Laverda In America

Laverda in America

Three decades of carving a niche within a niche

IT'S ENCOURAGING TO HEAR THAT Laverdas are once again being sold in the U.S., but for long-suffering fans of the marque, the appointment of a new importer isn’t really news. Like many Italian motorcycle—nay, motor vehicle—manufacturers, Laverda has a checkered past, with periodic profitable production foiled by financial faux pas and a revolving door of importers.

True to its ilk, Laverda did not start out as a motorcycle manufacturer; instead, it made farm equipment. When

it did begin to make a name for itself in roadracing in the 1950s. it did so with a humble 75cc Single. But unlike its more suc cessful contemporaries. Laverda's ultimate successes came not in glamorous Grands Prix, but in down-and-dirty endurance races. Indeed. the Montjuic 500's name celebrates the marques's success in a gritty Spanish 24-hour street race.

Ironically (if not symbolically). Laverda

achieved its greatest notoriety with a motorcycle that never won a race. In 1977. proud engineers unveiled a proto type, shaft-driven, V-Six endurance racer that sadly competed only once (DNFing the 1978 Bol d’Or) and was never put into production. Thus, like the glorious V-Eight Guzzi of the mid1950s, it remains a curious footnote in the annals of motorcycle sport.

Which fairly describes Laverda itself. If you count the early years when Laverdas were marketed in the U.S. as American Eagles, the Cycle World archives include a grand total of nine road tests spanning the period between August, 1968 and October, 1984.

Unfortunately, the editors never sampled la creme de la creme: the twincylinder 750 SFC or 1982 Jota “120,” which unlike previous Laverda Triples

had its crank throws spaced evenly at 120-degree intervals rather than 180. They did, however, test a 1977 Jota, and spared no superlatives in describing the experience: “Acceleration is more in the Saturn lunar booster class... The faster it goes, the better it gets, and you’re probably going to run out of road or nerve or skill or all three before you’re scraping anything.”

By 1984 and the arrival of the RGS1000 Corsa, though, the raves had turned to faint praise, with the editors trotting out the usual cliches about “character” and “personality.”

Between unplanned obsolescence and the ever-tightening noose of EPA emissions standards, Laverda was

doomed. Or so we thought prior to the arrival of the new 750S (whose fuelinjection system lets it pass muster even in California) and the appointment of a new importer.

Hope springs eternal

Brian Catterson