Eight, which they hope will bring in some new customers. It is unlikely to make an impact like they want, but they will certainly sell some of them. Good Luck H-D!

http://tinyurl.com/yby5d2t

Erik Buell Racing has signed on with think3’s ThinkDesign (CAD) and ThinkPLM (PDM) to help optimize their product development. This comes to us via a press release from the Erik Buell Racing company and think3. For more details, take the link.

http://tinyurl.com/yd9bd69

Derbi, with help from Sevcon, have created their own electric motorcycle, the GPR EV. They say that it is far beyond what is currently being produced by other electric motorcycle manufacturers due to its fully-integrated power system. No word on production or racing for this machine, just the short article and the photo.

http://tinyurl.com/yeg5ask

More Afternoon Moto News - Erik Buell Racing and Day of the Champions

Erik Buell Racing may survive the demise of the Buell marque after all! That is good news for motorcycle design and racing. He has sold two machines - the first sale for the new company - to a German racer who will use it to defend his 2009 championship in the Europe's Sound of Thunder Series. Nice news to receive for all of us...

http://tinyurl.com/ydcdy7f

In South Africa, on 31 January 2010, the 2010 Castrol/Honda Day of the Champions will take place at the Zwartkop Raceway. Around 18 foreign professional racers - from all over - from the 'golden age motorcycle racing' will attend and compete in the event. Luminaries such as Phil Read, Mick Grant, Alan Walker, Sir Alan Cathcart, John Chapman and Tony Salt will be racing against some of South Africa's best all time riders. It is an event worth attending, but it is very far from most everywhere. So, if you can, go, have fun and meet some of your motorcycling heroes.

http://tinyurl.com/ybwlh84

Another report on the Day of Champions: http://tinyurl.com/yzcq9xs

First Ride: 2009\2010 Buell 1125RR Race Bike

So, the company is now dead, but there will still be some support from Erik Buell racing and even H-D. Whether you will ever be able to get your hands on one of these Buell 1125RR machines is a very hard question to answer. However, at least we get to ride the bike through someone else's experience to see what we might think of the machine - a machine which will probably appreciate with time.

http://tinyurl.com/yelbdt9

Erik Buell Not Only Lives, He Thrives

Buell is now announcing that Erik Buell Racing will be providing race-spec 1125R for DMG / AMA Pro Racing Daytona SportBike and 1125RR for racing in American Superbike. Such good news to know he is doing what he loves again. I hope it all works well for him...it will not be easy, but he is used to that. There will also be a Euro-spec 1190RR - not sure for what series, exactly, but it may fit in many.

http://tinyurl.com/yzupe28

Erik Buell Starts Erik Buell Racing - Good News

It is nice to see Buell stepping away from Harley and moving back to doing something on his own. He will start by providing race-only parts for racing Buell motorcycles and will build race-spec 1125R motorcycles under license from H-D (the least they could do for him). It will, of course, be known as Erik Buell Racing and will be based in East Troy, Wisconsin. For more info, take the link.

http://tinyurl.com/yg7xn9k