Official eMotoRacing series announcement, first race in February 2014

Arthur Kowitz – 2013 eRoadRacing @ Laguna Seca

As I reported earlier, Arthur Kowitz, a long-time AMA Pro Racer who is a convert to electric motorcycle racing, is organizing an electric motorcycle racing series for North America. What we have now is an official press release as well as further discussion in the Electric Racing group on Facebook.

BTW – anybody interested in Electric Racing should join that group, pronto.

What does Arthur have on his mind? The press release (below) says quite a bit.

He wants to race electric. What Arthur explained to me last summer is that, after his retirement from AMA racing, he kept racing within the AHRMA. But it struck him that while he was advancing the state of the art in 2-stroke motorcycle racing, that’s really a throwback to an ancient bygone era of motorcycling. Two-stroke bikes have been banned from regular racing for ages.

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The future is electric, the handwriting is on the wall. Arthur wanted to be part of the future, rather than part of preserving the past. That’s why he raced with the eRoadRacing series this year, riding a Brammo TTX.

As he notes below, the ready availability of high quality manufactured bikes from Zero and Brammo now make it cheap for someone to race electric. Their speed is on par with 250+ cc gas bikes, and could mean some interesting racing action if there’s a full grid of such bikes on the track. Where the 2012 TTXGP and 2013 eRoadRacing seasons proved this, the 2014 season will see the Zero SR as a race-ready bike, and will likely see an upgrade to the Empulse from Brammo.

The press release describes two classes – eGrandPrix for the no-holds-barred bikes, and eSuperSport for the production bikes. It’s not clear where this would place the University teams (Virginia Tech, Ohio State, etc) or the DIY constructors. We haven’t seen the precise definitions, so the next paragraph is a bit of guesswork.

A little fly in the ointment might come from either Lightning or Mission, both of whom claim to be in “production” of their ultra-high-end electric motorcycles. Both have shown bikes which beat the snot out of the Zero S/SR or Empulse R/TTX. Depending on how Arthur wants to define eSuperSport – would he use the eSuperStock definition from the 2012 TTXGP season? Manufacturing and sales of over 25 bikes per year? Mission claims to have sold (but not yet delivered) 40 bikes, and it’s plausible that Lightning could do so as well. Would that undermine this eSuperSport class?

Arthur – it’s better to define the classes based on power and performance, right? Wink, Wink, Nudge Nudge. I thought at the time that the TTXGP was stupid to have defined eSuperStock that way. One hopes the same mistake will not be repeated for this new series.

Arthur did say on the Electric Racing group – “The 2014 series will not be TTXGP over again, but an AHRMA stand alone class. Their policy is that a new class can have its autonomy, points standings, and awards…but maintain exhibition status for the first season at least to assure interest and viability.”

This means eMotoRacing will exist at the AHRMA events while operating somewhat on its own.

Jeremiah Johnson is also working on setting up a 3-person team for this series. Anybody interested should contact him.

When I posted this question “If eRoadRacing is foundering where does the top electric motorcycle racing series go?” – Arthur answered “It goes to the new 10 race eMotoRacing Series…which will be affordable for racers and have a full schedule tied down well before the season starts.”

AHRMA has posted a tentative schedule for the 2014 season – the eMotoRacing dates will be the same. The first date is approaching fast, meaning the teams need to be organized right away.

Feb 28 – March 2 -Roebling Road Raceway – Savannah GA

March 28-30 – NOLA Motorsports Park – New Orleans

April 25-27 – Willow Springs Int’l Raceway – Lancaster CA

May 1-2  – Sonoma(Sears Point) – Sonoma County CA

June 6-8 – Road America – Sheboygan Wisconsin

June 13-15 – Grattan Raceway – Grand Rapids Michigan

July 11-13  – New Jersey Motorsports Park – Vineland NJ

August 29-31  – Miller Motorsports Park – Salt Lake City

October 9-12 – Barber Motorsports Park – Birmingham, AL

October 17-19  – Daytona Int’l Speedway – Daytona Beach, FL

Cutting-edge Electric Motorcycle Roadracing Series Hits the U.S.

National electric motorcycle roadracing championship kicks-off in 2014 as the zero-emission U.S. eMotoRacing Series, running in conjunction with the American Historic Racing Motorcycle Association (AHRMA) CPL Systems Historic Cup National Roadrace Series.

Races will be held at many of the nation’s finest racetracks — Barber Motorsports Park , Daytona International Speedway, Grattan Raceway, Miller Motorsports Park , New Jersey Motorsports Park, NOLA Motorsports Park , Road America , Roebling Road Raceway, Sonoma Raceway and Willow Springs International Raceway.

Race-ready electric motorcycles are available from Brammo and Zero Motorcycles, making it simple to participate in this series.

Electric racebikes’ fastest speeds are similar to race-prepared 600cc gasoline-powered bikes. These electric motorcycles have similar powertrains to electric cars like the Nissan Leaf, the Tesla Model S, and the electric portion of the Chevy Volt.

Riders and teams are invited to participate in the elite eGrandPrix class for full-on prototype machines, or in eSuperSport, aimed at production racers and race-prepped, electric-powered street bikes. Both classes give participants the opportunity to showcase and develop new technologies, while enjoying an affordable racebike with pure chassis feedback and very low maintenance.

Become a leader who is easy on the environment – the sky’s the limit in this high-performance, exciting new racing series! With trophies at each event and year-end awards, don’t miss your chance to become the country’s very first eMotoRacing champion!

Sponsored by Arthur Kowitz Realty of Daytona Beach, Florida, the U.S. eMotoRacing Series will run as an exhibition class at all 10 rounds of the AHRMA Historic Cup Series; for event information and a full series schedule, visit www.ahrma.org. For technical details on the U.S. eMotoRacing Series, email Kowitz at eMotoRacing@akr1.com.

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About David Herron

David Herron is a writer and software engineer living in Silicon Valley. He primarily writes about electric vehicles, clean energy systems, climate change, peak oil and related issues. When not writing he indulges in software projects and is sometimes employed as a software engineer. David has written for sites like PlugInCars and TorqueNews, and worked for companies like Sun Microsystems and Yahoo.