MotoGP Features

Aprilia's Shane Byrne starts the second half of a 'character building' rookie MotoGP season with his home event, the British Grand Prix, this weekend at Donington Park.

With all MotoGP teams using radios in the pits due to the deafening sound of the MotoGP bikes, no-one has cottoned onto the idea of using the now legal-for-three-seasons rider to pits radio possibility... except Team Roberts: and some interesting figures have come out of it.

The tight and twisty nature of Sachsenring lends itself to close racing. This is partially influenced by its rather short overall length - only just scraping in on the minimum allowed distance to host a MotoGP race - while the looping layout itself has the reputation of making passing moves on fellow competitors difficult even at the best of times.

The Men and Motors TV magazine, Bikes Aloud is now available on DVD and Crash.net has ten copies to give away.

Part of the perennial success and popularity of the Assen event is its ability to modernise its facilities and layout without losing one iota of its unique character and appeal, to riders and fans alike.

Located in the beautiful Tuscan hills, Mugello boasts a sequence of undulating medium to high-speed corners combined with a straight where even the former 500cc two-strokes were capable of achieving 315kmh... but last year Ducati's Loris Capirossi hit 332.4kph - a mark expected to be 'easily' beaten this year.

Earlier this week BMW unveiled its first Superbike, the 1157cc inline four-cylinder K1200 S (pictured) which, at 160bhp, is the most powerful motorcycle the company has ever produced.

Makoto Tamada may carry the hopes of the Honda and the Japanese sporting nation on his shoulders, but it seems such pressure does little to change his positive attitude to grand prix racing and life in general.

Former 500cc world champions Wayne Rainey and Eddie Lawson returned to the racetrack together last weekend, when they dominated the 'World Superkart' event at Laguna Seca.

Valentino Rossi's superb victory at Welkom may mark the start of a new era in MotoGP, where the recent emphasis upon exotic technology is replaced by a realisation that, however great the machine, it's the rider that's most important.

This Sunday will see reigning British Superbike champion Shane Byrne make his MotoGP race debut aboard the Aprilia RS Cube - a machine which 'Shakey' admits scared him at first, despite a dedicated PlayStation programme to learn new tracks!