Last June the Misano World circuit officially adopted Marco Simoncelli’s name to its and ahead of this weekend’s races, numerous riders from all three classes did a parade lap of the Italian circuit on bicycles in honour of the late rider, who died at Sepang last October.

They were also joined by the riders of Cycle of Wishes who rode the 1600km from Donington Park to Misano led by Kevin Schwantz and Jamie Dobb’s. These riders before arriving at a very wet and cold Misano (the bad weather arrived Wednesday) stopped at Coriano - Marco Simoncelli’s home town, just a few miles away - where they met Paolo and Rosella Simoncelli and the town’s mayor Domenica Spinelli. Cycle of Wishes has already gathered £21,000 with their charity ride.

While the parade lap was to pay tribute to the late Simoncelli, many of the riders didn’t forget the late Shoya Tomizawa who tragically lost his life at Misano two years ago.

To see the video, just click here.

Photo source | motogp.com

On Thurday, September 13th at 6pm at the Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli ahead of the weekend’s GP Aperol di San Marino e della Riviera di Rimini, all the GP riders from all three classes will lap the circuit with bicycles to pay tribute to the late Marco Simoncelli.

A new book on the much missed Simoncelli will also be hitting the Italian bookstores this month and it’s called Il nostro Sic (Our Sic) and written by Simoncelli’s parents, Paolo and Rosella with the help of Paolo Beltramo, Sportmediasets pitlane reporter (who Cal Crutchlow had some words for via Twitter) and published by Rizzoli.

The book contains numerous photographs and documents of Marco’s life and career, but above all it’s the story of Marco, written by who loved him the most and with the contribution of all his dearest friends.

Marco’s mantra was, “You live more in five minutes going flat out than some people live in a lifetime … “but before there was SuperSic, there was Marco”, says a line in the book. “A boy with a head of natural curls and the dream of being the best. Whether it was riding his bicycle with no hands down the the hills or winning the Minimoto Championship when he was twelve, it didn’t matter: Marco wanted to be ahead and always with his peculiar style, because on a motorcycle, any motorcyle, it was always a little tight.”

Hopefully someday some publisher will decide to translate and publish this book along with his autobiography Diobò Che Bello, for the thousands and thousands of non Italian fans.

During last Saturday’s fourth round of the Supermoto International Series at the Pomposa circuit (Ravenna, Italy) it was officially announced the latest event to help raise funds for the Marco Simoncelli Foundation..

The event created and organized by Federico Capogna is called “Sic Supermoto Day,” a supermoto endurance race that will be held next December 2nd and will be hosted at the Sagittario International Circuit (Latina, Italy) and promises to be packed with the partecipation of MotoGP stars.

On September 1st, Sic Supermoto Day will be opening an online registration site and with the last remaining open spots still available, will allow you the awesome opportunity to take part in the event as a competitor.

“The memory of Marco and the commitment of the Marco Simoncelli Foundation” - said Paolo Simoncelli, present at the presentation - “is the engine of our existence - everything revolves around several projects, such as the construction of a new hospital in Santo Domingo, near the Haitian border, but there’s also an abandoned hotel in the city of Coriano where Marco used to live that we want to turn into a day care center for disabled children. This isn’t an easy feat, but it allows us to be close to our dear Marco, and give us strength every day. ”

Italian motorcycle group Traersù decided to pay tribute to the late Marco Simoncelli with this very moving video that includes a ‘minute of casino’ (noise or chaos) that Paolo Simoncelli had asked for during the Valencia GP.

Over 300 bikers from around Italy showed up for the event that took over two hours to prepare and film and this is the result of their eulogy, which after watching you’ll no doubt say Diobò che bello!

The video will be given to the Marco Simoncelli Foundation with hope that it will raise awareness regarding the charity work that the foundation does.

Traersù Marco Simoncelli tribute

Continue reading: Paying tribute to Marco Simoncelli (w/video)

For this weekend’s Mugello GP San Carlo Gresini Honda will be returning to its white livery to pay tribute to their late rider Marco Simoncelli and the Marco Simoncelli Foundation.

Fausto Gresini decided to abandon the white paint job at the start of the 2012 season to mark their need from change and as sign of respect towards Simoncelli. stating that black is an aggressive racing color.

Paolo Simoncelli (in the video) will be receiving two special bikes this Saturday that will be donated by Honda, his son’s RC212V, and a special edition SuperSic CBR1000RR that will be auctioned to raise funds for the Foundation.

Fausto Gresini “Seeing the white livery on our bikes again was incredibly emotional. The choice to race in black was out of respect for the memory of Marco and to send out the message that he will never be replaced. Several months on Marco remains in our hearts and his fans have been very vocal to me saying that they would like to see the return of the one thing that most reminds them of him. Now we are back in white and my heart feels like it will explode.”
The team also added in their blurb that this change is only the beginning …

Ahead of the Gran Premio d’Italia TIM that takes place July 15th at the Mugello, the track owners have decided to dedicate to the late Marco Simoncelli the new grandstand.

Placed on the grandstands (that can hold 1500 fans) that are located at the second of the two spectacular and challenging Arrabbiata turns, they have placed Simoncelli’s racing number ‘58 ‘.

“Dedicating the Arrabbiata grandstand and characterizing it with his number 58,” said Paolo Poli CEO of the circuit,”is the tribute with which the Mugello Circuit wants to remember a champion who deeply loved this track and on which corners he wrote unforgettable pages in the history of motorcycling. “

In the aftermath of the World Superbike round that took place at the newly dubbed Marco Simoncelli World Circuit in Misano Adriatico, Italy, BMW has organized a quite cool event that allowed motorsports journalists from all over the world to test its outstanding machines that are racing in the series. More specifically, the testers were offered the chance to try out the ‘regular’ BMW S1000RR as well as its most adavanced versions, namely the Superbike and Superstock 1000 variants fielded by the official BMW Motorrad Motorsport team and by the satellite BMW Motorrad Italia GoldBet team.

BMW treated the testers like real riders, providing them not only with the actual bikes, but also mechanics and garage. The track sessions were divided into shifts, and everyone had free access to three different configurations of the awesome S1000RR: the standard motorcycle, the Superstock 1000 ridden by Italy’s Lorenzo Baroni in the FIM Cup and the proper World Superbike machines of Michel Fabrizio and Marco Melandri.

Moreover, as the proverbial icing on the cake, giving advice to the testers were the two aforementioned Italian riders themselves! We will tell you more about this event in the forthcoming days, but for now you can enjoy the massive collection of pics that our mates from twin-site Motoblog.it have taken right on the spot.

View the full BMW S1000RR live test Superbike - Misano Adriatico photo gallery

Just a few days after the death of Marco Simoncelli and the pressing rquest by thousands of fans that launched a petition to Misano World Circuit to be renamed as a tribute to the late rider, the Misano World Circuit announced in November, that they would adopt the name of Simoncelli, and today in a brief press conference Dr. Trevi, president of Santamonica SpA (owners of the circuit) and the Simoncelli family, presented the new name and logo.

The circuit will now be known as “Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli“ and the new logo was created by Aldo Drudi. While the Italian designer couldn’t completely change the look of circuit’s name and logo for legal reasons (bureaucracy in Italy is always complicated), he did highlight the two red L’s - the red bands were also part of Sic’s AGV helmet that he designed - as a symbol of looking towards the future, where the two lines never never meet and continue to infinity.

In an event organized to commemorate the late Marco Simoncelli, the Brno circuit set a new record for the number of bikes lapping on the same track at the same time. There were no less than 1,349 motorcycles on the track on Sunday, which is more than 21 times the maximum capacity of the famous track in the Cech Republic.

The participating bikers formed a column of motorcycles that was almost as long as the 5,403 meters of the whole track. The parade was made of all sorts of bikes (sportsbikes, scooters, mopeds, classic bikes and so forth) and led by MotoGP rider Karel Abraham, who said that in the second lap he could actually see the very end of the motorcade in front of him.

“I think the outcome is amazing - commented Abraham - This was one of the first opportunities for bikers to get together after winter. The Brno Circuit is one of the best venues for such purposes.” Karel Abraham’s fan club was in charge of counting the participants: each one of them was given a special sticker with the logo of the Brno Circuit, and the exact number of bikers was determined based on the actual number of stickers issued. “We hope that many of them will keep it attached the whole season” said Ivana Ulmanová, Executive Director of the Brno Circuit.

View the full Brno’s new record: 1,349 bikes together on the track photo gallery

To remember the late Marco Simoncelli, a member of Italy’s Fiat 500 Club (21,000 members), Gabriele Ravagnani from Modena decided to turn his historical Fiat 500 Abarth into a tribute to the Italian rider with this amazing paint job depicting Simoncelli racing on his #58 Honda and the words ‘Passione senza limiti’ - limitless passion.

Source | virtualcar.it