B
efore the FIM Superbike
World Championship gets
set for yet another change
in its technical rules and regula-
tions for 2015 we have the small
matter of the 2014 championship
to get settled.
It has hardened into a Kawa-
saki and Aprilia battle in recent
weeks. No surprise there, given
that the Ninja ZX-10R and RSV-4
Factory are acknowledged as the
two most sorted, heavily factory
backed and advanced bikes on
the World Superbike grid.
But it is no two horse race
week-to-week, not by a long way.
Even the seemingly too com-
plex Ducati has podiumed well
this year, and other manufactur-
ers have won races outright in
2014 - even Honda and Suzuki.
The two oldest and maybe least
factory supported machine de-
signs in the paddock.
Pata Honda's Jonathan Rea
had even led the World Cham-
pionship on merit this year, but
everybody knows he was only
able to do this because his team
could tune the Honda's relatively
mass produced engine exten-
sively, change all the electronics
for full race material and use the
addition of ride-by-wire to keep
up with the more advanced and
expensive (or simply more fac-
tory) bikes.
This regulatory philosophy of
allowing the least advanced and
expensive streetbikes to tune
upwards to meet the fastest and
most expensive was called 'Per-
formance Equalization.'
After a look at how many dif-
ferent bikes and riders have won
and scored podiums in recent
times and even SBK's worst
skeptics can understand what
everybody inside SBK has been
saying for years: The current lib-
BY GORDON RITCHIE
CN
III ROSTRUM OR HOSPITAL
THE PROMISE OF COMPROMISE
P124
PHOTOGRAPHY
BY
GOLD
&
GOOSE
