The festivities have commenced (and ended)! Here’s how things went over in Austin from one man’s perspective:
I woke up early Friday morning to a text message from Southwest Airlines noting significant traffic delays near the airport and warning flyers to leave extra early. That was all the impetus I needed to pack a bit lighter and just ride down instead of getting a Lyft. One of the nice things about parking your motorcycle at LAX is that you can do so for free and the location is super convenient to the terminals. I generally use my BMW K1200R for airport duty as it shows some corrossion after 88k miles, plenty of which have been in the rain. I figure it’s less appealing for a potential thief, plus it has saddlebags to stash some extras. I run a bicycle lock through my Aerostich and helmet and then I’m off to the races – in this case, literally!
It wasn’t until I got to the airport that I found out what caused the insane traffic: unfortunately, there was a police chase early in the morning that ended up in a crash.
I met up with Ted and Jay – we’ll both be racing AHRMA this year at Willow Springs, Inde Motorsports Ranch, and Barber Motorsports Park. I hope you’ll join us for the racing!
We had an uneventful flight (my favorite kind), though I was hoping to get some work done on the flight and unfortuantely the internet wasn’t working. This was a bummer for my productivity but it also made me think of a Louis CK bit that always comes to mind when internet doesn’t work on a plane:
We hadn’t had anything to eat all day and we were jonesing for a late lunch so we ended up walking to a local establishment called Ants Beer Cave as they had a few food trucks on the premises – I went to Knuckle Sandwich and asked the server for the spiciest sandwich they make. He said that they didn’t really have anything like that on the menu but their namesake “knuckle sandwich” came with special peppers and he could throw “a ton more” in. So that’s what we did – it was nice but I wasn’t as impressed as this local food reviewer. Next time you’re in LA, come see me and I’ll hopefully be able to take you to Bay Cities Italian Deli in Santa Monica for one of the best Italian sandwiches you’ll ever have.
I wasn’t able to make it to the track today but I should note that Marc Marquez (the overwhelming favorite) finished up Friday with the best time in practice sessions that featured a bit of rain. He knocked out a 2’02.929, a solid .736 of a second faster than his closest competitor (Fabio Di Giannantonio)! It sure was looking like Marc was going to continue his dominance in Austin…
Photo courtesy MotoGP
I also want to share some stuff about the MotoAmerica Talent Cup – specifically a rider named Solomon “Solly” Mervis that we sponsor over at Iconic! Solly placed 12th in last year’s Junior Cup series (in his rookie season) and is the oldest racer in the new Talent Cup – he’s two months older than Kody Kopp, who’s getting a lot of headlines as he races for Team Roberts (that’s right, Kenny Roberts is getting back into roadracing). Solly is a talented rider and a great kid, and I love that the MotoAmerica press release highlighted his intelligence as well: “Mervis recently was named to the Dean’s List for the 2024/2025 winter quarter at the Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, which is ranked as the top undergraduate engineering college in the U.S.”
Solly with Fast Freddie Spencer!
I’ll talk more about the Talent Cup in a separate post.
That evening, our group went to go check out the Handbuilt Show – I’ll also do a separate post on the show but for now I’ll just leave you with what ended up being my favorite bike: the Krauser Domani!
Here’s a short video of it for you, I also filmed a longer one with more details that I’ll be able to share on YouTube soon.
For now, the highlights are that this has a BMW K100 drivetrain wrapped in a proprietary frame and bodywork with a livery that matches Krauser’s better-known creation, the MKM1000.
A MKM1000 we sold over at Iconic.
The sidecar frame is integrated, the front wheel is hub-center steering, and according to the seller this is one of just two that got a turbocharger!
Roughly 100 were built and from what I can tell, most went to Japan. This is my kind of bike – super weird and super cool!
On our way back to the hotel, I noticed a couple of Ducati Panigales parked next to each other – a previous gen and the new one. I’m not really a fan of the styling of the new bike, and seeing them side by side definitely cements that opinion for me. What do you think?
As you can see from this progression-style photo, the new one features a double sided swingarm – something their top of the line sportbikes haven’t featured since the 999.
Photo from Ducati
Ducati would end up being a big theme of the weekend – so let’s get right to the action on Saturday!