Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
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AMERICAN FLAT TRACK CEO MICHAEL LOCK: PART 2 P64 INTERVIEW but they've put a big contingency fund into the sport to encourage Kawasaki-engined bikes. Honda doubled their contingency in 2017 as a show of support for the sport, and utterly dominated the singles championship without winning it. So I'm expecting to see increased support for AFT from many manufacturers. Clearly the KTM 790 power plant is tailor- made for our sport—we know that, and KTM knows that. But the 790 bikes won't be arriving in the USA until the second half of 2018, so if they do do something it would be a 2019 effort. But we'd love to see that powerplant in the sport. We already have in- volvement by their sister company Husqvarna, which is the official motorcycle of the singles cham- pionship, and I know that they're pursuing having a factory-backed effort in flat track next year, which I'd love to see. We also have very good relationships with Triumph and with Ducati. On a personal level! Ducati has flirted with flat track over the last couple of years with the Lloyd Brothers team, and have won races. Their factory's Sporting Director Paolo Ciabatti loves flat track, comes to races whenever he can, and has raised some support for the Lloyd Brothers team. Johnny Lewis has ridden for them; he's very talented. Troy Bayliss came over and left with his tail be- tween his legs a little bit. Troy is a wonderful competitor, but our sport is tough. So Ducati has flirted with it, Triumph has flirted with it; Joe Kopp came up one point short of winning the Hoo- ligans Flat Track Championship for them this past year, which is kind of like the entry version of our sport. And I pop into Hinck- ley every now and then just to have a chat and tell them what's going on—they're very keen, they just need a powerplant that can be competitive here. Someone who has that already is Royal Enfield, with their new twin-cam eight-valve 650cc parallel-twin models. Have you been talking to them? I have not spoken to Royal Enfield yet, but I've been watch- ing their progress and we would certainly welcome them as the world's fastest growing motor- cycle company that's got big potential in the USA with its new 650 twins. Look, we would welcome all of them. The more different brands in the sport the better, as far as I'm concerned. If Kawasaki can win the AFT Championship, in that case you should entice CFMoto, the Chinese manufacturer which has already finished fourth in the Isle of Man Lightweight TT with a near- identical motor. "I'm working with NBC's headquarters in Connecticut to finalize next year's deal that will be spectacular, much improved over this year's in every way."