Last night Lightning Motorcycles fulfilled a long-held promise of selling the Lightning electric superbike to paying customers. The company has raced with production-intent-prototype-bikes in events since 2010 setting a number of records. After every one, Lightning CEO Richard Hatfield promised their bikes were now on sale – a promise that’s…
Bobby Goodin, R.I.P. A question in my mind since the 2014 TT ZERO (and TT) at the Isle of Man is the carnage happening in this kind of race. The TT course, the Pikes Peak course, and some other races, are severe challenges between person, machine, and the elements. The…
Earlier today Mugen Shinden’s John McGuinness shattered the TT ZERO lap speed record – it now stands at 115.598 miles/hr. His teammate, Bruce Anstey, also broke the previous record, which had been set by Anstey on Saturday, with a 113+ miles/hr lap speed. These two are top riders in the…
I have some preliminary news on a new electric motorcycle racing season in Europe – MotoERacing. I learned of this series last week thanks to a posting by the Danish team, Future Electric, who made a blog post seeking sponsorship. Their reason for seeking sponsors? Because they’ve been invited to…
Yamaha, in their 2013 Annual Report, announced production of the Yamaha PES1 and Yamaha PED1 electric motorcycles would begin in 2016. While these aren’t electric superbikes, this will make Yamaha the first major motorcycle manufacture to begin building electric bikes. Further, it’s a step towards a full-on electric superbike that…
For years we’ve had electric powered racing, whether it’s drag racing (NEDRA and the like), go-karts, motorcycles (TTXGP and the like) or cars (Formula E, Formula Lightning, etc). Electrically powered racers ran in separate classes, and often separate events, because while electric race vehicles might be fast enough they didn’t…
Darvill Racing has announced (on Friday) a historic agreement in which they will be the first electrically powered motorcycle racing team to compete directly against gasoline powered bikes in a regular road race. They’ll be competing in the “Southern 100 Road Races” which is an ACU/FIM sanctioned event held on…
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…
Mission Motors appears to be coming back into the business of building high performance electric motorcycles. They of course started out in that business, but backed away from it when the company nearly died a few years ago. There was a change of CEO at the time, and a change…
Jeremiah JohnsonTTXGP 2012 World ChampionshipDaytona International Raceway Jeremiah Johnson (Be-EV.com) announced on Wednesday that he would be racing a 2013 Zero S in the as-yet-unnamed electric motorcycle racing series that’s due to supplant the TTXGP and e-Power series for 2013. I’m sorry that the situation of the TTXGP/e-Power is overshadowing…
Last week I was able to disclose news of a merger between the TTXGP and FIM e-Power electric motorcycle racing series. While the news itself was exciting and promising to heal the schism between those two series, it left out some important details. These details are important ones that race…
Brammo announced on Tuesday a historic agreement with the AFM allowing Brammo’s Empulse R, Empulse TTX and Empulse RR electric motorcycles to compete directly in AFM races. For the first time electric motorcycle racers will be able to compete for points and championship position in regular gas bike racing. The…
The TTXGP and FIM announced today a historic change in the face of electric motorcycle racing. The two organizations have announced an agreement under which both the TTXGP and e-Power racing series will be replaced by a new series. The announcement resolves several years of schism which split electric motorcycle…
The 2012 TTXGP season demonstrated one thing really well – that production electric motorcycles are now good enough for credible racing. The electric car field doesn’t have anything equivalent. First, there isn’t an electric car racing series with any history, well other than NEDRA electric drag racing. Second, there isn’t…
In 2011 and 2012 the TTXGP had a presence in Australia thanks to a partnership with the Australian electric motorcycle racing series, eFXC. The partnership made for two seasons of electric motorcycle racing that primarily saw Catavolt and Ripperton in competition. However, the partnership between TTXGP and eFXC has ended…
