2018 WSBK silly season

He chose to jump ship.

Althea STILL hasn't confirmed that they will be renewing their contract with BMW. No team contract means Torres can't have a contract.

He did the smart thing and jumped ship to what is likely a more competitive ride and a better paycheck than what Althea would've offered when his back was against a wall.

He'll do just fine at MV. I expect to see him take a podium or two next year.

 

My worry is the machine reliability.

 

I think Spanish Elvis will be good to go on the MV. Hoping they can get some reliability out of that thing during the off season.

 

Sykes will be out of Kawi after next year

 

where is he going? who will replace him?

 

Rea will ride both bikes, he needs a challenge

 

A or B bike backwards?

 

My condolences to Torres.

 

Haslm, new sponsor Virgin Air, he wants to see if he can crash one to the moon.

 

Once again, PJ's POS MV Agusta gives up the ghost while running up front... give me a damn break

 

That's bullshit...
https://motomatters.com/news/2017/10/26/new_worldsbk_rules_for_2018_will_rev.html
"There were two problem with using air restrictors. The first was that the effects were rather limited: factories grew more adept at squeezing more performance out of the engine despite restrictors, and there was a limit to how large or small the restrictors could be. A bigger issue is that it only addressed the performance disparity between twins and four cylinders, leaving the disparity between the different manufacturers of four-cylinder bikes untouched. It was aimed at containing Ducati. The problem is that Kawasaki has surpassed Ducati in performance, and there is no way of helping Honda, Aprilia, Yamaha, BMW, or Suzuki catch up.

Hence the switch to rev limits. Rev limits give the FIM and Dorna more direct control of the performance of different manufacturers. By allowing some manufacturers more revs and others fewer revs, they can impact peak power and torque of each individual brand. This will allow them, for example, to reduce revs for Kawasaki if Jonathan Rea and Tom Sykes keep winning everything, leave the revs untouched for Yamaha, as Alex Lowes and Michael van der Mark have been close to being competitive as the only other bikes on the podium other than the Kawasakis and Ducatis, while increasing revs for Aprilia and Honda to help make them more competitive.

The system will use an algorithm to calculate relative performance. That algorithm has yet to be completely defined, but it will combine a number of factors, including lap times, top speeds, number of riders on a particular bike, results, laps led, etc. to generate a relative performance ranking. Should a particular manufacturer come out high, then the series organizers will be able to reduce the maximum rev limit for that manufacturer by 250rpm. If the performance ranking comes out low, they can raise the rev limit by 250rpm.

The calculations will be made every three rounds, and may also be done at the end of the season for the following year. The proposed rev limits are shown below:"

 

lol should give Honda 20,000 rpm!

 

Whats bullshit about it?

You think anybody is going to give a shit about WSBK if it keeps being a Kawasaki show?

So you can try to build some parity into the racing or watch the whole thing disappear up its own asshole.

 

Correct. It has always been this way in every form of motorsport.
But it's becoming too complicated, algorithms and stuff. That's what's bullshit.

 

If the Kawi was blowing by people in a straight line or acceleration off the corner,I could understand this better. I guess they need to do something to improve the show, but dominant bikes rarely dominate for that long. At some point someone comes in and builds something better or a new rider arrives and upsets the balance. I do like the rules that allow private teams to be able to buy all the factory kit at "reasonable" prices. Well that is if you call 10,000 Euros "reasonable" for a swing arm.

 

So it could rev that high once?

 

I don’t know why people are complaining. Absolutely no one wants to watch racing that is not exciting at nearly every round with only one or two riders having a chance to win.

In my opinion they should just change WorldSBK to World Superstock 1000 and get rid of superbikes altogether. Nearly every manufacturer is competitive in World Superstock 1000 and it would keep more teams in as racing would be more affordable for not only teams but factories as well.

I just don’t get superbike classes at all to be honest. Leave the trick electronics and chassis elements to MotoGP.

 

I think we are slowly but surely moving that way.

Dorna isn't stupid. Who would've thought MotoGP would be where it is today when they introduced CRT bikes in 2012?

I think we'll see superstock level bikes, with very few exceptions, within the next 5-10 years.

 

I agree and wish MotoAmerica would have done this with their new class changes.

 

Seems a bit low actually