As you may already know, Travis Pastrana – the kind of guy that backflips a shoe bike, jumps his motorcycle over a hovering helicopter, backflips from one building to another etc for a living – has actually pulled off his latest stunt behind the wheel of his Subaru WRX STI rally car on new year’s eve. The stunt consisted in the daredevil jumping off a ramp mounted on a boat and onto a barge-mounted landing ramp. In between those: over 250 feet of water.
What you most likely don’t know is the extensive training required to pull off such a stunt and we’ve come to find that Pastrana practiced with both a car and motorcycle for this specific world-record-setting jump and even crashed the racing Subaru car after misjudging the speed required to land smoothly over the hump of the…whatever, just watch the behind-the-scenes video that Red Bull only recently made public.
Kawasaki now offers the KX250F motocross model as a 2010 model year. Not only that, but the quarter-liter racer is entirely new as a result of engineers aiming towards a higher revving and implicit more powerful, but also more reliable engine. Once you’ve done that, every single piece of the machine qualifies for a proper revision and that’s how dirt bikes end up being tweaked each and every year. Full story
The 2010 Kawasaki KX450F is now a fact on dealership floors and it comes with a whole range of improvements that are more than enough for a review of this new model year. Like with all previous generation models, the goal here was to improve performance and reliability as well as rider comfort and looks.
Kawi is quite proud of their new KX450F and they have plenty of reasons to also be enthusiastic about the new racing season. You see, more power and less weight will always do the trick in the right hands.
Electric motorcycles are becoming more and more popular and builders are continuously trying to expand their coverage area on the market. One very good such example is the Quantya electric snow bike prototype, which is based on a Quantya MX bike but features a snowmobile-like track and a front ski so that it would turn into a fairly easy and fun bike to ride on the show. The only problem is that the batteries tend to run out too fast because of the cold, so different battery and motor power combinations are being considered and tested at the Quantya HQ in Switzerland. Once they figure this last detail out, don’t be surprised if the company starts producing the thing for snow enthusiasts. Full story
People would go to any lengths to turn their dreams into reality and one such person is base-jumper Bernie Williams, who on November 28, 2009 set a first world record by flying his motorcycle from a hot air balloon in Chesaning, Michigan.
Coming down from 5000 feet relying only on the parachute and on his steady hand on the throttle, the ambitious man has shown that it is well worth waiting…20 years (in this case) for whatever makes you happy. The video is attached after the jump.
Suzuki carries on leading kids on their way to motocross success in 2010 with the RM85, a small and extremely versatile entry-level dirt bike with still plenty to prove in its segment, especially if we consider that the competition hasn’t upgraded their bikes either. Kids with a soft spot for dirt racing will find the Suzuki RM85 package truly manageable, meaning they’ll be sticking with the Japanese brand as long as this last is able to supply guaranteed performance and wins. Full story
World Supercross Champion James ‘Bubba’ Stewart has recently presented his house and several garages at MTV’s Cribs. Yamaha’s rider may be a lot of time away for the races, but when he’s home, he sure doesn’t lack comfort and bikes to ride. James even has his own track to practice on and a Segway to help him cover the immense yard. Hmm, I wonder what he expects Santa to bring him…
DDB&Co Istanbul was commissioned by KTM Turkey with the making of a print ad that ended up bringing an award for the original idea. The ad is for their 250SX motorcycle, a veritable off-roader, so the rider’s behavior is almost justified.
Congratulations KTM for this ad, which reminds us of Aprilia’s…
A rather quiet and exclusive yacht club in Beirut, Lebanon was recently transformed into a bone breaking area as twenty-five bikers gathered to see who can jump his motorcycle the furthest into the sea and win the $1,000 prize. Not only it is a miracle they all got out of it alive, but the contest even had a winner, Joseph Geaga, who jumped his dirt bike (now a submarine) an impressive 175 feet from the launch ramp. Congrats to him and let’s hope the cash prize is enough for a new bike. Full story
Nine-time World MotoGP Champion Valentino Rossi has organized the Motocross dei Campioni event at Cavallara in Italy and participated at the charity run in order to raise funds and help treat children suffering of leukaemia at a hospital in Pesaro, Italy.
The event gathered more than 10.000 people, among which Andrea Dovizioso, Julian Simon, Marco Simoncelli, Loris Capriossi and Marco Melandri were the other names associated with motorcycle racing.
Looks like The Doctor is no stranger to dirt riding either, as the attached video shows.
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Picture Gallery
![Flying Motorcycle from Hot Air Balloon Fulfills Lifetime Dream, Sets First World Record [w/video]](http://pictures.topspeed.com/IMG/crop/201001/flying-motorcycle-fr_460x0w.jpg)
![Contest: jumping motorcycles into the sea [w/video]](http://pictures.topspeed.com/IMG/crop/200912/contest-jumping-moto_460x0w.jpg)
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