Here are a few videos that caught our eyes this week.
First up, here’s a video of Andy Carlile’s 7m10s lap around the world-famous Nürburgring Nordschleife track. That’s an impressive time for the 20832m track, and Carlile claims it’s a record.
What makes it even better is that Carlile set the record on a salvage bike. He used a crashed, then resurrected, 2005 Yamaha R1 with carbon fibre wheels for the lap.The engine is stock; he spent his money on modifying the suspension setup and tweaking the brakes. He’s also managed to shave 11 kgs of weight off the bike by filing parts or drilling holes, or adding lighter aftermarket parts.
Carlile’s secret? Practice, practice, practice. He says he’s done thousands of laps at Nürburgring, and even walked the track, in quest of setting a better time.
And for a video with much less cornering and knee-dragging, check out this clip of stunt rider Chris Pfeiffer ripping around the beach on a sport bike. In the sand. You’ll note that he changes to a trials bike by the video’s end, though.
They said it couldn’t be done … and they were wrong. Lit Motors has been working on this self-balancing electric motorcycle for a while. It’s totally enclosed, is held upright by a gyroscope … why don’t you just watch this video from Gizmag and learn about it yourself?
Sometimes a commercial just nails it. This one from Honda sure does the job nicely.
Lit Motors, any connections to the company that made the Carver 3 wheel thing that Top Gear loved?
I’m unsure. I do know it has been in the making a while; I’ve seen several write-ups on it, but this is the first video of it actually working that I have seen.