Innholdsfortegnelse for Vol 68 Issue 18 i Australian Motorcycle News

THE FIRST TIME I laid eyes on Toby Price, I was in the middle of the bush, photographing a round of the 2009 Australian Off Road Championships for AMCN’s sister magazine, ADB. It was a sprint-style format, with riders setting off individually over a tight bush loop. I shot the first few riders coming through, moving as I went, but then froze as I heard a bike sounding all kinds of messed up. Someone was on the limiter, on a 450, through handlebar-wide tree gaps. Who was this nutcase? It was Toby, running corner speeds I’d never seen before in the bush and absolutely committed. He was clearly a motocrosser convert; the riding style was all aggression, as was the throttle control – he seemed to have zip tied that…

BRITON HAYLEY BELL and her pals have started the Women Riders World Relay, which will have routes in Australia and New Zealand in August and September. Already more than 14,000 women from more than 80 countries have signed on. The relay started late last month in the UK and will finish next January in Africa, having circumnavigated the world. “I wanted to ignite a global sisterhood of inspirational women to promote courage, adventure, unity and passion for biking from all corners of the world and do something that’s never been done before to this scale,” says Bell, who is talking of a possible Guinness Book of Records entry. “I want to show the force behind the market that is so blindly overlooked.” For more information head to www.womenridersworldrelay.com…

News Kawasaki annouced its new ZXR750 at the Cologne motor show. The 1991 model replaced the H-model and had a lot of new features, including upside-down forks, just like its logical rival Suzuki’s GSX-R 750, which was already running the inverted fork setup. Sport Daryl Beattie borrowed Mick Doohan’s spare Honda NSR500 at the IRTA test day at Eastern Creek Raceway. On his 250 he ran a 1:37.39sec lap yet on the NSR500 he ran a 1:39.28sec. It just shows you that a bike tailor made for you can still be faster than one with double the engine capacity. Bike test Alan Cathcart pulled apart a brand new Ducati 907ie after putting it through its paces on track. “Fuel-injection, uprated suspension, four piston Brembo brakes and 17-inch wheels are only…

Send an image and details about your two-wheeled pride and joy to access@amcn.com.au Giz a squiz He says Here’s the Kawasaki ZRX1100 I rebuilt. Although I own two other bikes – a Harley Breakout and Triumph T100 – there’s not a lot of tinkering I can do on them because they’re newer bikes. I am no mechanic, but I do like to have a play with the spanners, ever since I rebuilt a DT 250 in the late 1970s that I was given as parts in a box. Now I’m 57 years old, I grew up with naked inline fours and regret selling my Honda CB1100F. After countless days looking I came across this, and when I went to look at this bike my heart sank – but…

No worries… AS WELL AS different-coloured interchangeable panels which allow you to easily tailor your ride to your individual mood (or outfit), all versions of the Ryker also makes use of the firm’s so-called Ufit system, which lets the rider customise the machine’s ergonomics. It’s been done in the automotive industry for decades, the tool-free system lets you jump on and adjust both the handlebar and footpeg position quickly and easily to increase comfort and reduce fatigue.…

AFTER WINNING A support race at the Le Mans 24 Hour race with Miguel DuHamel, the Lightning went to Bonneville, where it set a record for electric bikes with a one-way pass of 218.627mph (351.846km/h). Then Hatfield had just a single visit to Pikes Peak in 2013 to demonstrate the bike’s effectiveness against piston-engined bikes. The LS-218 defeated all the conventional motorcycles taking part to win the 2013 Pikes Peak hill-climb outright, with rider Carlin Dunne clocking a time of 10m0.964sec, almost 20secs ahead of the best of the petrol-fuelled rest. That ‘best’ just happened to be a factory-supported Ducati Multistrada – and somehow Ducati’s official press release gave the impression that ithad won the event outright. Tut, tut.…

WHEN THE EU rubber-stamped plans for Euro 5 back in 2013, a key requirement was the addition of on-board diagnostics (OBD) Stage II monitoring systems. OBD has been a key element of emissions controls in cars for more than two decades, but while current Euro 4 emissions rules demand a basic OBD system that simply alerts you if an emissions-related sensor fails, the OBD Stage II setup planned as part of Euro 5 is proving to be a real headache – so much so that its implementation has been pushed back and remains under discussion at legislative level today. “Stage I monitors to see if the sensor is broken, Stage II looks at the voltage from sensors to see if they’re giving a reasonable value, and on top of that…

THIS YEAR’S COVETED Burt Munro Trophy, awarded each year to the competitor who exhibits similar traits to old Burt himself, went to Butch Woods. He’s the only other competitor who has raced each and every edition of the annual event alongside Kevin Ryan. After qualifying eighth in the pre-1972 sprint races at Teretonga Circuit, Woods raced his 1970 Norton Commando 750 to a 7-6-DNF scorecard. Earlier in the week, he finished third overall in the same class in the curtain raising hillclimb. The trophy was awarded to Woods this year by Burt’s son John Munro.…

LAST YEAR AUSSIE Damien Koppe came this close to wining every race he entered. This year his goal was to go one better. He was well on his way, too, with the wins rolling in until his KTM 450 had other ideas during the Beach Racing Championships. Watching him at the beach was nothing shy of spectacular, before his bike packed it in while leading the final race of the day, the big one, the 50-mile race for the Burt Munro Trophy. As the sand got chewed up and ruts began to form, the fit and fast Aussie from Townsville, Queensland, would take a really wide line way out in the shallows of the ocean before throwing the thing on its side and sliding with speed and precision across the…

ROUND 1 Suzuka, 26 March 3rd, 5 points behind Schwantz Lawson still injured from preseason crash. He jokes the NSR needs an 18-inch front wheel for stability. But the bike is a jet, “so fast it was embarrassing!”. Frame is already stiffer than 1988 NSR and 1989 prototype. ROUND 2 Phillip Island, 9 April 5th, 8 points behind Rainey Hurting from a high-speed practice crash, Lawson finishes 11 seconds behind Gardner. The NSR still isn’t steering right and the power is too violent. “The title didn’t seem likely at that point – we were way off,” he said later. ROUND 3 Laguna Seca, 16 April 3rd, 13 points behind Rainey Kanemoto watches Lawson in practice and makes the big chassis/ handling breakthrough by kicking out the front end to make…

Initially, it was six players a side, all on bikes. Some 43 years after the first rulebook was drawn up in 1924, the rules changed and took the goalkeeper off the bike for safety reasons – but he or she was still required to wear a helmet. These days, it’s only four a side and the still-bikeless goalie is also protected by a 5.5m radius no-ride zone around his box, which players are forbidden from entering. After various attempts, the duration of the match currently sits at four 20-minute quarters each separated by 10-minute intervals. As for the machinery itself, the displacement has been limited to 250cc since the 1950s and it wasn’t until the 1970s that the game emerged out of the paddocks and into specially prepared fields. These…

Toby answers… DEPENDS ON WHAT series and where you’re racing. The Australian Off Road Championship and the Four Day are pretty much on par. They’re two prestigious events that you want to win here. With rallies – as cool as a world title is, you can go to Dakar and win one stage outright, then wipe out for the rest and get more recognition than in the whole world championship. That’s my world championship – my race. Dan answers… IT’S HARD TO say. A more consistent rider can win championships, whereas with one-off events it’s just whoever has had a good day. There was something that I wanted to tick off my bucket list and that was Hattah, because it was such a difficult race. Being out there for four…

Show time 23 MARCH Salubrious Dirt Drags, Car, Truck & Bike Show, Archerfalls Airfield, 1253 Neurum Rd, Woodford, Qld. Bikes, cars, utes, trucks, customs and vintage aircraft demo. Trophies, dirt drags, spear a spud, go-to-whoa and joy flights. Food, drinks, bar and band til late. Gates open 8am. $10 entry; kids free; camping $5. No dogs, no fires, no BYO and no agro. For information phone Scott on 0417 427 016. 23 MARCH  Bad Company Racing Dirt Drags Rd1, Heathcote Park Raceway, Barnadown-Knowsley Rd, Knowsley, Vic. Practice from 9.30am; racing starts 1pm.Trophies for all classes; camping Saturday night; pee-wees to V8s. Patch clubs by prior arrangement only. For information phone 0422 877 822 or see the Facebook page of Bad Company Racing, Harley Central or El Disaster Drags and Show.…

WHAT IS THE collective noun for trumpets? I had a wrong idea that it was a Caparison, which rather rolls off the tongue. But I was, as so often, completely wrong. It is actually a Flourish. Now there’s a new one, spawned by our own dear world championships. A Gridful. From the first race of the year at Qatar, the Triumphs are joining the Moto2 party, with all the thrill of a big brass band. Having alternately despised and despaired of Moto2 (I invented the tag “a graveyard of talent”, which gained fairly wide currency in the paddock), I have the highest hopes. I think that phrase expresses correctly that it was the riders I felt sorry for. What had they done, as they moved up the ladder of GP…

Jack Miller MotoGP DNF “I feel I rode really well, and was going good in the first lap, following Dovizioso. Then as I went into the sequence of fast rights my seat decided it didn’t want to stay on. It was so loose I had to chuck it off, and after that my position on the bike was all wrong, and I burned my tyre.” Remy Gardner Moto2 4th “He [Marcel Schrotter] passed me before the finish line. I just didn’t have the speed on the bike. I was making everything up on entry and corner speed. It didn’t matter how good an exit I got, he’d pull away. It cost us a podium.”…

PRAMAC TEAM BOSS Francesco Guidotti said the incident was “unbelievable” and that Miller had confirmed his potential to be a minimum “top five contender” at every race. “The foam was glued to the paint and the paint ripped off, which is how the seat pad came away,” Guidotti said. “After the Qatar test we had no time to bring everything back to Europe so a few small parts were painted by a local painter in Qatar. “We have used this painter before but this time we had a problem. “What I don’t understand is how Jack could manage a 1m55.9 without a seat pad — this is something unbelievable. “It means he could do very good result, who knows maybe even the podium.”…

Why have you stuck with KTM for another season when just about everyone else is on Yamaha’s R3? Because KTM is sticking with me! I think the RC 390 suits my style and I’m really comfortable riding it. Isn’t it difficult not having another KTM team around to compare notes with? I don’t think so, as most riders have their own preference to the way their bikes are set up. How do you feel after the first round at Phillip Island (Crump qualified sixth, then finished fourth, 10th and ninth in the three races to finish sixth in the points)? “It was pretty cool to have a win in the MotoGP support races at Phillip Island in 2017 and 2018” It was a bit disappointing, especially after being fastest in…

Australian Motorcycle News road test photographs are posed for by skilled, professional riders under controlled circumstances. Attempting to imitate their actions may be dangerous. Australian Motorcycle News supports and endorses rider training and wearing protective riding gear. Of course, if you are planning to ride your bike in the Mardi Gras parade, dress code may be subject to your surroundings, in which case we recommend leather rather than textile apparel. Just a warning; body glitter can act as an abrasive if you come off on a hard surface. It’s probably best not to ask how we know this. The best thing to get it off after a ride is olive oil, which may have to be administered by a pillion/partner/neighbour...…

Just 10 lousy bucks gets you a lap of Sydney Motorsport Park during the parade lap before the International Festival of Speed’s racing begins on Sunday 17 March. Only 80 riders will be accepted.Visit www.internationalfestivalofspeed.com for more information. “We’ve been working on Euro 5 solutions for bike firms since 2013” Forgive the pun but we have an exhaustive and informative feature on this significant issue starting on page 48 WHATTAGUY! Two-time AMA 450 Supercross Champion Chad Reed recently scored his 132nd top-three finish at the Detroit Supercross aboard his JGRMX/ Yoshimura/ Suzuki Factory Racing RM-Z450. Halfway through yet another gruelling US season our Chad sits eighth in the series. “I’ll take the small wins from the weekend,” said the ever humble champ. “My top priority is to continue improving, so…

WHEN ALBERT GEOFFREY McElhinney passed away on the Gold Coast in July 2017 few would have known he was one of the most-well travelled blokes in Australia. Born in Melbourne in 1922, Geoff – as he was known – spent the war years as an Aircraft Engineer in Borneo. Blessed with a fine voice and an ability to handle a guitar, he found himself entertaining the British Commonwealth Occupation Forces in Japan. Later, while working the club circuit in Germany he met his soulmate, English comedian Tabbi Francis, after which they spent a few happy years touring Europe, North Africa and the Middle East. Their travels gave them a taste for even more exotic locations so when Geoff decided to return to his homeland, they chose the overland route. And,…

It was the summer of ’69. I was 16 and had just seen Easy Rider, so every penny of my allowance had to be spent on ‘chopping’ the old Beezer C15 250 single. Russ O’Connell Not my first bike, but close, 1975, my old bike, my old dog and my old man. I’ve still got two of them. The dog has passed but she got to see plenty of Australia on this bike, Townsville-Darwin, Darwin-Brisbane, etc. Glenn Heers This is my first bike, a Honda Fireblade. It was an awesome bike to learn on and I loved it. If it wasn’t for R1s I most probably would have kept it. Brendan Yates My Honda CB360 in 1977. I was able to ride it to school for the last term. The…

AS A RESTRICTED licence holder, and with the pre-learners and provisional license tests still very fresh in my mind, I couldn’t help but wonder how a new rider would successfully negotiate a 1509mm machine through the cone-dappled testing course all new riders are required to do. While you wouldn’t lose any points for putting a foot down, the rest would be virtually impossible. And if you’ve passed your licence on a two-wheeled machine, then there’s a good chance you might just stick with it and dismiss the idea of a Ryker altogether. Which is exactly why Can-Am’s parent brand BRP is currently lobbying for a licensing system specific to three wheelers, in the same way a personal watercraft licence is separate to a standard boat licence. And for the LAMS-approved…

SINCE BUILDING HIS first electric motorcycle over a decade ago, Hatfield has set the pace. In 2006 he acquired a Yamaha YZF-R1, sourced large format lithium batteries and matched it all to an industrial AC three-phase induction motor and drivetrain. With around 50kW and 94Nm of torque, it was geared for a top speed of 160km/h and would go over 100 kays on a single charge. “At that point nobody else had made a lithium battery EV sportsbike,” says Richard with a hint of pride, “and we decided to immediately start building one that was better.” He sourced a motor from an electric car and built a chassis around it, and sourced newer technology and higher power batteries that were already pouch-type cells, not the cylindrical batteries most other people…

FIVE-YEAR-OLD Jaxon Harley travelled seven hours from Christchurch to contest the 50cc solo category of the Oreti Park Speedway and won all of his three races under bright blue skies. Cute and confident, the youngster didn’t hold back when asked if he thought he’d have a good chance heading into the event. “I knew I was going to win,” he told me, and when I enquired how he knew, he looked at me almost puzzled and said: “Cos I’m fast and everyone else is slow. And I’ve got two ribbons at home.” But you can’t blame him, the 2019 Burt Munro Challenge was just the third event Jaxon had raced in, and those two ribbons at home are presumably blue. His bike is a Yamaha PW50 and I asked if…

THE BURT MUNRO Challenge is run by the Southland Motorcycle Club and competitors and spectators owe the privilege to long-time club member Wayne Affleck, who worked really hard to get the event he believed in off the ground all those years ago, even when many thought it too ambitious to be successful. Sadly, the 2019 event was the first Burt to run without Affleck’s watchful eye, after the founder and chairman of the Burt Munro Challenge died unexpectedly in August last year. As a result, the 2019 event saw the inaugural awarding of the Affleck Maverick Trophy, which this year went to Kev Kinghan. The president of the Southland Motorcycle Club, Andy Underhay, said the recipient would be the “left-field” competitor who displayed an “unconventional” approach to the racing.…

“THE BIKE WASN’T bad. It wasn’t as nimble as the Yamaha, but it was stable and didn’t do anything really bad. And it was a rocket. “Between Erv and I we made a lot of changes: chassis stiffness, suspension and so on. Honda kept telling us the chassis needs to bend like a tree. No it doesn’t! So we went off in the complete opposite direction to Gardner, and the chassis kept getting better and better. So HRC went, wow, Eddie knows what he’s talking about! “If we made a change to the bike I was never afraid to say it’s worse or I don’t know if it’s better or worse. I think a lot of riders ask for changes, then they’re like, ‘oh man, it’s worse; I can’t tell…

THERE IS SOMETHING special about motorcycle racing. I probably do not need to tell you that. But apart from the extraordinary races it can turn on, I believe that racing has a ‘flatter’ landscape than many other sports’; for all the superstars it produces, racing can bring together people that may never meet otherwise. For all its highs and lows, it democratises the landscape. I was thinking about that just last week, around something that happened to me 21 years ago. My brief was to hang around Phillip Island during a pre-season IRTA test, nag some of the good folk in the 500cc teams and produce a season preview. Mick Doohan was at the height of his powers, so the first four paragraphs would take about 90 seconds to write.…

Stop Draggin’ My RCV213V Around DUCATI WERE IN a querulous mood, and reportedly complained to Race Direction after Marquez’s front-row qualifying lap – which knocked Jack Miller off the front row – had been achieved by him following Danilo Petrucci. Directly afterwards, he had passed the Italian rider, and then slowed. Marquez laughed it off. “Welcome to factory team racing,” he said, adding: “I have been followed by many riders in my career.” Responding to further questions, he admitted that this was not his usual strategy, but he had been happy to follow the Italian. He could probably have achieved a front-row lap time alone, “but with more risk.” Marquez leads the Walking Wounded RIDER-WISE, THE injury and surgery victims arrived at least 12 days better than at the tests,…

REMY GARDNER TURNED around two seasons of pain and mostly unsatisfying results to reinforce his belief that he is now a contender for Moto2 race wins. Often impatient to show his potential but restricted by uncompetitive equipment, Gardner now feels he has the tools to show his potential. Now aboard Moto2’s class leading Kalex chassis and after the switch to the higher horsepower and beefier torque of the Triumph Triple control engine, Gardner scored a career-best fourth place in the Qatar GP. While dismayed to miss the podium by just 0.002sec to Marcel Schrotter after being ahead into the final lap, Gardner can now see upside to his career. “The last couple of years were tough but I always knew I could be there, and now I know I can…

CONDOBOLIN LOCAL JACOB Smith is looking forward to his first outing on his new bike but this one won’t be red. Smith has been a loyal Honda pilot for many years now, taking the CRF to wins and podiums in events like the Finke Desert Race, Australia Safari, Sunraysia Safari, Condo 750, Yellow Mountain and Hattah Desert Race. Jacob even managed a creditable 32nd in the 2011 Dakar Rally. For 2019, Smith has signed with Husqvarna and is keen for back to back wins at the Condo 750 being raced over two days in April. Later in the year, Smith will tackle the Finke Desert Race, Hattah Desert Race and Sunraysia Safari on his new Husqvarna FE501. But for now, preparation is underway for the 5-7 April navigational rally held…

With so many correct responses to our regular Mental Twisties quizzes, we thought it was time to up the stakes. But the tolerances were a little too close, it seems, with no one getting every question right. Kevin Beale of Victoria’s Balwyn North came bloody close… WHO Warren Willing (1) leads Kenny Blake (4) WHAT A self portrait with his mouth open WHEN 2017 Valencia GP WHY Protesting Melbourne’s first toll road for motorcycles WHERE Oran Park Raceway Sydney Answers for Vol 68 No 17…

"I'M A KIND OF court jester meets asylum escapee,” Keith Flint said in a recent interview in which he discussed his troubled childhood and “dark periods.” He appeared to have found a life balance in music and motorcycling. “I can’t do something half-cocked. I’ve got to do something because I love it and because I’m truly passionate about it,” he said in a 2013 interview in which he spoke about both his music and motorcycle racing. Flint’s motorcycle racing outfit, Team Traction Control, won worldwide attention when it signed Ian Hutchinson. In 2015 and 2016 ‘Hutchy’ won two Isle of Man TT Supersport doubles and an Ulster GP race for the team. Tributes poured in from both the music and racing worlds after Flint’s death. Carl Fogarty described him as…

Racing legends Thank god for Aussie motorcycling and racing. AMCN’s nostalgic stories of past glory got me reminiscing and thinking and about how lucky I was to have grown up in Sydney during the 1970s and early ’80s, the road-racing coming of age. We had access to such unbelievable racing like the Castrol 6 hour, Bathurst and Oran Park. The racing those tracks and events could produce was legendary. So were the riders themselves – spoilt or what? We got to see the incredible talent, such as a young Wayne Gardner, who showed me his talent by doing my personal best Amaroo Park lap time – in the wet! I was in awe and I knew he’d go on to bigger and better things. I don’t particularly like Valentino Rossi…

ENGINE Configuration Parallel-twin Cylinder head DOHC, four valves per cylinder Capacity 600cc Bore/stroke 74 x 69.7mm Compression ratio Not given Cooling Liquid Fueling EFI Power 37.3kW @ 7300rpm (claimed) Torque 49.7Nm @ 6200rpm (claimed) TRANSMISSION Type CVT Clutch Not applicable Final drive Shaft CHASSIS Frame material Steel Frame layout Y frame Rake Not applicable Trail Not applicable SUSPENSION Sachs Front: Wishbone type with twin-tube, non-adjustable shocks, 137mm travel Rear: Twin-tube shock, adjustable preload, 150mm Travel WHEELS/TYRES Wheels Aluminium alloy Front: 16 x 4.5 Rear: 16 x 6.5 Front: 145/60R16 (66T) Rear: 205/45R16 (77T) BRAKES Nissin, plus parking brake Front: 2 x 270mm discs with two-piston calipers Rear: single 220mm disc, single-piston caliper DIMENSIONS Weight 270kg (dry, claimed) Seat height 597mm Max width 1509mm Max height 1062mm Wheelbase 1709mm Fuel capacity…

MOTOR Configuration Three-phase AC induction motor Batteries Lightning high-power lithium-polymer cells, with integrated thermal management Capacity 18kW Cooling Liquid, with real-time data management Recharging 3.3kWh DC charger, charge time from zero under 40 mins Power 90kW @ 15,000rpm (claimed) Torque 95Nm constant from 1rpm (claimed) TRANSMISSION Type Single-speed direct drive Clutch Not applicable Final drive Belt CHASSIS Frame material Aluminium Frame layout Monocoque, incorporating battery shell Rake 24° Trail 105.3mm (adjustable) SUSPENSION Öhlins Front: 43mm USD, adjustable Rear: Monoshock (no linkage), fully adjustable, machined billet swingarm 125mm travel WHEELS/TYRES Wheels Forged, Aluminium alloy Front: 17 x 3.5 Rear: 17 x 6.0 Tyres Diablo Supercorsa SC1/SC2 Front: 120/70R17 (58W) Rear: 200/50R17 (75W) BRAKES Brembo Front: Twin 320mm discs, four-piston radial calipers Rear: Single 220mm disc, two-piston caliper, with regenerative braking DIMENSIONS…

KEVIN RYAN PERSONIFIES the Burt Munro Challenge. With his hand-stitched leather suit and homemade foam neck protector, the miner from the rugged west coast of New Zealand’s South Island is as quick as he is unkempt. He travels to the event in an old school bus converted into a workshop-cum-home (sound familiar?) and this year raced in every event except the final day’s street race on his old Triumph Bonnevilles and Jawa speedway bike. His machines boast handmade parts and his long beard and bushy eyebrows spill out from his old helmet as he chases down rivals. This year he picked up the pre-1972 class gong on the beach and he just missed out on honours in the hillclimb, to Vince Burrell’s 1972 Moto Guzzi V Sport 998. But he…

Premier-class Grand Prix bikes were never nastier than in the 1980s – two-stroke power was pushing them towards 320km/h, overpowering tyres, frames and suspension. Honda’s NSR500 was the nastiest of the nasty. The single-crank V4 had a precipitous power curve that was too much for any chassis, let alone the strange things HRC created at the time. HRC tried to tame the NSR with weird geometry, frame rigidities and centres of gravity, none of which worked. The bikes were fast – quick enough to take Freddie Spencer and Wayne Gardner to the 1985 and 1987 titles – but they were hellish to ride and not getting any better. “The 1988 bike was a piece of shit – it was just an evil thing,” recalls Gardner. Thus when Eddie Lawson quit…

Top TV 1 WSBK Rd2 Thailand Video Pass 16-17 March 8pm (AEDT) WSBK heads to Thailand for Round 2 and you can watch it by subscribing to Videopass. Superbike Race 1 starts at 8pm Saturday (AEDT) and Race 2 at 8pm Sunday. The Supersport race starts at 6.15pm Sunday. 2 AMA SX Rd11 Indy Video Pass 17 March 10am (AEDT) AMA Supercross heads to the self-proclaimed racing capital of the world, Indianapolis, Indiana for Round 11. You can catch the action live at supercrosslive.com, with racing starting at 10am (AEDT) Sunday morning. 3 ASBK Rd2 Wakefield Park, NSW SBS, Fox & ASBK 23-2 March TBA SBS and Fox Sports will broadcast live coverage of ASBK Round 2 from Wakefield Park, NSW. All classes will also be live-streamed on the asbk.com.au…

Circuit length 5.380km Race distance MotoGP 118.360km Moto2 107.600km Moto3 96.84km 2018 winners MotoGP A Dovizioso 42m34.564s Moto2 F Bagnaia 40m19.802s Moto3 J Martin 38m18.207s Did you know? The sessions before the race served up their share of surprises but maybe the changing landscape of MotoGP is best demonstrated by this statistic. Rookies starred in Qualifying, led by Fabio Quartararo, who started from fifth. He shared Row 2 of the grid with Jack Miller and Cal Crutchlow who, between them, have won four MotoGP races. Further back was Francesco Bagnaia, who shared Row 5 with Valentino Rossi and Jorge Lorenzo, who between them have 136 MotoGP wins, not to mention 10 MotoGP titles... Round 1 Finishing positions MOTOGP 22 LAPS…

Reckon you’re pretty quick when it comes to trivia? Then have a crack at our “who is it?” series. If you find it hard, here’s a clue; all these helmets appeared in pre-season testing in the last few months [and some may have changed for the 2019 MotoGP season]. When you reckon you’ve worked it out, email your numbered answers to comps@amcn.com.au for your chance to win! WIN! THIS AWESOME IPONE CARE KIT Answers will be revealed in the next issue…