BIKE WARS

We all have heard the saying “When u r at war, either stand up and fight, or else dig a trench and hide”. Well, off road bike specialists KTM seem to be going for the latter option. What has prompted this reaction is the enforcement of ban on V-twin engines by the AMA in the US for super-moto events. Now KTM played a major part in securing this rule by crying fowl about the high cost and power associated with a V-twin. The fact that single cylinder engines is what KTM specialises in, and not V-twins, makes them sitting pretty after this rule. On the other hand manufacturers like Aprilia, who have developed V-twin engines for their super-moto bikes are pointing to the smoothness, low noise, low stress, less failures and overall reduced maintenance costs of a V-twin and trying to prevent the same thing from happening in Europe. Aprilia is starting a new innings, both as a company and by developing all new super-moto (with V-twin engines) and super sports bikes. It actually plans to cover the entire range from 50cc to 1000cc by launching 20 new models, but more on the Aprilia story in a later post. Now with these bikes to sell, they will have to have a racing pedigree. And considering US is a major market for them now one can understand how this rule really hits them. Well so much for tactics, someone should be telling them “play guys and lets leave the dirt for the politicians”.