DECEMBER 2022

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Looking Forward to a Bright Future

The year 2022 has literally flown by and I am already writing the editorial for the month of December. We started the year with a lot of uncertainty because COVID-19 was threatening to make a comeback of sorts. Today, however, there is greater clarity as the pandemic is behind us and now we may look forward to planning for the future.

It has been a wait of 15 long years for Ducati to win the MotoGP world championship after Casey Stoner who won the crown for them in 2007. This year Francesco Bagnaia won the MotoGP crown and Ducati the manufacturers’ championship. To add to their success in MotoGP, Ducati also won the World Superbike Championship thanks to Alvaro Bautista. Incidentally, that makes Ducati one of the few manufacturers to win both the MotoGP and the World Superbike crowns in the same year.

It is great to see Indian manufacturers getting into motor sport. At one time, it was only TVS who were supporting motor sport and now they have taken their involvement to another level by upgrading the RR310 race series to Asian-level championship. The racing experience has helped TVS make better road bikes and, seeing this, other Indian manufacturers are getting into motor sport.

Hero MotoCorp started at the top by entering the Dakar Rally and now they have begun organising events in the country.

The latest entrant into motor sport is Royal Enfield. They started with a land speed event at the Bonneville Salt Flats and moved on to flat track racing in the United States. Last year was the first time we had the Royal Enfield Continental GT Cup in India and it was a great success. Now Royal Enfield want to take the game to the next level with the flat track slide school and track schools for the GT Cup.