March 7 through 9 at Daytona International Speedway will be quite the spectacle. Not only is it the 82nd running of the Daytona 200 and the opening round of the 2024 Mission King Of The Baggers Championship, but it’s also round one of two more of MotoAmerica’s super-popular and uber-eclectic class championships. The two-cylinder middleweight maulers in the BellissiMoto Twins Cup Championship and the high-bar heroes of the Mission Super Hooligan National Championship will also be in action on the high banks at “The World Center of Racing.”
BellissiMoto Twins Cup Championship
With its new title sponsor, BellissiMoto, MotoAmerica’s Twins Cup Championship kicks off its season with two races around the 3.51-mile, 12-turn Daytona road course.
What started out as a way to put club-racing motorcycle road racers into the MotoAmerica spotlight has grown into a championship that perfectly coincides with the motorcycle industry’s trend towards producing middleweight, twin-cylinder sportbikes for the mutual enjoyment of both new and already-seasoned streetbike and trackday riders.
After Aprilia launched its RS 660 that garnered immediate success in MotoAmerica Twins Cup competition, Yamaha transformed its MT-07 into a much-racier YZF-R7, the bike on which Blake Davis won the 2023 Twins Cup title. And then, Suzuki, whose venerable SV650 deserves full credit as the motorcycle that started the middleweight twin-cylinder road racing craze, launched the GSX-8S last year and the even-more-racetrack-committed GSX-8R this year. The new ‘Zook two-banger will make its road racing debut in Twins Cup at Daytona with none other than Team Hammer fielding Rossi Moor and Vance & Hines backing Rocco Landers aboard the new machines.
About the aforementioned Aprilia, Rodio Racing is back for 2024, and they’ll once again be powered by Robem Engineering with odds-on-favorite-to-win-the-championship Gus Rodio teamed up with Italian-by-way-of-Kentucky rider Alessandro Di Mario and wild-card New Hampshirite Ben Gloddy returning to the team for Daytona at least (and maybe more?). And, speaking of Italy, new team TopPro Racing has brought in Romeo Chiavini to pilot an Aprilia. Those four will be joined by eight more Ape-riders ready to go “660” on the field of 25.
Along with Davis in the Yamaha R7 camp are former class champion Kaleb DeKeyrel, South African Dominic Doyle and his Giaccmoto Racing Yamaha teammate Sonya Lloyd who raced in last year’s Royal Enfield Build. Train. Race. program, and British-racer-living-in-Canada Jack Roach returns to MotoAmerica after a hiatus of a couple of years.
Check out the complete entry list below.
Mission Super Hooligan National Championship
There is a whole lot of Super Hooliganism going on in MotoAmerica these days. Sprung from the fertile mind of Roland Sands, the Mission Super Hooligan National Championship is a delicious mélange of motorcycles of practically every description. In fact, the race class boasts the largest number of motorcycle brands in all of MotoAmerica. Twelve, count ’em, twelve different OEMs are represented in Super Hooligan, and making its debut at Daytona is the Yamaha MT-09 SP, a three-cylinder motorcycle that will be piloted by (there’s that number again) three different riders, including Italian-born, Switzerland-residing FIM Endurance World Championship-winning rider Niccolò Canepa.
Defending class champion Tyler O’Hara is back aboard his S&S/Indian FTR1200, Andy DiBrino returns aboard his Competition Werkes/Gray Area/KTM 890 DUKE R, and Stefano Mesa will once again be buzzing the tower aboard his Tytlers Cycle Energica Eva Ribelle RS electric bike. Plus, there are seven Harley-Davidson Pan Americas, a couple of BMW R nineTs, two Ducatis, a pair of Suzuki SV1000s, an Aprilia Tuono, a Buell XB12XT, and even a Victory Vegas in the mix.
Check out the entry list of 35 riders below.
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