Blue 2000 Yamaha R6 (brooklyn Park) on 2040-motos

Moto blog

Valentino Rossi Test Drives Kyle Busch’s NASCAR Toyota Camry

The morning after riding his Yamaha M1 to a sixth-place finish at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas, nine-time Grand Prix World Champion Valentino Rossi landed in Charlotte, N.C., to race around another track; only this time there were no right turns. (UPDATED with additional photos.) Rossi met up with NASCAR racer and fellow Monster Energy-sponsored athlete Kyle Busch to ride Busch’s Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota Camry at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Busch, winner of the last three Nationwide Series races, gave Rossi a walkaround of his car before taking the Yamaha factory rider around a few laps of the Charlotte  Motor Speedway 1.5-mile oval.

Back in the day, the All Japan 500cc Championship at Tsukuba

This ‘you tube’ gem sent to me recently brought back some funny memories from the scary but incredibly exciting days of 500cc two stroke racing. This particular race was the final round of the All Japan 500cc Championship at Tsukuba Circuit where I enjoyed a head to head battle with national hero Tadahiko Taira. Yamaha’s favourite son at the time, ‘tie wrap’ as we liked to call him, was taller and better looking than most Japanese riders (maybe a war baby?) and went on to win nearly everything in Japan during his career.

US Motorcycle Thefts Down 6% in 2011

Americans reported 46,667 motorcycle thefts in 2011, a 6% decrease from 49,791 stolen motorcycles in 2010, reports the National Insurance Crime Bureau. Despite the drop in reported thefts, the non-profit organization representing nearly 1100 property and casualty insurance companies says the theft rate still averages out to one motorcycle stolen every 11 minutes in the U.S. The numbers were published in the NICB’s 2011 ForeCAST Report which examined theft reports as well as recoveries.