Yamaha’s autonomous Motobot racing bike has attempted to beat Valentino Rossi’s time at Thunderhill Raceway Park, USA
With a targeted top speed of 124mph, the Motobot’s second development milestone is to beat Rossi’s time of 85.740sec around the two-mile circuit. Check out the video below.
The bike didn’t beat it, but Yamaha used the experiment as a learning process for the robot, which uses six actuators to gauge numerous factors including lean angle, altitude and speed. The robot itself rides a stock YZF-R1M, and manipulates the bars as a human would. Yamaha says that the technology has various real-world applications, and will “create new value for existing business and cultivate new business.”
There’s a good chance that factory Ducati team-mates Pecco Bagnaia and Enea Bastianini will fight each other for the 2023 MotoGP crown, so what are their strengths and weaknesses and will it get nasty?
The new Marc Márquez documentary tells us the story of his fightback from macabre surgery, painting a picture of a man who will keep coming back for more, whatever the odds
Comparing 2022 race times of all six manufacturers reveals just how ridiculously close their machines are in overall performance
MotoGP’s first pre-season tests at Sepang had every factory using ground-effect aerodynamics for the first time. But Ducati’s aero is still the best – good enough to put Luca Marini on top aboard a GP22