La Vita È Bella
La Vita è Bella
SPECIAL SECTION
Life is beautiful when you celebrate with the Italians
BRIAN CATTERSON
WHEN MIKE HAILWOOD CAME OUT of retirement to win the 1978 Isle of Man TT on a Ducati, I was 16 years old. Motorcycling to me meant motocross—roadracing was just something they did on the backside of the starting gate at Long Island's Bridgehampton Raceway. Hailwood? Ducati? Never heard of 'em, surely not in the dogeared pages of my cherished Popular Cycling magazines.
A few months later, however, that all changed. The Catterson clan had piled into our Ford Country Squire and head ed to Aunt Kathy's house for Thanksgiving dinner, a sure recipe for boredom for a high-school senior. So after scarfing a couple
platefuls of turkey and stuffing, I passed the time by thumbing through my Uncle Bob's latest Cycle magazine, where I happened upon an article detailing 38-year-old Mike the Bike's heroic feat. I was captivated, the tale sowing the seed for my lifelong appreciation of Italian motorcycles, underdogs (which some might argue is redundant) and the TT.
This past summer, I got a taste of all three. It all started when the phone rang. My buddy Ben Welch called to inform me that he had finally met the woman of his dreams, and innocently inquired if I might be able to attend his wedding. In Europe.
Normally, I'd have said no. I mean, fly across the Atlantic just to throw rice at a cou ple of newlyweds? But when Ben elaborated that the wedding was going to be at the Isle of Man during TT Week, I knew I had to go.
Fortunately, as happens once every century or so, the planets aligned just right and two events conspired to ease my passage. First, Gary Schmidt from Ducati North America called to invite me on a press junket to World Ducati Weekend 2000 at Misano, Italy, which happened to fall at the end of TT Week. And second, Massimo Fiorentino from newly revived Benelli responded to an e-mail I’d sent him with a polite, “No, you can’t test-ride the new Tornado 900 just yet, but we would like you to be our guest at the Isle of Man for a special presentation.” Benelli was celebrating the 50th anniversary of factory rider Dario Ambrosini’s victory in the 1950 TT by giving the Tornado its first public flogging. Suddenly, I had two legitimate reasons to go to Europe. Call me the busman, baby, ’cause I’m on holiday!
Ben picked me up at the Manx airport on Saturday afternoon, and promptly noted that I’d arrived just in time for the Formula One TT. So we high-tailed it to Creg-Ny-Baa, where we got to see 48-year-young Joey Dunlop win the 24th TT of his 25-year career. By week’s end, he’d added another two victories to his record tally-sadly his last, because he was killed in a racing accident just three weeks later.
Most roadracing fans know Dunlop’s nickname was “Yer Maun,” but unless you’ve heard the words echoing over the Isle of Man’s rolling green hills, you can’t grasp their significance. You need to have been there, and heard the announcers call out, “Here he comes, ahead on the road now and on corrected time, YOUR MAN, JOEY DUNLOP!” The words sent a shiver down my spine. Shame they’ll never be heard again.
The Benelli festivities kicked off on Sunday morning with a rally at the southern tip of the Island in Castletown, where appropriately there is a large castle. But between rain, jet lag, hangovers and a spontaneous lap of the Billown Circuit (where the classic races were run earlier in the week), Ben and 1 didn’t get there ’til everything was winding down. So we embarked on a lap of the 37.73-mile Mountain Circuit, where I got a rider’s-eye view of the world’s most infamous roadrace course for the first time. Suffice it to say you’ve got to be pretty committed to race there. In the straitjacket sense of the word.
That sentiment was echoed the next day by none other than Kel Carruthers, the 1969 250cc World Champion for Benelli who’d won a pair of Lightweight TTs in his heyday. Carruthers and company prez Andrea Merloni on a pair of race-prepped Tornadoes were slated to lead a parade of 68 Benelli and Motobi (a related marque) motorcycles on Monday afternoon following the Lightweight TT.
Appropriately wearing the numbers 1 and 2, the immaculate green-and-silver 900s created quite a stir as their lightly muffled three-cylinder engines roared down Bray Hill toward Quarterbridge. A half-hour or so later, the pair returned from their lap of honor, and Merloni was obviously stoked. “Following Kei, I could tell he still knew his way around, exactly where to be on the road,” he said excitedly.
Carruthers just shook his head: “I can’t believe I used to race here.”
Wheedle as I might, I couldn’t snag even a brief ride on the new machine. As Press Manager Fiorentino put it, “Last year we showed the Tornado, this year we showed that it runs, next year we hope to enter production.”
See you next year, then.
As it turned out, I never did make jt to ßen ancj Ferah’s wedding. Manx law states that the bride and/or groom must have been on the Island for a minimum of 15 days before they can be married, which meant the ceremony could be held no sooner than Saturday, by which point I’d be at World Ducati Weekend.
So on Thursday morning, I bade the Welch family farewell and flew to Italy, scoring a seat next to an attractive Italian stewardess. When I told her I'd been at the TT, she chuckled and told me that Bologna is known as the city of three T’s, for towers, tortellini and, uh, breasts.
I knew right then it was going to be a fun trip.
Oddly enough, I felt much more at home in Italy than I had on the Isle of Man. Apart from the fact that the Italians speak Italian (I don’t miss a trick, do I?), theirs is a much more welcoming culture. The weather was sunny and warm, they drive on the right side of the road, the food and wine are fantastic and the women are among the most beautiful on earth. Seems you can’t take two steps without being run over by a miniskirt-clad supermodel on a scooter. The Isle of Man apparently got its name because the Isle of Woman is someplace else. In fact, the only thing I missed about the Island while I was in Italy was the beer. Not even the Italians drink Italian beer.
My itinerary for WDW seemed pretty straightforward. On Friday morning I’d meet the other members of the world’s motorcycling press at the Ducati factory in Bologna, where we'd pick up our designated bikes (in my case an ST4) and follow a police escort (on Ducati Monsters, how cool is that?) to the Autódromo Santamonica in Misano. We’d spend Friday afternoon and Saturday at the racetrack, and then on Sunday morning parade back to the factory.
But reality looked nothing like it had on paper. To start with, the procession out of town was a complete fustercluck, with the polizia repeatedly cutting and thrusting their way from the back of our group to the front in order to block traffic at the next intersection. And then everyone got separated at the autostrada tollbooth, which meant we had to find our own way to the racetrack. I latched onto the rear fender of a staffer from Italy’s Motociclismo magazine, and made it with no problems, as did my fellow Americans, who inexplicably latched onto my rear fender, figuring I knew which way to go!
No sooner had we arrived at the racetrack then I realized the magnitude of the event. It was huge! The line at the entrance was at least a quarter-mile long, with riders six or eight abreast, and more were expected over the weekend-the official tally was 23,000 attendees on 17,000 motorcycles. I’ve got to admit, sitting amid all those thundering VTwins with their rattling dry clutches and feeling the exhaust pulses rattle my faceshield was pretty dang cool.
Once inside the track, we entered Ducati Village, where there was a concert-sized stage, rows of food and beverage vendors, and numerous tents where members of the world’s various Ducati clubs could kick back and relax. And everywhere were flags flying the “Ducati” and “WDW2000” logos.
Anxious to get in some track time after my bikeless TT week, I made my way to the sign-up booth. And there I learned the horrible truth: Each attendee would get just one 15-minute session.
Tact prevents me from quoting my response here, other than to say I began by reciting the New York Alphabet: “Fuggin’A!”
In that one brief moment, my perception of World Ducati Weekend did an about-face. The various Ducati club events I’d been to in the past had all revolved around riding, whereas this one was something different. It was a celebration not of riding Ducatis so much as owning them, of being part of the “in” crowd. Between that and the numerous billet-laden, custom-painted Monsters on hand, the event reminded me-dare I say it?—of a Harley-Davidson Homecoming. Were Ducati’s new American owners purposely emulating The Motor Company? Were we witnessing the McDonald’s-ization of Ducati?
In many ways, it seems so: Ducati shops have become boutiques, there’s Ducati Insurance, Ducati Tours, a Ducati Fly/Buy/Ride program, Ducatis in the Sotheby’s and Neiman Marcus catalogs, I even saw a few Ducati tattoos!
But fortunately, amid all of that, there are still Ducati motorcycles. And scattered around the Misano paddock were enough red and yellow two-wheelers to fill a book (which, of course, the company is planning to produce). Italy’s Café Racer magazine hosted a stunning custom-bike show. The Amici Dello Scrambler club showcased a couple dozen ’60s Singles. A.C. Farias and Gary Rothwell performed breathtaking stunts on modified Monsters. And there were twice-daily practice sessions for the Ducati teams who would be participating in the World Superbike races seven days hence.
At the conclusion of one of these sessions, I sought out Ben Bostrom. This was at the depth of his crisis of confidence, yet he’d somehow managed to turn the quickest lap of the session, besting his replacement on the factory Infostrada team, Juan Borja, and new wonder-boy Troy Bayliss. How’d he do that?
“I don’t know,” he replied. “I did it on shit tires, too. I guess it’s just because there wasn’t any pressure. Sometimes the pressure gets to me.”
I grabbed him by the shoulders, shook him, and said, “Relax, bro...”
The next weekend he posted his best results of the season, and at the following round in Spain he twice put it on the box. Way to go, Ben!
All weekend long, the party was in full swing. Bands played, girls gyrated, beer flowed freely and the announcers babbled alternately in English and Italian, occasionally chatting with one of the many celebrities in attendance. Among those I spotted were Paul Smart, winner of the 1972 Imola 200 race that put Ducati V-Twins on the map; Marco Lucchinelli, former 500cc World Champion who did much of the development testing on the 851 ; Doug Polen, former World and U.S. Superbike Champion on a Fast By Ferracci Ducati, who was on hand to do commentary for Speedvision; Giancarlo Falappa, the wildman of World Superbike whose promising career was cut short by a head injury; and Franco Fame, the living legend who’d raced for Ducati in the 1950s and remained on the company’s payroll until this year, when he defected to Bimota’s World Superbike squad. Which probably means that he'll soon be back at Ducati.
On Saturday evening, each member of the various race teams was paraded up on stage. The crowd clapped politely for WSB winners Bayliss and Neil Hodgson, yelled louder for Bostrom and went absolutely bonkers for Carl Fogarty, as though they were witnessing a Beatles reunion. As Foggy himself put it, “I really can’t believe the response. All weekend long, wherever I’ve gone, I've been mobbed.”
But as vocal as the crowd was welcoming the reigning World Superbike Champion on stage, the biggest reaction was reserved for his response to The Big Question: Now that he’d recovered from his injuries, would he race again?
“Definitely,” he said. And the crowd went wild. Everything after that was academic.
On Sunday morning, I had the opportunity to see another new motorcycle run for the first time in public. The first three purchasers from the New Year’s Eve Internet sale of the limited-edition MH900e Hailwood Evoluzione were presented with their keys, and allowed to flaunt their new possessions on the racetrack. The bikes looked great, even if the charcoal canister on the American buyer’s machine did look like an afterthought. Probably because it was.
Then came time to parade en masse back to the factory. Watching the queue form the length and breadth of the start/finish straight, I decided to sit this one out. When the group finally left the racetrack, making their way at a snail's pace down the arrow-straight Via Emilia in a 10-mile-long motorcade, I saddled up my ST4 and took the long, twisty way back to Bologna over the Futa Pass.
I didn’t make it there in time for the closing ceremonies, which meant I didn’t get to see the great “Dr. T,” Ingegnere Fabio Taglioni, in person, or watch Polen and Falappa draw the winning raffle ticket for the official WDW Monster 600 Dark. But that’s just as well, because while all the other Ducatisti were celebrating in the factory’s parking lot, I was celebrating by doing the very thing that makes one a Ducat ist a in the first place.
Riding a Ducati.
