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THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE RXV CONTINUES ON THE SNOW
Everything continues as planned. The Aprilia RXVs, the exclusive enduro bi-cylinders, are following a rigorous development plan that is geared towards participation in the season’s most important races. Only seven days after the episode in the Sicilian mud, Team Aprilia was forced to confront the snow and ice of Ostersund where the first trials of the Enduro World Championships were held. On an unfamiliar terrain with which only the Nordic riders were familiar, the RXVs were forced to endure two days of torturous testing that not even the most severe testing could simulate. Temperatures between –10 and 1 degree Celsius, wind, snowstorms, a layer of ice, and huge ruts were all elements that Alessandro Botturi, Alex Zanni, and the two RXV 450’s and four-time 500’s were up against. Without the time to carry out the programmed updates due to the small window of time between the trips to Sicily and Sweden, the motorcycles made the transfer in their basic configuration and were able to pass the trials without too many difficulties. Therefore, Stefano Passeri’s evaluation, coordinator of the entire Team Aprilia enduro sector, could not be anything but positive. “A first important result at Ostersund confirmed the trustworthiness of our motorcycles. Notwithstanding the conditions that are understated as prohibitive, they didn’t have any problems and marched towards perfection on both days. We didn’t expect to encounter ideal conditions for our type of motorcycle and we were aware that the situation would be aggravated by the fact that we were putting forth technical aspects still in a development phase. Instead, everything went well in the best of ways especially if you consider that the Swedish ground didn’t do anything but confirm the direction in which we need to work to further evolve the RXV. We have clear ideas and know which details we need to intervene on in order to put to good use the data we obtained at the end of these two close and engaging road trips. A final positive aspect came from the classification, especially that of the second day. On Sunday, Botturi and Zanni finished as the top Italians in their respective categories. After the initial, determined approach owing to the fact that they were forced to ride on the frozen earth with spiked tyres, Alessandro Botturi and Alex Zanni began to take shape with sensible riding that was different than usual. The first to acquire a correct rhythm was Zanni (already 7th in the E3 class at the end of Saturday) while Botturi had to be content with 19th place in the E2 class. The race took on a different result than that of the previous day, confirmed by Zanni’s 9th place and Botturi’s 11th. On the Swedish Sunday, no Italian did better in their respective cylinders: the only riders ahead of them were really the Swedish specialists, decisively the most habituated to this type of climate.
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