It’s 1:30 in the morning and I can’t sleep. It’s been a long week (actually weeks, but who’ really counting, right…) and as I lay in bed starring at the ceiling my initial reaction is that dosing off at 8 pm has royally screwed up my system. But then somewhere in the hazy reality of being semi-conscious, the annoyance of starring at the alarm clock for the umpteenth time and dealing with a dog who thinks its time to eat again, it begins to dawn on me that I’ve been here before.
The restlessness. The anticipation. The excitement. They’re not the evil trappings of a bad night, but the derivatives of a good one. In just seven hours I’ll head to Pro Italia and pick up the new Diva (or perhaps more appropriately the newest Diva). For all of my attempts to temper my emotions and the overwhelming sense of enthusiasm that builds during a bike purchase, it’s clear that I am now deep in the throws of a teenage kind of exuberance turned human condition. Who am I to try and stop it?
By now one would think I would understand the emotional outpouring that comes from a new bike. The hopes. The fears. The drain on the checking account. The crazy motolust inspired insanity of it all. After all this will be my fourth Ducati in less then three years and obviously I’ve done this dance before. Yet as the clock continues to move very slowly through the night I find myself feeling like a kid before Christmas once again. And again. And again. ( I mean who knew that March was the holiday season, right???)
With nothing better to do at this time of night and what feels like an almost interminable wait before me – seven hours never felt so long – a curiosity with the past begins to grow. A desire to go backwards to my other first days and nights with new Ducati sportbikes. I suppose that’s one of the greatest joys I find in writing a blog, it gives you a tangible way to relive or more appropriately re-read moments from your past that while important on some level, aren’t noteworthy enough to be lodged in the forefront of your mind at all times.
My initial reaction is as mixed as my mindset right now.
From the very beginning the blog and the brand have been intertwined. As the morning continues to thankfully move forward it occurs to me that I started Twisting Asphalt just a few months before purchasing my first Ducati, which was a darling of a 749. As I think back about that bike the word ‘nimble’ comes to mind. It’s one of those illogical emotions I suppose because when all is said and done the 749 and the 999 are almost identical platforms. ( I’m not a physics professor, but perhaps because it had less rotating mass? Or maybe because I feel compelled to remember the bike fondly…)
After the 749 (which was stolen, thus eliciting a whole other arena of emotions) came the ’04 999, a bike that lived hard and died fast. Like a bad ex-girlfriend who you know you shouldn’t date but still do, this was a bike that did some things amazingly well and yet at the same time did a lot of things that were utterly annoying. Like having the engine blow up. Twice.
Of course the ’04 9’s greatest attribute might have been that it lead to the ’05 999, a bike which right out of the box just got it right. With more horsepower, more torque, a better fairing, and a hell of a lot of great rides under its belt, this bike has been the foundation of dreams from day one. And thankfully its not going anywhere.
How and why we fall in love with certain mechanical objects and not others is one of the great mysteries of riding. Yet clearly the ’05 9 has been and continues to be a bike that I can’t help but think of fondly. It’s the bike on which I came of age. The bike that taught me to be an actual rider. And a motorcycle which thirty years from now I have a sneaky suspicion will still be one of the greatest bikes I will have ever owned.
And yet this morning while emotionally I love this bike, the reality is that logic dictates that the 1098S will be better in every way imaginable. It will be lighter, faster, more nimble, more responsive, and have loads more power. A simple look at the stat sheet makes all of this abundantly clear. And I guess that’s the ultimate draw. The ultimate attraction. The reason I can’t wait and can’t sleep. I know I love the last generation and now there’s a new one that’s ready to play.
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D-Man,
Something tells me that right about now you’re on the way to Glendale but I hope you take the vid so your readers can see your first date with the new diva and we can hear some good Ducati exhaust porn. We’ve all seen some new owner movies but they were done by amateurs that thought Ducatis look better sideways or didn’t know what the viewfinder was for. Congrats on the new rig–I think I’d be peeing my leathers!