The Unfair Disadvantage, Or The Magic Of The Marquez

Arguments over the greatest rider of all time are essentially entertaining-yet-pointless exercises. Barring the invention of a time machine, it is impossible to objectively judge how a rider on any given machine on a particular tire in one year compares against the skills of another rider on a different machine (or that same machine) on different tires in a different year. It's impossible to say at the end of a given race which rider was better on a given day, regardless of who won. It's entirely possible to argue that the rider who came from a horrible qualifying spot on the grid to fourth was the best rider of the day.

It is entirely possible, however, to make an absolutely objective, unassailable argument about the relative advantages and disadvantages a given rider had during their careers. During certain periods, some riders are given such immense advantages that, win records aside, it's hard to argue that it is their skill that earned them their domination. It is the nature of the sport that introduces this variable - a talented rider will be given, by a factory and supporting companies determined to win above all else, every single advantage they can muster. Yes, it helps guarantee the success that the companies crave. But it also reduces the ability to truly judge the rider's skill in comparison to other racers.

The central idea here is simple: No other multi-time World Champion has raced with fewer of the equipment advantages of the epoch-definers of modern motorcycle road racing than Marc Marquez. I've long marvelled at his sheer talent and speed - what he did to the lower classes bordered on criminal - but I've been pondering during my morning runs why I'm so impressed with what he's done in MotoGP.

And this is why: In every other period, the defining Champion had an Unfair Advantage (phrase gleefully stolen from the autobiography of car racer, engineer and racing genius Mark Donohue, a must-read for any race fan). Marquez has raced during a period when MotoGP's rulemakers have - in a very literal sense - stripped him of the advantages that his predecessors enjoyed.

Consider:

Giacomo Agostini is legendary, with 122 GP wins to his name. And his talent is legendary, as he proved in titanic battles with full factory efforts by Honda-mounted Mike Hailwood in 1967. But Honda left the sport the following year, and Ago literally raced the factory-backed multi-cylinder MV Agusta against a field of privateer and single-cylinder machines. His win total is impressive, but ... after battling to the 500cc titles in 1966 and 1967, Ago on essentially the sole factory machine in the field won every 500cc and 350cc race in 1968, all but one of the 350cc races in 1969, every race in those categories in 1970 ... you get the idea. Such was the mechanical dominance of the MV Agusta that, as Colin MacKellar writes in his history of Yamaha GP machines, the 1973 season finally showed enough competition from the emerging Yamaha two-strokes that "there was the forgotten sight of MV engine blocks being opened in the grass fields accurately called 'paddocks' at the GP circuits. For the previous five years, the MV's had been taken out of the truck, dusted off, filled with oil and fuel, raced, garlanded and loaded back onto the truck." The advanced MV Agusta, and a virtual lack of factory competition, was Ago's Unfair Advantage.

Mick Doohan's era - five straight 500cc titles - started as Honda introduced the "big-bang" firing order for its four-cylinder NSR500. It was such a clear advantage that the other factories tried to copy, but Honda had gotten the technology and the application right first. As the other factories caught up, Doohan was racking up wins and titles. Then, just as every other rider on the grid was coming to terms with the "big-bang" motors, Doohan tried the old, even-firing-interval engine again and found it faster, easier to handle, easier on tires and a motor configuration no other rider wanted to try! "The bike to me feels better. The other guys are not used to this style engine. They have grown up with the "big bang" ... This is better for me, and I think the others have been scared off by the rumours of how the old ones used to be," Doohan says in MacKellar's awesome book on Honda's GP racers.

Valentino Rossi inherited Doohan's winning team at Honda, including legendary crew chief Jeremy Burgess. When the Rossi era started, he took the dominant Honda to title after title, then took Burgess with him to Yamaha, where the two of them revamped the Yamaha into a title-winner. Rossi had Burgess, and one other Unfair Advantage - tires. Michelin were the hot property during this period, and Rossi had access to the company's "overnight specials." These were, literally, tires that Rossi could test on the Friday of a race weekend, give feedback to the company, who would cook a new, specially honed for the track and conditions tire and fly it into the track for race day. Rossi was not the only rider who had these "overnight specials," but the majority of the field didn't. And as Rossi was one of the winningest riders in the series at the time, Michelin likely would have paid more attention to what he wanted in a race tire. The extent of this Unfair Advantage was made clear when the "overnight specials" were banned, and Rossi's results nose-dived so dramatically that after Casey Stoner took the 2007 title, Rossi switched to Bridgestones, and a year later MotoGP adopted the spec tire rule.

What's noteworthy here is that this was the first step in "leveling the playing field" moves that have led to the current MotoGP machines.

Fast-forward a bit to the Marquez era. Winner in his first crack at a MotoGP title, he humiliated the field in his second season. Arguments raged that Honda's superior machine was ruining the racing. Never has Marquez had access to special tires; his entire MotoGP career has taken place on spec tires, at first Bridgestone, then Michelin. No advantage there. Testing restrictions never have been tighter. During his career, first the electronics hardware was standardized, then the software was standardized for the entire field - no advantage there anymore. Engine limits were introduced, with engine specifications "frozen" for long periods during the season. Fuel consumption was restricted. Teams and factories that performed poorly got extra engines, extra testing, to help them catch up. And MotoGP execs spoke openly about making sure they had a "show" to sell - which is another way of saying that they weren't going to allow another Doohan-esque period to manifest itself if they had anything to do about it.

It is in this era that Marquez' accomplishments have to be seen. Marquez has 34 wins and 60 podiums in 86 starts during an era where the rules are stacked against anyone winning that much. It's unlike any era before in racing, an era designed to prevent the emergence of a superstar, yet Marquez has done just that.

I'll wrap this up with a hypothetical question: If the rules were the same as they were in 2014 for the machine (no spec electronics), Marquez had a legendary crew chief in his garage and Michelin would cook special tires for him for specific tracks for specific race weekends ... would he ever lose a race again?

Words With P.J. Jacobsen: “It's Time To Move Up To Superbike ...”

Preseason testing marked P.J. Jacobsen as one of the favorites to take the Supersport World Championship in 2017. But in hindsight, the Phillip Island round may have been a harbinger of things to come. Undeniably fast, Jacobsen's season has not gone to plan.

In a wide-ranging conversation in the paddock at Lausitzring in Germany, Jacobsen reflected on his career, his season to date, and his desire to move into the premier class of the series.

"It's been up and down. It started off pretty good at Phillip Island, with the testing and all, and a silly mistake from myself. I should have had a win. Truthfully, I feel bad, it was an easy win,” Jacobsen says.

“I've had a lot of pole positions this year. On the down side, we've had a couple of DNFs which have affected us in the Championship. It's just been up and down. The team's trying really hard. I'm working really hard. It's a new bike for me. But also new teams have come in and stepped up the level a bit. So it's right now a bit hard to compete. But I'm trying to do my best, keep pushing, and Sunday's what counts. We keep trying to get as many points and keep the flow going and try to click off podiums."

Jacobsen broke through in 2015 after his team collapsed mid-season. The New Yorker jumped onto a different team, immediately put his Honda CBR600RR onto the podium first race out and ran off two wins and two more seconds to close out the season second in the Championship. It was an amazing accomplishment after an insane season, and much was expected in 2016, especially after Jacobsen joined the immensely successful Ten Kate team.

But 2016 was a struggle, and four podiums were not the results Jacobsen expected. Jumping to the factory-backed MV Agusta squad to race its F3 675 seemed like an excellent move, as competitive as the MV had been in 2016.

The landscape for 2017 has changed, however. Yamaha, eager to demonstrate the superiority of its new YZF-R6, hired the reigning Endurance World Champion and a host of other supremely talented riders and put them on full factory-backed bikes.

"In the past couple of years, it's been me, Jules (Cluzel) and Kenan (Sofuoglu, the five-time and defending Supersport World Champion). Since the new teams and other riders have come in, and the new YZF-R6 has come out, I think it's had a big impact on the class," Jacobsen says. "It's a very good bike. Everyone knows that it's a really good bike. I was teammates with a couple of riders who are in front of me in the championship, and um ... It's hard to race against them right now. It's a very competitive bike."

And Jacobsen has had to adapt, after a year and a half on the Honda, to the demands of the MV Agusta.

"You have ride them differently. The Honda's a more aggressive bike to ride,” he says. “The MV is more like a 250 GP bike - you have to be more relaxed on the bike, real corner speed and flow, not so aggressive with the bike. I notice that when I get more aggressive with the bike I start going backward with my lap times. You relax more, the lap times come easily."

Jacobsen has raced literbikes in the Endurance World Championship, and has impressed. He's happy with his riding style on the bigger machines, and is looking to move up to Superbike.

“I'm not here to just make up the numbers. I've been four years in the Supersport class. I'm trying to move up to Superbike. Obviously, you need to be challenging for the Championship to move up,” Jacobsen says. “I've been second in the Championship before. Last year didn't quite go as planned. Hopefully this year I can continue to show people I can move up. The ultimate goal is to be in Superbike and ride in front of American fans. I think it would be cool to be up there one day.

"I'm getting older - I'm 24 now - and I've been in the class four years. The class has changed so much, with different rules, and 600s aren't such a big thing right now, as manufacturers seem like they're not focusing on it right now. Yamaha is, but ... I don't know. A lot of things are changing, I'm getting older, and it's time to move up to Superbike.”

Jacobsen was among the front-runners every time he got on the Endurance bike, demonstrating that he could race literbikes and do it well. In the past, Jacobsen has raced for a front-line Superbike team in the British Superbike series and has won in Superstock 1000 in that series.

"I rode for Honda in Suzuka and I did very well there. I came from British Superbike. I like the Superbike. I like riding the Superbike better, and I think I ride it better,” Jacobsen says. "Every time I did an endurance race we were in the podium positions, and we always had a mechanical. I was the fastest Honda rider in Suzuka last year, and we were always in the top three - we just needed the bike to last."

With MV Agusta reportedly considering adding a second bike to its one-rider Superbike effort, a move up to the premier class and the manufacturer's F4 1000 would seem to be a natural step for Jacobsen. He's interested, but there has been nothing settled.

"I'd like to stay with a manufacturer and be loyal. That's one thing I believe in. Hopefully they have a Superbike spot open,” Jacobsen says.

In Praise Of Elias, Or It's Not Easy To Tame A Tiger

It is fashionable to cite the success of Toni Elias as proof of the dearth of talent in U.S. road racing. The mantra goes that Elias, a washed-up has-been, showed up on a MotoAmerica Superbike ride for Yoshimura Suzuki and casually beat the best of the U.S.

Toni Elias, MotoAmerica preseason testing, Circuit of the Americas, 2017.

This assessment is based on a short-sighted view of history and a lack of understanding as to how the business of racing works. Fact is that beating Toni on any given day is a challenge for anyone, not just in the U.S. but anywhere in the world.

Elias' speed is indisputable. Not only is he one of the few racers to beat a top-of-his-form Valentino Rossi, but he did so on a satellite machine. And Elias adapted to the new Moto2 series quickly, winning the first championship in that category. Speed is not the question.

Elias' reputation took a serious hit the following year when he went to MotoGP. Faced with the entirely different Bridgestone MotoGP tire after a season on the Moto2 spec Dunlop, Elias struggled to make the tires work. On his best days, he was mid-pack. On his worst, he was like Dani Pedrosa trying to get heat into the current spec Michelins - the tires simply gave him no grip, no feedback, and he struggled to get into the top 10. 

Switching back to Moto2 didn't help, and the underdeveloped Honda production MotoGP racer wasn't any friendlier. In racing, all you have are the results from last season, and Elias' results were literally nothing you wanted on your resume, especially given the heights he had ascended to. The top-level machinery that gets you wins simply wasn't made available to him.

In addition, Elias is a professional, with more than a decade of GP experience. In the post-economic-meltdown world, there were a lot of teams who could overlook Elias' speed, experience and talent and opt for a racer who would bring cash and sponsorship, rather than demand a paycheck. After earning a living doing something, it's hard to do it for free. It's a harsh-but-true estimate that on most grids, a third of the riders are getting paid, a third are doing it for free, and a third are paying for the privilege of racing. With no offers of paid rides, Elias sat, in his words, watching racing from the couch.

Many mistook this as European teams dismissing Elias' skills. Not true. They were dismissing his demands to be paid as a professional, compared to the extra value he could bring. Could Elias have scored mid-field or top 10 results in Moto2? Certainly. But why pay a rider for a 10th-place finish if you can have a rider bring the team money and finish 15th?

When Yoshimura Suzuki called, Elias was motivated. Yoshimura was a paying gig. Elias rewarded them with wins right off the bat on one of the oldest machines on the MotoAmerica grid - although, it must be said, a very well-sorted motor racing bike!

And that led to the 2017 season, with a very motivated Elias riding a brand-new GSX-R1000 that Suzuki had tested extensively in the off-season. Elias and teammate Roger Hayden both were more competitive than they had been, and Elias in particular gelled with the machine. Elias pushed hard; note the scuffed left hip of the leathers in the picture above. Elias dug deep into his well of experience and skill to earn the results he did.

The fact that Elias is the 2017 MotoAmerica Superbike champion isn't a damning indictment of the talent in the U.S. Rather, it could be viewed as the opposite. It took a rider who could win at the MotoGP level to defeat the U.S. riders, and even Elias had to push as hard as he could to make it happen.

Factory Proximity

Dan Linfoot, Honda Racing British Superbike Team, Druids Hairpin, British Superbikes, 2017. The flames erupting from the exhaust aren't just spectacular to look at. They hint at something deeper, something that is relevant to the very core of professional racing.


Linfoot, like most other professional racers on the new 2017 Honda CBR1000RR Fireblade, had struggled, with little in the way of help coming from Japan. At this round, he qualified third, led Race One and took his first podium of the season.

After the qualifying news conference, we spoke about a comment he'd made - that he'd gone to Japan to ride the Honda Fireblade put together by Moriwaki Motul Racing for the Suzuka 8 Hours. Linfoot had just gotten back from testing the bike, and he said he'd tried to get his team to make the BSB bike react like the Suzuka bike.

Linfoot said what he got most from the Suzuka test was a feeling that he wanted replicated in the BSB machine. Specifically, he wanted a smoother, more direct response to the throttle, which would make it easier for him to dial in the power and get out of turns more quickly. It is an axiom of racing of any sort: The pilota who gets on the power earliest wins.

"I told the team, the feel of the Suzuka bike - that's what I want this bike to feel like," Linfoot said.

The flame coming from the exhaust could be an indication that the team, unable to use electronics to dial in throttle response, had resorted to some old-time tuning techniques like richening the mixture to avoid lean on-off throttle response. It's crude and inefficient, but when you're banned from using more sophisticated techniques, you use what you've got.

Linfoot isn't the only Superbike rider who went to Japan and came back impressed by the machinery they rode, even though in some cases the spec of the Suzuka 8 Hours bikes were nearly identical to the spec of the machine they rode in series like World Superbike.

It is the phenomenon of Factory Proximity. Not all the information the factory knows leaves the building, the series or sometimes the country. As one BSB racer told me, "If Honda wanted to win World Superbike, they'd be winning World Superbike." Obviously, what Honda knows about making the new Fireblade competitive isn't transferring to Europe. 

Linfoot made it clear that the Honda at Suzuka was a much better machine. Alex Lowes liked the Suzuka 8 Hours Yamaha far better than his WorldSBK machine.

It is one of the fascinating subplots of racing, that information goes as far as it needs to go to achieve a company's greater goals. And winning at all costs isn't always the goal. To get that information, that data, that first-hand experience with the front-line weapon, the closer you get to the factory, the better.

 

Images Of Speed - 4

Been traveling a bit. Took my camera. Will be posting images of racing every now and then ...

Eugene Laverty, Milwaukee Aprilia Shaun Muir Racing RSV4, Turn 11, Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, practice, Superbike World Championship 2017.

The factory Aruba.it Racing Ducati Panigale R racebikes wore special colors at Laguna.

Tom Sykes wheelies the factory Kawasaki Racing Team ZX-10RR up the front straight, Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, practice, Superbike World Championship 2017.

Start of MotoAmerica Superbike Race Two, Turn Two, Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, MotoAmerica 2017.

Images Of Speed - 3

Been traveling a bit. Took my camera ...

Superbike World Championship, Lausitzring, Germany, August 2017. This picture reflects the story of the season so far: Chaz Davies (7) and Jonathan Rea (1) battle for the lead in the opening laps of Race One, while Tom Sykes slots into third. On any given weekend, Rea and Davies are the two safest bets for the win. If you look carefully at the shot of Rea, you will note his more upright riding position, and that the top of his boot is on the ground.

It's about 30 feet tall, and it's the hospitality structure erected just behind the garages by the Milwaukee Aprilia team run by Shaun Muir Racing. To give you a sense of scale, the white-and-red structures at the edges of the picture are full-size cargo trailers. It's not just the tracks in Europe that are temples of speed, it's the effort that goes into a race weekend. Remember, this is the hospitality structure for a team that hasn't yet scored a podium.

From mid-race on, Davies was untouchable.

Nicky Hayden was in the paddock of WorldSBK for only a season and a half, but he was adopted by everyone there as one of their own. Look at the images of WorldSBK from the second half of this season, and note how many times Hayden iconography is visible.

Images of Speed - 2

Been traveling a bit. Took my camera. Will post images of racing every now and then ...

Fans in paddock, Brands Hatch, British Superbike, July 2017.

 Shakey Byrne, Be Wiser Ducati Panigale R, Cooper Straight, Brands Hatch, British Superbike.

 John Hopkins, Moto Rapido Ducati Panigale R, Druids, Brands Hatch, British Superbike.

Michael Laverty, McAMS Yamaha YZF-R1, Clark Curve, Brands Hatch, British Superbike. I love this shot; the bike is barrelling toward me at about 100 miles an hour and will pass about three feet to my right, accelerating hard. The ground is thoroughly wet, so the riders have gone with full rains. As they cross the white grid marks painted onto the ground, the bike slips sideways. It's a corner that takes commitment and bravery under the best of circumstances; in these circumstances, it takes everything you've got to go fast.

Images Of Speed - 1

Been traveling a bit. Took my camera. Will be posting images of racing every now and then ...

Image One: Me, Goddards Corner at Donington Park, Ron Haslam Racing School, Honda CBR600RR. Obviously, I didn't take that shot, but think of it as a byline for this series ...

Image Two: Chaz Davies, factory Aruba.it Racing Ducati Panigale R, Turn One, Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, Race One, Superbike World Championship.

Image Three: Toni Elias, Yoshimura Suzuki GSX-R1000, front straight, Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, Race One, MotoAmerica Superbike.

Image Four: Another of Toni Elias, Yoshimura Suzuki GSX-R1000, front straight, Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, Race One, MotoAmerica Superbike. No one else in racing anywhere in the world made the new-for-2017 GSX-R1000 look as good as Elias.

Comfort Zone

Me, CBR600RR with full rain tires, Woodcote corner, Silverstone.

I have ridden on racetracks for 22 years and always managed to avoid riding in the wet. Recently, I had a choice: Ride the Silverstone Racing Circuit in the wet, or don't ride it at all. I chose the wet. I am happy I did, because I was able to watch the MotoGP round at Brno with entirely new eyes, an immense amount of respect for those who can go fast in the wet, and more than a little sympathy for Valentino Rossi.

Through chance and happenstance, I had my choice of two machines at Silverstone. For the first session - wet but not pouring - I chose the 2017 Yamaha YZF-R6. It was fitted with Pirelli Supercorsa tires - dry-weather DOT-certified racing rubber, with just enough grooves to make it legal for road use. The bike also comes stock with an immensely powerful system of electronic rider aids. I set the thing on full nanny mode - Power Mode B, Traction Control 4 - and headed out.

Even with those settings, the bike was - tricky. I could get it to twitch in a straight line, and there was no way to get any kind of confidence in the grip. I felt as though I was playing a video game, with virtually no feedback from the machine, and just spent the session blasting from corner to corner as rapidly as I could, then creeping around them at a snail's pace. That's not true. I think I saw a snail pass me once. And it gave me the finger.

Next session, track soaking and rain lashing down, I got on the Honda CBR600RR. A wonderful bike, yet a pale shadow of a new-generation R6. Cruder, slower, and no electronics at all. But it was mounted with full rain tires.

The difference in feel was - what is the term for the distance from zero to one? There was grip. I wasn't at dry condition lean angles by any stretch of the imagination. But I was able to brake ridiculously hard and to start feeding in the throttle far, far earlier than I would have imagined. I was able to drift the bike sideways over the painted grid lines exiting Woodcote, with a much greater level of confidence than I'd anticipated. For those conditions, the simple change of rubber made the greatest amount of difference, compensating for everything the CBR600RR lacked.

Dry pavement, dry-weather tires, all is right in the universe.

The track dried for the last session. I went back out on the R6, and I was immediately knee-down everywhere, confirming the positive dry-pavement performance of the Supercorsas. I left the track that day with a new, personal, visceral respect for the difference between rains and dry weather tires.

Arguments over whether Rossi waited too late to switch to the dry motorcycle at Brno aside, I can understand and feel why he made the choices he made. Rossi was leading the race, was faster, and the difference in the feeling between slicks and wets on a damp track is massive. Non-racers really don't grasp how tricky slicks can be to get to function - they're just tires, right? Hardly. At this level, they are insanely sensitive performance devices, rubber that will give you grip that your brain almost cannot process, yet will spit you off the machine if you go into a corner with the temperature of the tire just a few degrees out of its optimal operating range. A full-on racing slick (or DOT race tire) out of its operating temperature range is just flat spooky to ride on, even on a dry surface.

Part of the magic of Marc Marquez is that he's able to ride rapidly in those conditions, when the grip simply isn't there, sliding the machine around until the tires come up to temperature and the conditions improve.

Rossi? I understand why he clung to the rains for one more lap. The difference in feel, the confidence that a racer craves. The rains were giving him exactly what he wanted - reassurance and speed. And he knew what that out lap was going to feel like on the slicks. It was going to be the exact opposite. No racer wants that.

I can't empathize with the choice made by Rossi. All of the riders in MotoGP are professionals, I'm a hobbyist. And every one of them is so far beyond my level of capability that it's like they are governed by a different physics textbook than I am. 

But I can sympathize.

Sport Touring, BMW, And Nirvana

Kevin Williams has done the 800-mile round trip to Laguna Seca for years on his BMW S1000RR. Photos by Michael Gougis.

I know these roads. I have ridden them from my earliest days of riding. They are the asphalt capillaries away from the highways that link Southern to Northern California, the two-lane roads that offer an escape from the beaten path.

For decades now, I've ridden them for weekend getaways, for motorcycle road evaluations, and every spring for a visit to Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca to watch the world's best roadracers on one of the most iconic circuits in the world.

They offer everything that the roads can throw at a rider. There are wide-open spaces that test the ultimate power of the fastest machines - there is a reason that BMW brought us here, years ago, to sample the K1300S, at the time the most powerful motorcycle BMW ever had produced. There are tight, twisty sections, long, open sweepers, and if you are so inclined, you can jump onto long stretches of freeway to get you between Point A and Point B in as little time as possible.

At the end of a day on these roads, you feel like you have put in a full day of riding. Your skills are sharper, your knowledge of your machine more intimate, and your appreciation for the art of motorcycling never will be greater.

For the 27^th year, the same group of friends joined me for the annual ride up to Laguna, this time to watch the Superbike World Championship and MotoAmerica races. This year, I wanted to do the ride on a machine that would, at first glance, seem to be out of its element. It's easy to focus on the sporting elements of the BMW S1000RR. Hard to overlook nearly 190 horsepower at the rear wheel, semi-active suspension, massive disc brakes, dynamic traction control, and a riding position that looks like something off a Superbike grid.

But the fact is that more than nine out of ten Supersports machines sold in the U.S. never are taken onto the track. They are used on the streets, as weekend thrill machines, as commuters, and even as long-distance touring bikes. Look at the parking lot at the WorldSBK races, and there are lots and lots of sportbikes with soft luggage attached.

I have, in my library, Ian Falloon's book on the history of the iconic BMW R90S. The machine was praised for its ability to compete with the best on the track and perform the role of gentleman's express on the highway. So, the question here is simple: Can the finely honed blade of the S1000RR cut it in the role of touring bike? From the saddle of BMW's most advanced, most powerful and fastest motorcycle ever, can you feel the ghosts of the R90S?

Paddock, Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, the turnaround point for the trip.

The Route:

Fire up the 101 in heavy traffic out of the Los Angeles basin. Overnight at a friend's house, where each year dinner gets a little longer and the boots-up time gets a little later.

First up is the two-lane Highway 33 past Ojai, away from the coast and up over the mountains toward the great central plains of the state. This road has everything - blind, tight switchbacks with the occasional rock and shale on the verges, long, sweeping turns with clear lines of sight for half a mile, and long, long stretches of straights that look like they were drawn on a map with a ruler.

Drop down onto Highway 166, where the temperature is soaring. More two-lane highways get you over a high-speed mountain pass with broad, wide-open corners that clearly were drafted by a sportbike rider who had infiltrated the state transportation department. Into Taft for fuel, where the temperatures have soared well into triple-digits. Back onto Highway 33, onto a long, straight two-lane highway populated by big trucks and farming equipment, bisecting vast expanses of oil drilling rigs and empty land.

Up to Highway 58, more tight, twisting two-lane asphalt with dramatic elevation changes thrown in. One stretch of straight pavement is just a series of blind crests, so steep that the other side is hidden. Even after riding that same road for so many years, the experience never fails to amaze me. A few more fast sweepers, then split up to Paso Robles for lunch, then a straight shot up the Highway 101 to Monterey, battling the vicious crosswinds through the vast agricultural tracts north of Greenfield. By the time the sidestands go down in Monterey, it's been more than 278 miles since Ventura.

This portion of the ride tested both the sporting and touring capabilities of the machine. Loaded with a camera, a computer, running gear and everything else I'd need on a long weekend, the S1000RR carried a full complement of tank bag, passenger seat bag and saddlebags. But the machine didn't seem to notice while riding at a pace that was appropriate for public roads – but quite far toward the enthusiastic end of that range!

Highway 33 and a respite from the heat.

Sporting:

The Metzeler RRacetecs provided more than enough grip for anything I care to do in a corner, and the electronic rider aids really prove their value in real-world riding. I left everything on Sport mode, where the ABS just sort of sits in the corner and lets you get on with the task of braking (which is really just setting your corner entry speed) comfortable in the knowledge that if something untoward appears on the road without you seeing it, the machine has your back. In addition, the anti-wheelie and anti-slip allow you to get on the throttle enthusiastically, and if you cross the line, the machine once again keeps you out of trouble. This allowed me to more thoroughly enjoy the ride, accelerating harder out of corners with less worry. It really is amazing how unobtrusive the system is in street riding. When I'd dial in too much throttle for the available grip at the lean angle I was at, the machine just sort of gathered speed a little more slowly than the right hand wanted, then when all was well, picked up its skirts and flat flew.

Clutchless shifting is one of those things that once you experience it, you're thinking, why did it take them so long? Accelerating out of fast corners, grabbing gears as you go, is seamless and doesn't upset the chassis when leaned over, the power on hard. And clutchless downshifting means one less thing to think about when entering a corner. That is, really, the advantage of clutchless downshifting to racers: More of their brain is available for braking, turning and leaning. The more brain available for that, the better (read, faster and more accurately) it can be done. And it works the same way on a two-lane highway.

In short: The bike is a missile. The electronic rider aids make all of that capability accessible to you.

Jordi Torres on the Althea World Superbike S1000RR. Torres has just crested the hill after the short straight at Laguna, is traveling approximately 160 miles an hour, is knee-down, the bike touching the pavement so lightly after the crest that you can hear the traction control modulating the throttle to provide maximum power and speed for the grip available. Standing at this spot, watching and knowing what is happening on the bike is powerful proof of how well modern electronic rider aids work.

Touring:

What I found most interesting was that the technology incorporated into the bike for the purposes of getting it around a racetrack more quickly paid big dividends while touring on the bike.

As on most long rides, comfort becomes a major factor on the way home. For me, that meant 371 miles straight, almost all on the 101, from Monterey to the far eastern corner of Los Angeles County.

After two days of watching the races at Laguna, we chose to head home on Sunday night to try to avoid the worst of the heat. It was only partly successful, as it was still well over 100 degrees at 5 in the afternoon. I recall thinking, as we rode south and the sun sank, that it couldn't possibly get any hotter, that eventually it was bound to cool down, and then rounding a corner past a foothill only to find that yes, actually, it could get hotter, thank you very much. Then, after fueling at Atascadero, the temperature plummeted more than 40 degrees and into the high 50s as we approached Pismo Beach and the Pacific Ocean, shot back into the 90s a few moments later as our route brought us back inland toward Santa Maria, and stayed there nearly the entire way home. It was still almost 90 degrees when I pulled into my garage at 10:45 p.m.

Little things normally associated with reducing lap times made such a mile-eating grind far, far less unpleasant. Clutchless shifting made dealing with traffic a one-handed affair, not that you needed to do a lot of shifting with the torque and flexibility of the S1000RR motor. I first experienced an S1000RR on a test ride when the machine first was introduced, and all these years later the engine still thrills, every time. 

Sylvain Barrier

ABS took even more stress out of traffic. (And yes, while ABS isn't normally associated with racetrack use, the fact is that modern ABS systems would likely get most club racers around a circuit more quickly. Old superstitions die hard.)

Add in a couple of touring-oriented features like the heated grips and cruise control, and the bike becomes a pleasant place to spend a couple of hours without stopping. The electronic cruise control on the S1000RR is nice and accurate, and gave me peace of mind while stretching my right hand for a moment or two.

Not that my wrists, back or legs ached much. On a modern sportbike, the bars are low, but the machine is so short (for agility on the track) that the reach to them is not far. The S1000RR's seat was well-padded, the pegs high but not cramped for my 5' 10” frame, and the sporting fairing does a decent job of deflecting the wind.

Six hours straight on a cutting-edge sportbike platform capable of winning National-level Superbike races (see Jordan Szoke, the dominant rider in the CSBK Canadian Superbike Championship on the Mopar Express Lane BMW Superbike Team S1000RR) was a lot more pleasant than it had any right to be. The proof, to me, was that when I got home after that six-hour, 371-mile ride, I just got off the bike, unloaded it, took off the luggage, wiped it down, showered and went to bed. The next morning, I felt like I could do it again – and wanted to.

Epilogue:

There was a moment on the ride up, in one of those big, fast, wide-open sweepers. My friend Kevin was ahead of me on his 2015 S1000RR, Chuck behind on his 2016 S1000RR. I was following Kevin closely enough that I could feel the turbulence left behind by his machine slicing through the air. Leaned over, knee out, upper body cranked into the wind for a proper cornering position, the wind noise and exhaust note providing the final sensory elements of a symphony of speed. The S1000RR was in its element; loaded with luggage and hundreds of miles into the trip, perfectly settled and stable, power pouring through the rear tire, giving me everything a sport-touring rider could want, and I actually thought: I wish I could live right here, in this moment, all the time.

The Cutting Courses

Ondrej Vostatek is 12 years old. He's been racing since he was six years old, has won mini road racing championships in the Czech Republic and in Germany. He's raced in the Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Holland and Spain.

Vostatek has raced Honda NSF100s and Moto4 machines - twin-spar aluminum framed machines powered by 25-horsepower Honda CRF150 engines cranking out 25 horsepower and weighing 165 pounds.

Now he's competing in the FIM CEV Repsol European Talent Cup series on a Honda NSF250R, a 250cc four-stroke single with a GP twin-spar frame, a bike that kicks out 46 horsepower and weighs 185 pounds.

That is the specification of the machine Vostatek races.

He's one of 29 riders competing in the entire series. The teams competing in the series have direct links to the teams competing in MotoGP and are funded by some of the same companies whose logos appear on the fairings of MotoGP machines. MotoGP factory rider Alex Rins runs a team in the series.

That is the level of competition Vostatek races at.

He's 12.

And he's not the youngest rider in the class.

There is a term that first-year law students quickly learn. It is the phrase "Cutting Course." These are the courses that are designed to weed out the students who will not  be successful lawyers. They are wicked-hard, and the instructors are merciless. The point is to allow only the most talented to proceed. The rest are cut.

Spain is the Cutting Course of motorcycle road racing. Much has been written about how the Spanish domination of Grand Prix racing is bad for the sport. But the fact is that no country has made motorcycle road racing its national sport in the way that Spain has.

No country has institutionalized the care and feeding of young racers quite the way that Spain has. There are institutions and academies where young, young children spend hours and hours riding pocketbikes around cones while instructors bark information at them. Want your youngster to train with the father of five-time World Champion Jorge Lorenzo? You can enroll him or her in the Lorenzo Competition schools at the age of two.

Two.

No country has an infrastructure designed to give young races a step-by-step ladder of machinery quite like Spain has. Take, for example, the BeOn Automotive company's line of GP machinery, starting with 25-horsepower GP machines with twin-spar chassis and moving up to Moto3 spec bikes. And they are not the only company doing so in Spain.

While you can find similar companies and schools elsewhere in the world, what you are unlikely to find is ferocity of the competition at such a young age. The FIM CEV Repsol series posts full-length videos of its races on YouTube. The races are well worth watching - the kids in the European Talent Cup and the Moto3 classes race like if they don't win, they don't eat. And if they succeed there, they have at least a chance of making the jump to professional International racing. There's no guarantee that they'll succeed. But it's hard to think of a racer who's failed in Spanish youth road racing and then gone on to success at the higher levels.

Some of the countries in Asia are starting to put together similar systems. The Asia Talent Cup races are - and have been for a while - spectacular, although their success at putting their graduates into International competition has been limited to date.

MotoAmerica has, undoubtedly, saved professional road racing in the United States. But one of the reasons given for its formation was to create a clear path to International level racing and to groom talent in the States for racing at that level. It's not enough to simply clear the path. It has to start much, much earlier than the KTM RC Cup series and Superstock 600 racing.

Think of it this way: By the time Vostatek is 14, he'll have had three seasons in the European Talent Cup on the NSF250R, fighting against nearly 30 other riders backed by International-level teams. He could move up to a full-blown, aluminum GP-chassis Moto3 machine with about 50 horsepower, where the bike and rider combined weigh as little as 329 pounds, and test his skills against the packed, factory-supported Moto3 fields in the CEV series.

In the U.S., riders 14 years old who want to compete at the FIM CEV Repsol-equivalent level, MotoAmerica, would find themselves racing a 38-horsepower bike with a trellis steel frame that weighs 304 pounds by itself - rider not included. And they'll be racing fields that are about half the size of the Moto3 CEV fields.

When those racers turn 16, graduates of which series will find GP team managers calling?

A clear path is only one step. To be successful, one has to be able to follow the path.