Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/128360
Briefly... Chili Gets Honda Deal the Klaffi Honda team. last year Chili rode a Ducati to fifth in the World Superbike Championship, scoring a victory along the way. "There were a lot of ups and downs Continued from page 7 eighth annual Suzuki Crossover Challenge will take place at San Francisco's SBC Park on Saturday, january 29, during the night program of THQ World Supercross GPfTHQ AMA Supercross Series. This year's participants will compete on Suzuki's DRZ I 10 mini bike. The Crossover Challenge is comprised of 24 action sport athletes and celebrities who are given the during my career," Chili said in a team chance to race on a professional supercross release. "Sometimes even nobody trusted in me, but especially in these situations I track, under the lights and inside a stadium. last year's Suzuki Crossover Challenge for the first time ever - ran during the night program at San Diego's Qualcomm Stadium. This year, athletes and celebrities will race on the smaller DRZ II Os. The 24-rider lineup is a three-lap, go-for-broke race that allows the winner to present $1000 to a charity of his choice. T he ever-popular Pier-Francesco Chili will race a Honda CBR IOOORR in the 2005 World Superbike Championship, the PIer-'ranceKO Chili Italian having signed a contract to race for had success. Joining the Klaffi Honda team means a super possibility for me to reach out for the Superbike Championship again. Honda and Klaus Klaffenbock [the team owner] did all their best to make this possible. Besides this I want to say thank you to my Italian crew. Even when we needed a lot of time to discuss all the details, they were waiting for my decision. Nobody left the crew. Now we join together with the Klaffi Honda team and the decision is made: Frankie Chili rides a successful World Championship 2005." Max Neukirchner will join Chili on ie season last year. "I always promised our sponsors a rider who is a winner," KJaffenbock said. '~nd also, this time my promise comes the two-man team, the German hav- true. During the last weeks we had a lot ing finished ninth in the World Supersport Championship in his rook- of discussions. Frankie Chili or Ben Bostrom? - that was the question. Now likely to join the Renegade Honda team, though nothing had been signed as of press time. are looking forward to an exciting and Klaffi Honda Fireblade in 2005." With Klaffenbock opting for Chili instead of Bostrom, the Californian is now Pro Moto Billet is no longer offering its Kick-It line of kickstands through its distribution outlets, and the kickstands will now be available only through Pro Moto Billet dealers and from Pro Moto Billet direct, according to Pro Billet. Dealers who have any questions can contact their sales representatives or Pro Moto Billet directly at 208/466-4762. Distribution of spark arrestors, disc guards and crank stuffers remain the same, Pro Mota says. New Bike, New Team morning and got progressively worse. By late Wednesday morning, high winds were blow- American Honda goes into the 2005 AMA Superbike season with a different philosophy: japan and shipped back to the United States Instead of the ultra-expensive works machin- in pieces. ery leased from Honda Racing Corporation, any of it because you didn't know what it was. There was at one point a water bottle out on the past, and gave them the opportunity to "Four days ago, these bikes didn't even exist," he said. "The stuff just showed up four days ago. The boys have been thrashing just getting the bikes ready to go just so we could ride them these last few days." The new bike is slightly different every- use their skills as tunerS rather than parts changers. where, according to Zemke. "It still has some of the same characteristics, did get his first chance to work with his new jake Zemke and Miguel Duhamel gave the Honda CBRIOOORRs a shakedown run during a day and a half (high winds and debris on the track ended the test prematurely) multiteams but everything just seems to be a little bit differ- "It was a pretty relaxed atmosphere in our ent." Zemke said. "The seating position on the bike is quite a bit different. It's a lot closer to pits," Zemke said. "We knew just basically what we had to do, and we were getting sorted through all that stuff. " joining Plumlee are Bob Reichman (superbike engines), Rick Boyies (superbike chassis), Mark Braunwalder (superbike chassis engineer), Masahiro Iizuka (Formula Xtreme engine) and Perry Meineciuc (Formula Xtreme chassis). Zemke's 2004 crew chief, Dave McGrath, will do development work at American Honda is building its own 5uper- bikes this year. The change infused enthusiasm in the technical crew members, who were hamstrung by factory conventions in test at California Speedway in Fontana, California, just a few days prior to Christmas, and Zemke came away impressed. "It's kind of interesting because as similar as the bike is, it's like starting brand new, page one, starting all over again, Zemke said It on his cell phone as he was driving home to Paso Robles on Wednesday, December 22. "I know the guys are excited about being able to do a lot of development work on the bike. "It's definitely different," Zemke said of the difference between the '04 and '05 Zemke said the machines were built in what the Superstock bike was when I rode Alex's [Gobert] Superstock bike last August because the tank is quite a bit different. It's quite a bit smaller than the tank on the works bike was last year. If you looked at last year's bike enough, you could look at this one and you could see quite a bit of difference in the gas tank, which also changes the way the exhaust routes, because before, the exhaust had to route around the gas tank, where it hung really low over the shock there. Obviously, the swingarm is very different. There's a lot of knowing that we don't have a ton of work to do. We do, in a sense, have a ton of work to do because we have plenty more stuff to test. things that are qUite a bit different on the new bike. Overall, it's pretty close." Zemke said he tested three different suspensions; the 2004 works Showas, the kit Showas that came with the bikes, and Ohlins. They also tried Nissin brakes, Zemke on the Superbike and Miguel Duhamel on the just for it to be pretty darn good out of the Formula Xtreme machine. No decision has box - being more or less a street bike com- been made on what will ultimately be used. "We're going to take all this stuff to Hondas, "but it's encouraging to be straight out the box and we're not too far off where we were last year. It's definitely encouraging pared to last year having a full works bike it's not too far off without having done any Daytona with us and test it down there," he development work on it yet. It's pretty said. close." The track was at its best on Tuesday ing debris on the track. "There was so much stuff flying across the track," Zemke said, "you didn't want to hit the track for quite a while before it blew away The result was that the team didn't get through its whole test program. But Zemke technical crew, led by Merlyn Plumlee. the team's race shop. "We've got a lot of stuff to test, and we're just barely even scratching the surface," he said. "On my superbike and Miguel's, we each had one of the new bikes, and then there was a third bike that had some data [acquisition unit] hooked up to it. We didn't even have data on our main superbike. We're a long ways out right now. Basically, all the feedback we're getting right now is just rider input, which is kind of fun, which is kind of the old school way of doing it, not having to MX Sports, producers of the Air Nautiquesl AMA Amateur National Motocross Championships at Loretta Lynn's Ranch, has introduced ,Moto Heroes, the first motocross superhero comic strip for kids. Moto Heroes will track the journey of five children who dream of racing for a national championship at Loretta's. Along the way, they will face a series of moral challenges and life-<:hanging choices, according to MX Sports. They'll also meet the incredible Smart Bikes, motorcycles with personality and real superhero powers. Mota Heroes is running as part of a new ad campaign for the Air Nautiques/AMAAmateur Nationals. Ads began running in the January issue of Racer X Illustrated, with the first comic appearing in the February issue. Moto Heroes also runs in popular youth and ama- Moto Kids and Mato Playgraund. ''Any child who loves motocross will love following the exciting adventures of Moto Heroes," says MX Sports director Tim Cotter. "No one has teur motocross magazines ever made a motocross comic series of this nature, and we know children will be fascinated and educated by following the Moto Heroes and their incredible adventures. Ir's a really fun way for racers to understand the MX Sports program." Motocross artist Marc Estabrooks pens the comic. MX Sports will produce nine chapters of Moto Heroes, culminating with the race August look at computers. At the same time, the 1-6 at Loretta Lynn's Ranch in Hurricane computer can be a helpful tool. When we go to Daytona, hopefully, we'll have some data on the bikes." Henny Ray Abramss Mills, Tennessee. The second round of Asterisk Supercross Continued on page " ....