MasterBike 2010: Which is the Best Liter-Bike for the Average Rider?

I know Mark Cernicky, I have been on the track with Mark Cernicky, and you, sir, are (probably) no Mark Cernicky.

Cernicky was a top privateer in 600 and 750cc AMA national roadracing once upon a time and won a slew of supermoto championships after that. The two guys who went quicker than MC at MasterBike are professional racers and ringers, and the three next fastest riders behind him were no slouches, either. MasterBike being all about speed and swarthy Spanish bulls with big horns and all that, those "Fast Six" guys are what the results are based upon, and in a test of outright speed and performance, that's as it should be.

That leaves nine other riders who are also probably faster than most of us—but by a closing speed that would be less harrowing—and as a result, their times are probably more realistic and telling for those of us who don't race every month or get in 10 trackdays a year. The average "Fast Six" lap over all nine bikes was 2:04.86. The average "Slow Nine" lap was 2:11.72.

Some old speed truths always bob to the surface. One of them is: More horsepower only helps if you can use it. The Fast Six went, on average, 1.3 seconds faster around Moto Aragón on the BMW than on the next-fastest Aprilia, quite a gap considering all nine bikes finished within a 3.4-second window. Technically speaking, these guys were "giving it the whip in top cog." When you're a fast guy, the question is less, How fast can I go? than it is, How fast will the bike go?

Freddy Papunen, the fastest of all, says in his notes that the BMW has the best power and electronics, and the worst brakes of the bunch, but he set the fastest time of the test on it anyway, a 1:59.927. Then he went about 1.5 seconds slower on the Ducati, followed closely by the Kawasaki (harrumph, Freddy is sponsored by Kawasaki this year), the KTM, the Suzuki, the MV Agusta, the Honda and finally the Aprilia in eighth place—even though Papunen's notes say the RSV4 Factory has the best engine and chassis and was the most fun to ride (he didn't like its rear suspension). Except for the red-herring Aprilia, in fact, Papunen's lap time rankings read almost like a list of these bikes' power-to-weight ratios. Óscar Peña, another Fast Six guy, said the BMW had the worst handling of the bunch, but set his fast time on it anyway. Of the Fast Six, only Cernicky didn't go fastest on the BMW.

Meanwhile, our "Slow Nine" notes regarding the BMW say things like "needs experienced rider" and "worst suspension" and "unstable on the brakes" and the "rear tire is sliding on the brakes!" Nobody asked for their mommy, but you get the impression it was a near thing. When you're not quite so fast, speed is a product of not just how fast the bike is, but also how comfortable it makes you feel. On average, the Slow Nine went fastest on the Aprilia RSV4 Factory, and their notes read, "race-ready overall bike," "very easy handling," "best engine character and power," "very quick and small, holds a good line!" Three of the Slow Nine set their best times on the Aprilia, while two of the faster slow guys did their best on the BMW. Two more slugs went fastest on the MV Agusta—and the CBR and KTM were fastest under a couple of other backmarkers.

In the end, physics keep guys like Freddy Papunen and Cernicky from going faster. For most of us, though, it's a combination of physics and psychology, and for the majority of us, the Aprilia seems to still have legs. And massive kudos to MV Agusta, which has engineered a new bike with performance worthy of its snob appeal. The Yamaha YZF-R1, left for dead by the fast group, did better under the slower riders. And just to rub our noses in how irrelevant all of this is to anything, the R1's the reigning World Superbike champ. Just goes to show you.

But it looks like for those of us who are not gifted superbike racers, the Aprilia gets the nod as the most confidence-inspiring and fastest track bike. How some of these contenders fare on the street, well, we’ll just have to get a selection of these liter-bikes over here on U.S. soil to make the final judgment.