Patina. Ducati's start out new and shiny but how they weather as time goes by results in that special look referred to as patina.  This is what it looks like when it's left alone, classic old water transfer decals wizend with time and cracked like the face of a sun browned old Italian farmer.  As seen on the fairing of a 900 Darmah SuperSport this weekend at the Dania Vintage Motorcycle Show.

This is the first of a series of interesting photos of things seen in my travels.  Ducati People, Ducati motorcycles, anything that catches the eye as style setting,  unusual or uniquely Italian as it relates to Ducati Motorcycles. I took this photo at Miller Motorsports Park a couple of years ago on one of those bright blue sky days that Salt Lake City specializes in.  It’s still among my favorite Ducati Monster photos.  

Ciao for now…….
Vicki

Vindicate. Webster’s dictionary says the definition is “to lay claim to, avenge”. I doubt anybody has more right to own that word today than Larry Pegram. Yesterday afternoon, after a weekend of crazy weather at Road America Larry dug deep and got it all right and did what nobody expected, but many people hoped - he raced Matt Mladin heads up, lap after lap and in the end took the American Superbike win on the Foremost Insurance/Pegram Racing Ducati 1098R by 300th’s of a second. For American Ducatisti, that might as well have been a mile. For us, this win is huge. Sure, Ducati’s win races all the time. They dominate series, grab headlines and glory on a regular basis but not here, not in this series. In the American Championship series, Matt Mladin and Ben Spies have dominated the landscape for years. Matt Mladin is the AMA Pro American Superbike All-Time Win leader with 72 victories as well as the class All-Time Pole Win leader with 55. He’s been champion 6 times and he rarely gets well and truly raced and comes out the loser. Matt Mladin, like him or not, is a winner. And that’s what makes this so sweet. There is no “asterisk”, no excuses, no off road excursion or big mistake that gifted the win. Larry raced lap after lap and in the end, he crossed the line first. If anything, the * should be on Larry’s win and the fine print should say “In spite of the rules, in spite of the budget, because of his persistence, and the people who believed in him, and his refusal to listen to anybody tell him it would take a chink in Mladin’s armour or different rules, Larry Pegram won this race”

Congratulations Larry.

They teach children in school the days of the months, the hours on the clock and the four seasons of the year. Then, some of us grow up and thow that all away. For most of my life there have been only two seasons, the one during which racing goes on, and the one during which it doesn’t. Maybe the most famous quote about racing is Steve McQueen’s “Racing is life, everything before and after is just waiting” and that’s what many of us do, struggling through stick and ball sports all winter, reading anything we can find on the off season drama in order to shorten the string until somebody starts waving colorful flags in front of revving motors.

Ducati owners are a lot more likely to love racing than many of the other marques because it’s always been in the epicenter of the soul of the machine. Both in how Ducati used racing to make it’s mark in the world, raising the name Ducati out of the heap of small machines being built in and around Bologna in the 1950’s with speed records and race victory’s as well as in how it has always taken the information gained racing and handed it to the public like precious gems, normally fit only for royalty but at Ducati, available to those willing to make the sacrifices needed. From the Ducati F3 and TT 1 and 2 to the modern Desmosedici RR and 1098R, what you got was truly a factory racer with a string so short to the one that Troy or Nori or (insert Iconic name here) was riding that in many ways the bikes were literally the same as the one on the track. Ducati, more than any other manufacturer has a long history of rewarding our loyalty with access to machines fit for the Gods.

Right now, even in this crazy time, it might be the best time in history to be a Ducatisti. We stand in a place where we can still shake the hands of many of the men who gave these bikes the direction and DNA that they enjoy today, men like Franco Farne and Rino Caracchi, Paul Smart and Bruno Spaggiari, Phil Schilling and Cook Neilson, living legends every one. At the same time we enjoy the brilliance and foresight of the men who helm the company (and unlike any other company to my knowledge) the race team as well, men like Claudio Domenicali and Filippo Preziosi. Ducati is a company that truly makes machines designed by men, even in the time of computerized modern design at the end of the day these men are who make the machines great.

Many of the changes I have implemented (and will implement) to the Ducati.net website will be designed so that the members of the Ducati.net family will have a deeper understanding of the history as well as the forward direction of the machines. In a time where every other website is a specialist in one model or one style of ownership, I believe that we can do better at both honoring these men’s life work as well as our knowledge of the machines going forward and meet other like minded people in the process. Like I said, it’s a great time to be a Ducatisti and Ducati.net is going to be part of that.