motoGP vs. Superbike

[slapnpop]

For some reason the World superbike riders never seem to cut it when they move up to MotoGP and the best champions have usually come through from the 125 & 250 classes.

My personal belief is this has to do with the age at which 125 and 250 riders are brought into the program. The top tier talent shows at a young enough age that they are scooped up early. If you're not good enough to be in the 125 or 250 class by the time you're in WSB, you've missed the boat on the GP "fast track."

I think i get it now. MotoGp is like Formula 1 is for race cars, top of the game and designed purely for the track, and not in the states, and Superbike is like Nascar, even though it is called stock car, there is nothing on the car stock, even though say a gsxr1000 is being raced, it still has to be in production to the public. Kind of like when Honda made the rc51 a few years ago.

The superbikes are *much* closer to stock than a NASCAR. To wit, every superbike starts life as a crated production model. They are stripped down, motor rebuilt, suspension changed, etc, but there's still a production machine hiding in there somewhere. NASCAR (from what I've heard ) is race built from the ground up these days. There was a time long ago when it too, was indeed a modified production car.

The RC51 was a special case, starting as a race bike later brought to the street. I could be wrong, so someone please correct me:

Honda models that start with "cbr" are street going models initially. Models that start with "rc" are race models initially (rc51, rc211v, etc..)

 

[Randy]

The RC51 was a special case, starting as a race bike later brought to the street. I could be wrong, so someone please correct me:

The RC30 and RC45 were primarily built as race bikes but they made some street legal models so it could be homologated for street use. The RC51 was much more tame and affordable.

 

[Randy]

Thanks to everyone who put their two cents in. I recently got bitten by the motorcycle racing bug when my husband and I went to the AMA Superbike races at Road America in Elhart Lake, WI. However, it has been difficult to figure out what the differences between the classes are and the differences between the plethora of different racing types. If anyone has any more links for perusing regarding this subject I would appreciate it. Thanks!

Are you talking about the plethora or different racing types at an AMA event or the plethora of different racing types in the US? If you're talking about the plethora of different racing types in the US, after reading my post above, what additional information are you looking for?

Oh, just any good websites/resources that you would recommend to look at regarding the club racing mentioned above that would be a good place to start...

https://www.roadracingworld.com/resources/organizations/