Honda can be more than satisfied with its results at the Estoril GP. Dani Pedrosa seems to have overcome most of his shoulder problems and taken his first win of the season, even if we admit that after seeing him stretch out his arm in one of turns while chasing Lorenzo we thought he couldn’t last the whole race distance, and how wrong we were.

Casey Stoner had some rear tire problems, a back problem and a beef about Marco Simoncelli after taking third, while Andrea Dovizioso was in a certain way the other man of the day after he pipped Valentino Rossi at the finish line. Hiroshi Aoyama had his hands full with a very smooth Cal Crutchlow. Toni Elias wasn’t dead last this time and was able to fight with Loris Capirossi, but both riders were advantaged by the fact that three riders crashed out in the first lap.

Probably the biggest disappointment in today’s race was Marco Simoncelli who binned it on lap 1, when he had the potential to be on the podium.

Rider quotes after the jump.

Continue reading: Honda rider quotes: Dani Pedrosa more happy with arm condition than win

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Last year Honda and Yamaha both bowed out Milan’s EICMA show, citing the economic crisis that hit both the automotive and motorcycle industries, but this year the two largest motorcycle companies have had a change of heart, or the economy is finally picking up (while European governments are drowning in their debts) Honda announced that they would be back and so has Yamaha.

Yamaha has already booked a stand of over 1000 square meters in pavilion number 2 and it seems they’ll also be present in the Motolive area with a series of initiatives on road safety.

Honda has decided to make EICMA its European trade fair of reference and will be present in pavilion 4 and have booked the track for live exhibitions.

The 68th International Motorcycle Show in Milan will be held November from the 2nd to the 7th.

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While Grand Prix racing teams and riders were unpacking their suitcases after the official announcement that the MotoGP round at Motegi was postponed, Marco Simoncelli San Carlo Honda Gresini’s rookie rider was lucky enough to get on a plane in Rome heading to Japan.

“Super Sic”is headed to Honda to have an extra large fairing prepared for him. Simoncelli is taller (183 cm) and heavier (72kg) than all the riders that compete on this year’s RC212V and his weight and size put him at a certain disadvantage especially compared to a smaller and lightweight rider like Dani Pedrosa, especially in aerodynamics and finding a proper riding position in the saddle.

Simoncelli will head into Honda’s wind tunnel to try to solve the problems that have been afflicting him during all of the pre-season testing and in the Qatar race where he took a lowly 11th place, a full 1o seconds behind 10th place Hiroshi Aoyoma, another Honda rookie.

Source | sportmediaset.it

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You don’t often see the top brass of the biggest motorcyle company of the world don leathers, a helmet and hit a race track to personally compete in a race, but HRC Vice President Shuhei Nakamoto did just that yesterday at Motegi.

Nakamoto, HRC directors Seiki Ishii and Tomoaki Nagayama suited up alongside former GP riders Tady Okada and Shinichi Ito for the final and special four hour endurance race of the NSF100 HRC Trophy mini bike series.

86 teams and 420 riders took part in this one-off race, all on Honda mini-bikes and the HRC team completed 105 laps and finished as the press release says a ‘respectably’ 57th out of 80 finishers. We think that the HRC team got their butts kicked by younger and lighter kids. Anyone ever notice how heavy these guys are, including Okada, the official MotoGP RC212V test rider?

Continue reading: HRC Honda Boss Nakamoto races in mini bike endurance race

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All of today’s rumors regarding Livio Suppo have been confirmed. The Italian manager will be in Honda HRC next season as their Marketing Director for HRC’s MotoGP activities.

Livio Suppo:

“It’s been a very good relationship for me; eleven years working with Ducati has been a dream, and I think together we have achieved something good. I think sometimes in life you need new motivation. I must thank Ducati of course for all the opportunities they gave me, and also HRC for being interested in me. It’s a new challenge, it won’t be easy but we will do our best. Eleven years at Ducati has been magic. Of course the 2007 World Championship was the highest hope at the beginning. Since then it has also been good to work together with Filippo (Preziosi, Ducati Corse General Manager) and Claudio (Domenicali, General Director of Ducati) and all the team, and I’ll leave a piece of my heart in this company. But again, I think Honda is something difficult to resist. Next year I will be a kind of Marketing Director for the MotoGP activities and I hope to start on the right foot.”

Source | motogp.com

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Yamaha may have mathematically won the 2009 MotoGP Constructors’ Championship, with Jorge Lorenzo’s win at Estoril, but the factory can’t celebrate due to the five engine limit rule that was implemented at the Brno round.

Using more than five engines could potentially mean that a manufacturer could lose points before the end of the season, but Yamaha is pretty safe because they’ve got a 167 point lead on second place Honda.

Initially it was to be the rider, who used more than the alloted engines would be punished with a 10 point penalty on his championship standings, but the rule was modified at Estoril and rider will now have to start at the back of the grid, while it will be the manufacturer who’ll have 10 points deducted from the constructors championship classification and you can imagine they’re not happy at all and have already starting bitching about it.

Continue reading: MotoGP - Yamaha waiting before celebrating Constructors Championship

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Honda celebrated fifty years at the Tourist Trophy and Honda South Africa to commemorate the event has released this CBR600RR 2009 limited edition of this year’s Supersport TT winner Ian Hutchinson racing livery.

Each bike is serialized No. 1 through No. 50, and comes with a Shark RSF3 helmet personalized with the same livery colours and and a personalised certificate of authenticity will be supplied with each and every bike purchased with the buyers name.

The bikes will be selling for R 109.999.00 (10.185 euros) while the C-ABS version will sell for R 118.999 (11.018 euros)

Source | motoring

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Richard Hammond pre-Top Gear days with a Honda Fireblade (CBR 1000 RR) in this ridiculous video races a rocket and a golf ball to see who goes fastest. Hardly a surprising result from the Brainiac series, but a very nice bike all the same.

Source | Faster and Faster via Autoblog

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Check out our photo gallery from this weekend’s MotoGP Gran Premio d’Italia Alice, that saw Ducati factory rider Casey Stoner put an end to Valentino Rossi’s seven year reign at Mugello.

Images from Mugello Weekend

Continue reading: Images from the MotoGP Mugello Weekend

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Last year while Marco Simoncelli was racing to win the 250cc World Championship, the Italian rider was already being courted by Ducati who wanted him to join their stable in 2009. Simoncelli reported he even refused $ 1.000.000 to ride for them stating that he wanted to try to win a second World Championship title.

On Sunday, during Italia 1 show Fuori Giri that airs right after the MotoGP race and has in-depth interviews and guests, Ducati team manager Livio Suppo, without beating around the bush asked outright Simoncelli to ride for them.

“SuperSic was great, he rode like a God. Marco wouldn’t you like to ride our bike next year? You’re always in our hearts, we have to talk …” declared an almost adoring Suppo to Simoncelli who was sitting in the studio.

Simoncelli is ready to move to MotGP next year as is Spanish rider Alvaro Bautista and both riders are receiving various offers. One of these is from Yamaha Tech 3, who seem ready to put out to pasture Colin Edwards and send James Toseland back to WSBK and sign Simoncelli and maybe Superbike sensation Ben Spies.

Other rumors say that Honda is extremely interested in Simoncelli and that is even ready to line up a seventh bike on the grid, with no distinction between factory and satellite bikes. Speculation has it that they could even set up a one rider team for the Italian just like the Scot Racing team with Takahashi.

Silly season has already begun.

Source | sportmediaset

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Check out some pics from the Le Mans race.

Pics from MotoGP Le Mans

Continue reading: MotoGP Le Mans Images

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The initial engine supplier for the Moto2 class, the 600cc prototype World Championship series which will run for the first time in 2010, has been confirmed as Japanese manufacturer Honda. After receiving offers from various potential suppliers, the Permanent Bureau of FIM President Mr Vito Ippolito and Dorna CEO Carmelo Ezpeleta made the unanimous decision to give the tender to the company.

The first Moto2 engine will run at over 150hp, housed inside chassis of the teams’ choosing. The prototype bikes will make their entrance to the World Championship against the current crop of 250cc machinery, which will run alongside the class in an arrangement similar to that made for the 500cc/MotoGP switch in 2002.

When Dorna decided to change the 250cc class to Moto2 and the one make engine regulation, did anyone really have any doubts that Honda wouldn’t be the engine supplier?

Source | motogp

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