Ducat; V4 Apollo 1260
A Ducati V4 retrospective
By ALAN CATHCART
PHOTOS BY KYOICHI NAKAMURA
AND KEL EDGE
W
hen Troy Bayliss and Loris
Capirossi took Ducati's new
990cc desmosedici MotoGP racer to
the grid for the first time at Suzuka on
April 6, it was the end of a 40-year
odyssey for the Italian factory that
was finally able to see one of a trio of
V4 prototype projects its engineers
have built during that period come to
fruition.
At 20-year intervals over the past
four decades, Ducati has flirted with
the V4 concept, without ever adopting it wholeheartedly until now. Legendary Ducati progettista Fabio
Taglioni produced as many as 1000
different engine designs during his
30-year reign (1954 until 1984) as
Conceived by Ducatl's American
distributor in the early 1960s as a
potential "robber" of HarleyDavidson's police market share, the
V4 Ducati Apollo 1260 was the largest
machine ever built by the Bologna,
Italy, finn. It offered tire-tearing high
perfonnance... but, alas, that's what
killed It.
44
MAY 7, 2003'
cue
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