Ducati Mutistrada 1200: now lustworthy and semi-affordable

No, that is not a misprint: Ducati has announced that the 2010 Multistrada 1200 will require major service intervals (valve clearance inspections) every 15,000 miles. Complex valve adjustment procedures, previously required at 7,500 miles and beyond the realm of most shade tree mechanics, often meant that riders of modest means shopped elsewhere.

The competition between sports cars and sport bikes is an old rivalry, one impossible to decide conclusively on either side.

However, like any good rivalry, scores can be settled on an individual basis, such as at the Ducs Fly South track day July 13th at the New Jersey Motorsports Park.

Three Ferrari Challenge cars will hit the track to determine the fastest driver. Immediately after, three riders from Ducati will hit the track to do the same, and the winner will face the Ferrari driver for a one-on-one faceoff for the title of “The Fastest Italian Exotic Lust Machine Middle Class Blokes Only With They Afford,” or TFIELMMCBOWTA for short.

While C’était un Rendez-Vous may be my favorite 8 minute French film, David Cronenberg’s The Italian Machine is my favorite 30 minute Canadian film. The center of the film’s attention: a 1976 Ducati 900 Desmo Super Sport.

The plot basics: Some Canadian bike enthusiasts find out that a bizarre local art collector has bought a Ducati 900 Super Sport with the intention of keeping it for display only, in his living room. Obviously, this upsets the enthusiasts, one of them almost to the point of frenzy. So they come up with a scheme to liberate the 900SS from it’s freak warden.

It’s short, awkward in some spots, and a little bit absurd as it shows motorcycle enthusiasts as some sort of hardcore cult, but it’s still a great flick if you’re into bikes. And here it is in it’s entirety: