The F5 Bivouac (rallye raid news) and W2RC - World cross country rally championship

:huh

Makes absolute sense, in light of her long (and successful) relationship with the HRC/Repsol/Montesa trials team. Hope it's true.

busy day in the rally news world all of a sudden
imagine if something about Cyril broke today too

Things are getting interesting. Thanks for all the intel.

Well said Cyborg, this stuff is gold.

:eek1

sam & bam bam.
young team now --> future greatness

Looking VERY interesting... to say the least! :eek1

Wow how things have changed..

Ktm with Lopez & Coma. Certainly the smart money is on these guys and this team. Add Kurt as a wilcard and big orange is looking very strong, yet again.

The relatively new HRC has a decent chance with Helder. Team dynamics and a bike that has yet to prove itself (to me anyways) seem to remain a challenge. Personally I say give Helder 2 bikes, a van and a small support crew that consists of his buddies and he would do better than being a spoke in corporate red wheel. Sam, Joan.....wildcards...who knows....both very promising. Certainly top ten, podium...not so sure, like I said they are wildcards.

Cyril. Yahamaha? According to all the rumors looks like Yamaha France will have a strong team. Mr consistent just became a wildcard in my opinion. Team dynamics, bikes reliability and performance....who knows.

Speed brain left with Quinn and Speedy. An outside chance of a podium, very doubtful though (my opinion).

A bunch more with a chance to crack top ten. Certainly a mix up this past 18 months. No sightings yet of ktm's new design?


7 more months to go

Indeed lots of potential but I doubt they stay with HRC for their careers (at least the odds are against this). But who knows...Internet speculation from an uninformed, badly educated and slightly drunk guy on the Internet doesn't mean much

I have a strong premonition that Cyril Despres is going to find out how Valentino Rossi felt at the Ducati.
Upside is that it will be entertaining to watch.

Big news, wow.
What's the current intel on Helder? During the Dakar we heard he might not have an HRC contract for the '14 Dakar.

A guy who was at the Cavalcata del Sole in Sardinia (not Manuel), told me yesterday that he heard Cyril talking about a "yellow" option too:huh! And there is a chance that also the "green" power can make something new fo the next Dakar?

Yellow Green Blue?? He must have some rainbow socks on!

All we need now is rumors of Christini in there!!

So rumors of pretty much every brand now...no mater what brand he ends up on it wont have the experience KTM had. The only one that would make some sort of sense would be the Speedbrain team. Fast proven bike that has shown itself to pull results along with a semi experienced team. He isnt in it for the long haul (my guess) just for a few more wins .....kinda makes Speedbrain make sense.

Who knows...I am still kinda in shock that he left KTM prior to signing a contract. Yellow, Green...heck even Blue......none of them seem to have a winning track record in recent years at the Dakar. I find it hard to imagine, even with Mr Despres obvious talent, that he could get one of those bikes across the finish line in first place.

I'd tend to agree - but don't forget that Helder put a WR 450 on the podium when Cyril and Marc were still on 690s... Now whether it was the bike or the rider/s that got first and second that year is a moot point, everyone is on 450s now - so all being equal, I don't think it is beyond the realms of possibility for Cyril to win outright on a WR too?

Jx

My guess is he would be on a yz ? Unless I am mistaken weren't Pain and the rest of the team riding them last year? On a side note I think the JVO kit is still the best looking bike in the race...slim and trim

You sign up Jenny?

It seems there have been a number of different development variations of the WR and YZ based bikes at JVO in the past couple of years, including I understand, a variant that fits the new 2012-on model WR450 - that is with the traditional engine layout that incorporates EFi, but in the new smaller YZ derived frame... so perhaps all this development will ultimately lead to one definitive Yamaha team bike?

I tend to agree with your assumption, since there is no doubt that the current reverse cylinder YZ engine has the potential to make significantly more power than the older architecture engine (and is therefore likely to be the basis of any elite-team effort), I'm just not sure Cyril will like having to revert to kick-start only after all those years on E-start only bikes?!

Jx

That said, it is also interesting to see that no other manufacturer is going down the reverse cylinder route, and one might argue that KTM particularly are producing plenty of [the most?] power from their conventional architecture 450cc rally engine...

As with the Genesis 5-valve head design, perhaps Yamaha will ultimately drop that idea too?

At least they never pivoted the rear suspension around the countershaft sprocket, or had a clutch that ran backwards at twice the speed on the end of the crankshaft!

Jx