Ducati’s Superleggera V4 is lighter than Scott Redding’s factory World Superbike and capable of more downforce than Jack Miller’s MotoGP machine. Oh, and you can ride it around to your mate’s house
The Superleggera is actually lighter than the WorldSBK bike and its huge bi-plane wings create more downforce than even Ducati’s current GP20 MotoGP machine. Yet, it has headlights and mirrors, and you can ride it to the shops. Despite its V4 Stradale motor revving to 16,500rpm, service intervals are at a perfectly normal 12,000km.
Two Mugello lap times tell the true story. Michele Pirro, a Moto2 race winner who finished seventh in MotoGP at Mugello in 2019, set a best lap in the Italian Superbike race of 1m50.3s on his race-prepared V4. Meanwhile, Alessandro Valia, the highly skilled Ducati test rider, on the same tyres as Pirro but aboard the Superleggera with a race kit, managed a 1m52.45s. There’s just two seconds in it, and it’s a really long lap. And the Superleggera was running standard gearing and gearbox, road-compound brake pads and so on. Simply by optimising the gearing for the Tuscany track, Valia would have shaved off another second.
So don’t be fooled into thinking this is ‘just’ a Panigale with a race pipe and big wings. Oh no; this is something else indeed.
For the inside word on Ducati’s remarkable Superleggera check out the latest issue, on sale now…
