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/1440270
RIDE REVIEW I 2022 DUCATI PANIGALE V4 S P60 CAPTAIN VALIA naled by a single yellow flashing LED perched to the top left of the dash, which by the way could've been trying to tell you almost anything (TC, slide control, wheelie control) now it's broken out into four separate displays and shown proud and center in high resolution. Light the TC up? The TC light will flicker. Wheelie control doing its thing? You'll see that independently of TC, anti-wheelie, stability and engine braking. The revs are now just a thin bar up top, almost reminiscent of the 1199 and 1299, and there're lap timers, max speeds and lap counts. What this means is you can better understand how to adjust every facet of the electronics to suit what you're asking of it by virtue of being able to un- derstand exactly what's going on. No more guess- work, and no other bike on showroom floors is do- ing this. It's impressive stuff; it makes one wonder just how many years ago the GP bikes were doing this. Our guess? Probably not all that many. The story from Ducati to go alongside this new flagship was an interesting one, delivered mainly by lead Ducati test rider Alessandro Valia at Jerez's floating spaceship. Alessandro's no punk, the dude is an absolute monster on a motorcycle and has signed off every Ducati production bike since 2007 and went to great lengths to explain how life in the warp-speed lane would be even faster if it was a more effort- less place to be. It all starts, he said, with the ergonomics. Narrowing the tank to give a more usable surface area to hang onto when you've got the thing on its ear, combined with a seat unit that's had more depth and longitudinal room carved into it, should help with fatigue. Next up, the steering needed to be even lighter and more telepathic, and the chassis needed to transfer less weight back and forth between throttle and brakes. That all makes sense to us, but the next-level thinking is that this isn't just about being more comfy, it's about affording riders more mental time and space to spend on better understanding the bike through the electronics mid-lap. The all-clever ones and zeros were what Alessandro really wanted to talk about. Race mode on the old Panigale V4 S was not much more than a more aggressive throttle map, but now it's an entirely new way of plugging your brain into the Panigale's, and in Track EVO mode it's all displayed via the dashboard. Whereas on the previous Panigale V4s (2018 and 2020) the electronic assistance was sig- (Right) Got to love that new race mode! (Bottom) Winglets are slightly different compared to the 2020 model, but not as much as you might think.