Wabi-sabi, Racebikes And No Reason

The movie "Rubber" begins with a monologue that centers on the concept of "no reason." Some things just are, for no reason that can be discerned. More important is to know when knowing the reason for something is completely unnecessary and detracts from the experience.

The Japanese wabi-sabi aesthetic's characteristics include "asymmetry, roughness, simplicity, economy, austerity, modesty, intimacy, and appreciation of the ingenuous integrity of natural objects and processes," according to Wikipedia.

I shot these images in the pits at a recent track day for vintage bikes and vintage riders. It is, I believe, a Honda CB160, gloriously unrestored and wearing its rust like a badge of honor. On any other track day, this bike would be ignored and unappreciated. On this day, between sessions, it was one of many machines that drew many appreciative visitors.

I am not Japanese. 

I have many other things I should be doing.

So why am I posting these images here?

No reason.

If you are still with me, you completely understand.

A Ronin Goes Home For The Holidays

Racing is like life; it has a beginning, a middle and an end. While the ascent of a racer's career is magnificent to watch, the descent can be painful. The slow drop down the order, less-competitive rides, and all too often injuries as the rider tries to capture with pure desperation and force what once came easily, can be sad to watch. The racer mentality, the outlook that gets you to the front, blinds you to the inevitable.

And of all the sports, racing can be the most ruthless and unforgiving when it comes to retaining the athlete. For the team, or the factory, there is no place to carry an underperforming rider, as any given rider is, typically, either half or all of the entire athletic department. Results are all that matters. And you're only as good as your last race. There's little room for emotion, or even doing the right thing; it's a matter of economics and performance.

So there is something that is touching when a factory finds a soft landing spot for a rider who is on the downward arc, a place for the rider to serve the vicious master of ambition and drive that makes them grid up, anywhere, anytime.  
 
Ryuichi Kiyonari enrolled at nine years of age in the Suzuka Racing School junior program, the first student of that racing academy. Kiyo spent his early adolescence being trained as a road racing samurai for Honda. He graduated in 1995 at the age of 13. For 21 years now, he has raced. The racer's life is all that Kiyo has lived.

At the end of 2013, Honda called time on Kiyo's career, with the two not coming to terms on a new contract. At that point, had Kiyo retired, he would have been a success. He had won in World Superbike, won three British Superbike titles, and raced in MotoGP.

Instead, Kiyo left the Honda fold, shopped his services to BMW and Suzuki. He was a ronin, a warrior selling his services to the lord who needed him most. They were adequately successful partnerships; he is a popular figure in the BSB paddock and nearly took the title for BMW in 2014.

But it never felt right. Kiyo was raised by Honda, served Honda, and his BSB title-winning motorcycles were in Honda's collection at Motegi. It would have been somehow unsatisfying to see his career end with another manufacturer's logo on his leathers.

So for 2017, Honda and Kiyo are reunited. At the age of 34, it's likely Kiyo's last factory ride. He'll be racing in the All-Japan Road Race JSB1000 superbike class. And one gets the feeling that Honda made a space for him at the Superbike level, a way of thanking him for a career of representing the company well.

The ronin is home for the holidays.


 

Vision

Gratuitous Nicky Hayden shot.

If there was a need for any more proof that the Superbike World Championship needed an infusion of new thought and vision, that proof arrived with the recent announcement of the inverted Race Two grid. 

 
Straight from the Saturday Night Specials shootout at a backwoods U.S. dirt track, the idea of putting fast riders behind slow riders at the start and hoping something interesting happens reeks of desperation and a lack of vision from the series organizers.

It is the height of hubris for an Internet blogger to say to the owners of a multi-million-dollar international corporation, "Well, here's what you should be doing with your property." Warning: Such hubris is coming in about three paragraphs.

But, first a word of sympathy. Prior to Dorna's purchase of the Superbike series, it was a direct competitor to GP racing. So it was relatively easy to take certain steps to build and maintain popularity. If the other series was doing well, steal everything you could from them, then add what was missing. See prime-time broadcast television, United States, history of.

Now Dorna owns both. And robbing from one to feed the other is a zero-sum proposition. So it's not just a matter of one series emulating the other to steal audiences. Dorna now needs to figure out how to sustain World Superbikes in a manner that doesn't take away from the popularity of MotoGP, and prop up MotoGP while keeping Superbike healthy.

OK, here's the hubris part. What Dorna needs is vision.

First, a hard look at what World Superbike offers that MotoGP can't. From the outside, it appears to be two things - lower costs and showroom relatability. 

By racing production-based machines, the price of competing is reduced dramatically. You can, realistically, go racing for podiums, or at least top-six finishes, in Superbike for $100,000 per vehicle. You might - might - be able to do that in Moto2. Definitely not in MotoGP nor Moto3, where costs have escalated well beyond the initial intent of that class.

And by racing production-based machines, manufacturers can see a clear connection between what is raced on the track and what is sold to the public. This can leverage dealer, importer and distributor interest in the series.

Between the two, Superbike always will have a role. Companies will always want a showcase for their latest and greatest street machines. The lower cost of competing means that it doesn't take direct manufacturer involvement to put together a team to compete in the series. And if necessary, Dorna can prop up manufacturer involvement with subsidies, and get much more bang for the buck than in MotoGP.

The next step is to position World Superbikes as a placeholder. Trying to gather huge TV audiences is a mistake, a mistake that is understandable for Dorna to make because it is, essentially, a television production and promotion company. Superbike is the series you sell to the tracks that can't afford MotoGP, or when manufacturers want to race in a particular market. Do that, and you prevent another series - like, say, BSB - from coming in and staging races and stealing your audience. Sometimes, it's not about the profit you make, it's about the losses you avoid.

Short-sighted band-aids - inverted grids, naked bikes - work about as well as band-aids. They quickly fall off and stop doing any good. Dorna needs a long-term vision that understands that close racing is only part of the package. The AMA's old Harley 883 series had very close racing. It's dead. The Harley XR1200 series offered amazing-looking racing. It's dead.

Showcases for the latest and greatest streetbikes, rules that allow inexpensive modifications that bring bike performance closer, and a tight, packed weekend schedule that a racing fan can afford and understand are the things that bring in the audiences. Staying the course and building a solid platform with Superbikes in their proper place in the pantheon will do far more than gimmicks to make sure that in five years, Superbikes will not go the way of the XR1200 series.





 

The Last Chicane: Photos From The 2016 Suzuka 8 Hours

The final corner of any track carries a special emotional meaning for a racer. On many circuits, a racer knows that leading out of the final corner usually means victory. For endurance racers, they know that the final corner means the end of their stint or the end of a long, hard race.

Niccolo Canepa aboard the GMT94 Yamaha YZF-R1.

At Suzuka, the final chicane represents the end of a long, challenging lap. The 8 Hours machines slow to about 35 miles an hour and then the rider hammers the throttle, plunging downhill and accelerating to nearly 120 miles an hour in the final right-hand sweeper that leads onto the start/finish straight. It is a spot where photographers can catch the bikes and riders at full lean and relatively slow speeds, leading to amazing photos.

To purchase a copy of the "Suzuka 8 Hours 2016" book, click on the box to your right.

Akira Yanagawa on the Team Green Kawasaki ZX-10R.

Kazuhiro Kojima on the Japan Post-Honda Kumamoto Racing CBR1000RR.

 

Makoto Inagaki on the Akeno Speed: WJR Yamaha YZF-R1 Superstock machine.

 

It Never Has To Happen ...

Finally, it looked like it was going to happen. Race Two of the Superbike World Championship event at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca was all going Davide Giugliano's way. The longtime and loyal Ducati factory pilot had pushed his way past the dominant Kawasaki Racing Team ZX-10Rs of Jonathan Rea and Tom Sykes, and was starting to pull a gap when the red flag came out.

On the restart, Giugliano got into the lead again, but this time wasn't able to drop Sykes, who came past after three laps. Sykes is a master at late-braking and awesome corner exits, and that skill set allows you to hold off faster competitors at Laguna. Giugliano spent the last half of the race fending off teammate Chaz Davies while still trying to hunt down Sykes. In the end, Giugliano came in second, yet came up 0.209 seconds short of the win.



The race pretty much illustrated Giugliano's career in a nutshell. Undoubtedly fast, loyal and brave, Giugliano never managed to put the Ducati on top of the podium.

Fast is beyond a doubt. The 27-year-old Roman won the Superstock 1000 championship in 2011 and moved up to Superbike the next season. In 113 starts since, Giugliano earned five pole positions, eight fastest laps and 14 podium finishes. Nine times he finished second.

It is all the more impressive when you realize that when Giugliano started riding the Ducati, it was during the Bologna factory's darkest days in World Superbike. Giugliano was there during the company's longest winless drought in the series that it once owned. First he raced the 1098R during a period when it was hopelessly outgunned by the horsepower of the Aprilias and Kawasakis. Then he helped develop the Panigale through its teething phase, pushing the bike past its limits over and over in an attempt to put it on the box.

Let no one doubt Giugliano's bravery. He has missed several races due to back injuries. Potentially crippling back injuries. The kind of injury that makes racers shudder, the one thing that they keep locked in the deepest recesses of their minds, because if that thought escapes that little mental prison it is locked in, the racer's speed is gone. Racers commit suicide because of paralysis from racing injuries. Giugliano came back from back injuries - multiple times. 

That desperate battle at Laguna took place one year after he crashed there and suffered a potentially career-ending back injury. Racers do things that leave mere mortals just slack-jawed. In many ways, they go places non-racers simply cannot even imagine.

But bravery and determination only go so far. Factories want results. Giugliano didn't deliver them. When he crashed at a sodden Lausitzring, his Panigale kept running for a bit while on its side. Then, Terminator 2-style, the tail light, required by the rain, blinks out. At that moment, Giugliano's World Superbike career was over.

He's got a new gig in British Superbike. Giugliano will be putting everything he has into it, putting his life on the line for a win. But it never has to happen.

Farewell To A Racing Boss

Shuhei Nakamoto joined HRC's MotoGP program at a time when neither he nor Honda were on a winning streak. In MotoGP, although Honda had taken the rider championship with Nicky Hayden in 2006, the company had been schooled by Yamaha for several seasons, first with Valentino Rossi, then with Jorge Lorenzo. 

While wins came Honda's way every season, and podium positions were frequent, it had been a long time since HRC looked like its rider would end the season atop the points. Hayden's championship, which came as a result of solid finishes, not domination, was the first since Rossi left, and in the seasons to follow, the handful of victories was not what the company wanted. Corporations go racing to demonstrate their superiority, and superiority wasn't being reflected in the results table or in the headlines.




It was worse - way worse - in Formula One. In 2006, Nakamoto was named Senior Technical Director for the company's Formula One program. According to various reports at the time, Nakamoto inherited a car that was marginally capable, with one win in 18 starts, and a wind tunnel that was broken. 2007 saw Honda score no podiums in F1 competition, and 2008 saw only one.

It was the nadir of Nakamoto's career with Honda. He'd been with the company since his late 20s, and had devoted his professional life to Honda and motorcycle road racing. He joined the company in 1983, and was quickly assigned to the RS125 and RS250 GP bike projects. During his tenure, the Honda became a consistent race winner, a bike that was always a threat to win a World Championship. From 1984 to 1996, Honda won 11 125cc and 250cc GP World Championships.

In 1997, he was named Large Project Leader for Honda's World Superbike competitor, the RVF750, which immediately took John Kocinski to the title and Honda to the manufacturer championship. It was the first Superbike championship for Honda since the formative years of the series and Fred Merkel's back-to-back titles on an RC30. Annoyed by a rules structure that many felt favored Ducati's V-twins, in 2000 Honda put Nakamoto in charge of a V-twin project of its own, the VTR1000SP, better known as the RC51. It won the title the first time out with Colin Edwards aboard, and won again in 2002.

Nakamoto was not a man who took losing well, and he knew how to go hunting for titles at the highest levels of motorcycle road racing. 2009, Nakamoto's first season at the helm, was all about Yamaha. In 2010, longtime HRC MotoGP soldier Dani Pedrosa suddenly doubled the number of wins from the previous season. The next year, Honda poached Casey Stoner from Ducati and immediately won the MotoGP title. With Stoner injured for much of 2012, Pedrosa came within a tire warmer malfunction of winning the championship. These were the performances that made a manufacturer look good. Honda's machinery was so good that fans of the sport wailed like infants that the racing was boring because of the amazing job HRC had done with its bike and its team.

For the whiners, it got worse. 

Stoner retired, but Honda had laid claim to one Marc Marquez, who proceeded to then take three of the next four MotoGP titles, and the one he didn't win he finished with the second-highest number of wins. Nakamoto knew that it was the combination of machine and man that won titles, and Marquez could help an under-performing machine look better than it was.

Nakamoto is leaving HRC, retiring due to his age. HRC has named three people to do his job. It is a testament to his leadership, and a loss to the sport to have such a single-minded individual leave the paddock. When Nakamoto showed up, it was to kick ass, make Honda look good and chew bubble gum, and someone invariably forgot the bubble gum.

Two comments from Nakamoto illustrate why he deserves the title of Racing Boss: 

Back when the whining about "boring" racing was reaching a fevered pitch in 2012, Nakamoto was asked about the entertainment MotoGP provided. His comment was simple: This was of no concern to Honda. Winning was what mattered, not bread and circuses for the minions.

When Rossi left Honda and won titles with Yamaha, he was famously quoted as saying that the rider mattered more than the machine. When Rossi fell flat on his face at Ducati, Nakamoto took the opportunity to kick him when he was down. "After he (Rossi) left Honda, has written a book, saying that the driver has more of the bike. Now it has to prove it," Nakamoto told GPOne.

The joy of sport is that it is unfettered competition where the goal is to prove that you are the best. Under Nakamoto's reign, Honda was so dominant that many claimed the company would destroy MotoGP. It's perhaps the highest praise you can offer Nakamoto for a lifetime of service to his company and his dedication to racing's highest ideal - winning.

The 2016 WERA West Yearbook Now Available

The 2016 WERA West Yearbook, featuring more than 130 full-color images, race reports, results and complete class championship standings from the 2016 WERA West season, now is available. Images and words by motojournalist Michael Gougis, 62 pages, soft bound. Retail cost is $29.95 plus shipping and handling. Order from Lulu.com at:

http://www.lulu.com/shop/michael-gougis/the-2016-wera-west-yearbook/paperback/product-22937345.html

Or order directly from the author at morbidelli17@yahoo.com, 626.221.7466. Please allow four weeks for delivery.

Thanks to the supporters who made this project possible:

Friction Racing Products: http://frictionracingproducts.com/

A.G. Assanti & Associates: http://www.bike911.com/

M Racing Performance: http://www.mracingperformance.com/

R.Tillery Powersports: http://rtillery.com/

Tony Serra

Images From The WERA West Season Finale, Part One

Images From The WERA West season finale at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Release of the 2016 WERA West Yearbook should be this week. Stay tuned ...

Sidecars from SRA-West raced both days in their own penultimate round of 2016.

Brad Saenz set out to win a championship on his Triumph 675, and sealed the B Superbike title.

Matt Warnert showed up for his first race weekend on a nearly-vintage Honda CBR600RR, struggled on Saturday and came back to take trophies in both of his races on Sunday.

The lightweight battles were awesome, as always. Erick Vizcaino (63) leads Jack Baker (27) through the final turn, with Toby Khamsouk behind.

Curtis Biegel (848) and Steve Zoumaras.

Start of one of the mediumweight races, with Mookie Wilkerson (136) leading Anas Sorhmat (117), David Guerrero (20, yellow plate), Edgar Zaragoza (20) and Vincent Mendez (hidden). On a clear day, the mountains surrounding the track always take my breath away.

 

Second Thoughts

The problem with signing riders before the season is over is that the new team has half a year or more to worry about whether it made the right choice. Signing a rider is always a stab in the dark, a bet on the future, and having time to wonder about whether you've made the right choice isn't always a good thing.


Last weekend's International-level races likely have allowed a few teams to sleep more comfortably, more confident that they have made the right choices. A few have got to be worried about their decisions. And one or two have got to be waking up in a cold sweat at 3 a.m., calling their lawyers to see exactly how iron-clad those contracts with the new riders actually are ...

Among those sleeping well likely are the Ten Kate squad that runs the Honda World Superbike Team. Nicky Hayden managed to squeeze one more front-row qualifying slot out of the aging CBR1000RR platform before it gets put out to pasture. Hayden is the only rider other than Chaz Davies on the factory Ducati and the two factory Kawaski riders to win in World Superbike this season, and he's made his teammate, the highly-acclaimed Michael van der Mark, look slow and inconsistent. 

Hayden will be back for another season, alongside Stefan Bradl, a Moto2 World Champion and a guy who is overlooked mostly because he had the misfortune of competing against one Marc Marquez. With an all-new bike on the way and these two riders in their stable, Ten Kate has got to be comfortable looking forward to 2017. Taking the fight to the Ducati and Kawasaki teams is going to be hard, but it's difficult to think of two better riders that Ten Kate could have signed to head the charge.

Ducati's got to be thinking it made all the right choices. On the MotoGP side, signing Jorge Lorenzo was a no-brainer, and he's going to be motivated to make Yamaha look bad. Andrea Dovisioso's win in Sepang last weekend validates the company's choice to keep an experienced hand, skilled in tricky conditions, on board. On the World Superbike side, Chaz Davies and the Panigale look unstoppable. That means that week-in, week-out, Ducati will have a shot at the wins, whichever Marco Melandri - the crazy-fast or the just-crazy - shows up for work on Friday morning for Free Practice 1.

Suzuki's GP squad has got to be a bit worried. Andrea Iannone keeps falling off the bike, as he did again last weekend. (An aside: I am glad that Iannone won in Austria, because I honestly think it will be his only MotoGP win, and I wish that every rider who has the courage to grid up for a MotoGP race could experience winning at least once. Call me a hopeless romantic.) Alex Rins' performances in Moto2 have not been anything to write about of late. Yes, he's been injured. But playing hurt is part of this game. Suzuki has got to be wondering which Rins is going to show up in 2017; the one from the first half of 2016 or the second half.

Yamaha, interestingly, is the factory that has got to be losing the most sleep and spending the most time pouring over escape clauses in rider contracts. Valentino Rossi is still fast, but is making more mistakes than ever before to ride at that pace, and he seems to be struggling to find the magic he could pull out of a hat a decade ago. It's hard to see Rossi losing a race like Sepang if you wound the clock back a decade. And Maverick Vinales is fast but inconsistent, and Yamaha has to wonder if it's the Suzuki that Maverick rides or ... Maverick.

Yamaha's World Superbike team has to be even more worried than its MotoGP team. Alex Lowes has defined under-performing this season. When teammate Sylvain Guintoli has been fit, he has been Lowes' equal at worst and thoroughly thrashed him at best. After Guintoli came back from missing half a season due to injury, matched his teammate straight away and put the YZF-R1 on the box in Qatar last weekend, Yamaha had got to be wondering if keeping Lowes and letting Guintoli go was the right call. And who is taking Guintoli's seat next season? van der Mark, whose picture is next to Lowes' mugshot in the dictionary next to "under-performing."

By the time Phillip Island rolls around, every one of these observations may be proven to be incorrect. But that's a long way away, a lot of rest for some teams, and a lot of sleepless nights filled with cold sweats for others.

Straight Gangsta ...

Wrapping up the MotoGP title early allows for a viewing of the season from some distance, from a different perspective, a chance to see some of the other realities that the 2016 campaign has brought into focus. The season has been more than just a showcase for the otherworldly talents of Marc Marquez. For those willing to look a little deeper, it showcases some other truths about racing in general, the industry of Grand Prix racing, and where Grand Prix racing fits into the broader picture of those who pay for it. It shows that HRC may just be straight racer gangsta, and that's meant to be a compliment. The object of the day, after all, isn't entertainment or fair competition. It's beating the others and demonstrating, beyond doubt, that you are best.

Consider:

- The spec electronics package hasn't done a thing to make the racing better. Not a thing. Many of the races have been runaways, with virtually no lead changes past the halfway point. Take away the unpredictable weather of 2016, injuries and the frightening tire lottery that Michelin has hurled at the competitors, and you see the same or even bigger gaps at the front of the field. 

Interestingly, an argument could be made that the spec electronics have made things worse, because teams and factories no longer have the wide array of capabilities of last year's electronics to refine their bikes to the edge of their performance abilities. You could argue that the spec electronics have given satellite teams a better shot at the wins. But that ignores the fact that it has been one factory that has made the best use of the rules package this year, and the success of only that manufacturer's satellite teams has been at the expense of the other factory squads. 

In Australia, on a satellite Honda, Cal Crutchlow straight-up, flat-out beat the best that the Yamaha, Suzuki and Ducati factory teams could throw at him. Only those ignorant of how racing works ever believed that spec electronics would "level the playing field" or "make things more competitive" at the front.

- HRC didn't even bother starting to sort out its electronics by the start of the season. It was clear, when Marquez and Dani Pedrosa were complaining about a lack of acceleration, that horsepower wasn't the problem - it's never the problem on a modern MotoGP bike. It's getting the power to the ground. Last year's RC213V had a honed-to-perfection set of electronic rider aids that tamed the wheelies. This year's crappier electronics package wasn't sorted at the beginning of the season, so the bike wheelied and the riders couldn't get on the gas like the Ducati and Yamaha riders could.

HRC's attitude seemed to be, we'll fix it when we get around to it. 

And that attitude is kind of understandable. 

There was no consensus as to when the wings would be banned - not if they would, but when. No sense in developing an electronics suite that worked only with an aero package that would be thrown in the dumpster in a month. 

There were the unpredictable Michelin tires to sort out.

And you have to remember that a race team isn't a stand-alone entity. It's part of a huge corporation, fighting for money with all of the other parts of that huge corporation. And it's hard for a race team to make a plea for funding and resources to make the crappy spec electronics do "X" when someone else in the board room says, "Hey, didn't we give you money to do 'X' with the package you had last year? Where did that money go? And don't we have a bike in the production lineup that already does 'X'?" It's embarrassing for the race team to explain that the MotoGP rules now ban the company's upcoming CBR1000RR's electronics package that will cost - literally - a mere few hundred dollars per unit.

So, in straight gangsta fashion, HRC sat and waited, completely confident that it would get everything sorted out in time to take the championship. Sometimes, the boldest move is to stand still and wait for the exact moment to attack. And the definition of gangsta is knowing that when you do move, you will crush the competition.

It took Honda and HRC until the post-Brno test to get around to sorting out the electronics package, according to Marquez. By then, the wings were heading for the recycle bin, so Honda stuck a pair of big ones on the front of the bike and called it a day on wing research. Marquez was starting to understand the Michelins. And it was clearer and clearer what the engineers needed to do with the spec electronics.

Honda now has won seven of the nine last rounds on a bike that the "experts" criticized as an ill-handling slug at the beginning of the year. With no mid-season changes to the engine spec allowed, the thing is now virtually a match in a straight line for the fastest bikes in the field, the Ducatis. And it handles well enough that not only the factory riders, but the satellite riders, can get the thing going well.

Sometimes gangsta is sitting on the sidelines, knowing that when the time is right, you can stride in and let everyone else on the grid know exactly who the 800-pound gorilla is.


 

The Kenan Principle

  
Laurence J. Peter noted that employees tend to be promoted to their level of incompetence and stay there. No higher-up wants to admit they made a mistake and demote someone they promoted. So over time, the principle suggests, in any given hierarchy, most positions get filled by incompetents.

Racing works this way, too. Teams, mechanics, engineers and particularly riders get noticed by winning in the lower ranks and then move into more and more challenging environments. It is easiest to see in rider careers; when the rider stops winning, there are no more promotions. Riders must exhibit not just competence, but excellence, by dominating in the lower divisions before they get the call-up for a front-line shot at the big leagues.



Jorge Lorenzo crushed the 250cc GP field in 2006 and 2007, winning 17 races in two years and taking the title easily both years; Yamaha had his name on a contract to ride its factory MotoGP bike before his second year was even well and truly started. Valentino Rossi won 11 125cc GP races in 1997, and that got him a 250cc GP ride. He won nine 250cc GP races in 1999, and that got him a factory 500cc Honda ride - and the wrenching skills of Jerry Burgess to help out. 

It's interesting to look at Casey Stoner's career, because he didn't dominate the lower classes in the same way, and he wasn't invited to ride the front-line weaponry. Stoner kicked his way into racing immortality through the back door, taking the less-fancied Ducati MotoGP ride and riding that evil, scorching missile straight to his first World Championship.

What Marc Marquez did to the lower classes doesn't even need to be mentioned, to avoid embarrassing his competitors - and you have to use the loosest definition of competitor in that context.

Those four riders account for 15 of the last 16 500cc/MotoGP World Champions. The only interloper was one Nicky Hayden, who got his ride in MotoGP by, frankly, making the rest of the AMA Superbike paddock look slow.

So what of the rest? What are they to do? Especially those who show that they have the talent, the skills and the bravery, to ride at the very front in the lower ranks?

Ego and finances sometimes dictate that a racer chooses to ride mid-pack in a higher division rather than to race for the wins in the lower classes. Personal sponsors pay more for exposure in the higher ranks, and it can be easier to get those sponsors to begin with. And sometimes that will pay more than a salary in a lower division, even the salary of a race- and title-winner. So you'll see riders sign on with satellite teams in, say, World Superbike, rather than race for wins in World Supersport.

Kenan Sofuoglu seems to be one of those racers who had the choice. His career is fascinating. In his rookie World Supersport season in 2006, he won two races, then crushed the competition in 2007 for his first World Championship. The next year, he moved up to World Superbike on a satellite-equivalent team (he was on the third Ten Kate bike on what the squad called a junior team) and wasn't successful. He moved back down to his level of competence, struggled the next season, then came back in 2010 and won his second World Championship.

For 2011, he moved to Moto2. One podium in 14 starts was not the level of success he sought. The next year, he moved back to World Supersport, his level of competence, this time with Kawasaki, and won his third World Championship.

The next season was pivotal. Sofuoglu had the choice to move back to Superbike with a team that does not have full factory support. Had Sofuoglu gone, he would have been in the same place that he had been in 2008. Sofuoglu chose instead to stay in World Supersport. He's since gotten two more World titles. He now has more Supersport World Championships than any other racer. 

He is revered as a sports figure in his home country of Turkey; when his ailing son was dying, the president of the country publicly announced that all of the country's resources would be at the disposal of Sofuoglu's family so Kenan could go race. And Sofuoglu mentors and manages young Turkish riders, one of whom, Toprak Razgatlioglu, won the 2015 European Superstock 600 Championship.

It's easy to say from the sidelines that every racer should always race in the highest possible class. But by functioning at his level of competence, Sofuoglu has not only made himself a legend, but has increased the visibility of the sport and given younger riders chances they might not have otherwise had.

Practicing the Kenan Principle, in other words, has worked out not just for Sofuoglu, but for the sport. Not a bad principle by which to live.

Getting Stuck In ...

 
... is a British informal phrase, defined as to "start doing (something) enthusiastically or with determination." In the world of motorcycle road racing, it is most often heard during the broadcasts of British Superbike series racing, when one of the riders with a reputation for more bollocks than brains arrives on the scene of a scrap for position and an announcer booms out, "Oh yeah! 'eel get stuck in, 'ee will!"

Endurance racing requires a different type of "getting stuck in." It requires brains and controlled aggression. It takes a rider who is blindingly quick and equally smart, someone who knows exactly when to dive to the inside of another rider for an apex and who knows when to hold off. Raw speed remains critical, but discretion usually is the better part of valor in an eight-hour or longer contest. Actually, it's usually the smart move in a race as short as a GP or a Superbike World Championship sprint race.

But sometimes, sometimes ... 

 
Let's just say that there is such a thing as being too smart. Motorcycle racers do things that seemingly defy the laws of physics. And when you try to do something that you're not sure if it's going to work, if you open the throttle 10 yards earlier than you thought was possible or brake 10 yards later, the resulting euphoria can be addicting. Abandoning caution - and making it work - can take your breath away. Racers live for moments like those.

Anthony Delhalle is one of the best in the business when it comes to balancing speed and aggression. He's a multi-time World Champion in the discipline of motorcycle endurance road racing. His speed is undeniable, his mistakes rare, and the combination of the two makes him one of the most-respected figures in his field and a pillar of the Suzuki Endurance Racing Team rider squad.

Into Delhalle's orbit entered one Juan Eric Gomez, also a World Endurance co-champion for SERT and a manager for Racing Team JEG, which races in the FIM CEV Repsol European Championship. It's a private but professional operation based in Spain that helps give up-and-coming riders and mechanics in the sport experience in the field of motorcycle road racing. 

Gomez kept offering Delhalle a spot on the Superbike he fielded. Delhalle always had a good reason to turn the offer down - he was a contracted Suzuki rider at the time JEG campaigned a competing brand. There were conflicting race dates between the FIM EWC and the Repsol CEV championship.

But this year, Gomez went out and got a Suzuki. And Delhalle had no reason to say no anymore. Dominique Meliand, SERT manager, wasn't thrilled with the plan, but didn't say no. "Obviously, I do not think he jumped to the ceiling saying "whouaaa, it's great," Delhalle told Moto Revue.

So Delhalle went sprint racing. He offers very logical reasons. It's good training, something he can't get with SERT, which can't afford to go testing whenever its riders want to go riding. A front-line EWC bike is an expensive, sophisticated piece of kit. And in the Repsol series, Delhalle rides a different brand of tires and can learn something, and he can push his personal limits as well.

The point of all of this is that if you haven't seen it yet, go to Youtube and watch the Repsol CEV Superbike races from Jerez this season. The highlight, beyond any question, is watching Delhalle getting stuck in, good 'un proper.

The first indication that Delhalle is dropping "controlled" from "controlled aggression" comes about two-thirds of the way through the first race of the double-header. Aboard the Racing Team JEG Suzuki GSX-R1000, Delhalle is drafting the Leopard Yamaha Stratos YZF-R1 of Alejandro Medina down the front straight. At the end of the straight, the GSX-R1000 veers toward the apex at a rate of speed that, from half a world away, you can see isn't going to work. Delhalle makes the pass (undoubtedly Medina heard Delhalle yelling "Yee-haw!" as the Suzuki went past) then runs wide, the front slides, the rear slides, and Delhalle is closer to the outside edge of the track than the apex when he finally turns the big Suzuki.

Notice served.

The next laps continue in this vein. Delhalle gets past Medina and promptly spins up the rear tire on a corner exit, launching himself out of the saddle. Every turn is a spectacular near-disaster. Marc Marquez would have covered his eyes watching this. And the climax comes in the run to the flag, where Delhalle and Medina throw elbows and swap paint. If Delhalle did this in an endurance race, Dominique likely would run out onto the track, grab Delhalle off the bike as it went past, and French-slap him all the way down Pit Lane. But it was a sprint race, and it was all (barely) within control and within the limits of acceptable risk-taking in a sprint contest.

Delhalle put it on the box, taking third spot. He learned something, certainly. He sharpened his skills, got familiar with new tires, trained in a competitive environment, etc., etc. All good. All legit.

But best of all, 'ee got stuck in, good 'un proper.