Cycle News

P30 WIND manufacturer. "You have to give a lot of the credit to Bob," said Dick Mann on his 1970 Daytona victory. "He did some extra work on the bike that the European teammates didn't do, and our bike finished and they didn't. We had a good strategy and worked well together, and it was a real workout for both of us, but it all worked out at the end. He deserves a lot of credit for preparing the Honda 750." Just a few months after Honda's victory at Daytona, Hansen accepted an attractive offer to work for Kawasaki. That compa- ny wanted to establish a name in racing as well and felt that Hansen would be the right person to coordinate its racing efforts. It proved to be a good decision. Under Hansen's guidance, Kawasaki won its first AMA National with Yvon DuHamel, and became a powerhouse in U.S. racing. While at Kawasaki, Hansen also served as vice president of the AMA's competition committee, the rules-making body for racing. Hansen was also the U.S. delegate on the FIM road racing committee. By the mid-1970s, after a short stint with Italian manufacturer MOTOGP ELECTRONICS EXPLAINED C orrado Cecchinelli is the man responsible for the seamless integration of the control Magnet-Marelli ECU and software into the MotoGP class in 2014. Already a number of CRT teams are using the ECU and software, which is being supplied free from Dorna, though there has been teething problems. NGM Mobile Forward Racing's Colin Edwards said his team had some difficulty with the control equipment at the recent Sepang test, though those kinks were eventually ironed out. Cecchinelli came to the job of MotoGP technical boss after a career spent mostly at Ducati. He rose through the ranks of Ducati to become second in command at Ducati Corse after having early on been the technical boss of the MotoGP team. In January 2011, the graduate of Turin Polytechnic took the job as Director of Technology for the MotoGP World Championship. In that capacity, he's responsible for all technical aspects for all three classes, Moto3, Moto2, and MotoGP. From its inception, Cecchinelli has been intimately in- PHOTOGRAPHY BY GOLD & GOOSE IN THE Laverda, Hansen moved out of the motorcycle industry and made his living in real estate. Later in life Hansen kept up with his interest in motorcycles by restoring collector bikes and acting as a consultant for Heritage Racing, a Honda vintage racing operation. A wonderful storyteller, for years he was in demand at various racing gatherings to give talks on his days in racing. Hansen is survived by his daughters, Roberta Hansen and Kathy Dunkerley. A memorial service is planned for April. Larry Lawrence Corrado Cecchinelli is the Director of Technology for the MotoGP World Championship.

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