Attending the emissions-free TTXGP

I just finished arranging a very last-minute trip to this year’s Isle of Man TT. A loaner Triumph Daytona 675 has been arranged, flights and ferries have been booked, and I’m pretty sure I landed the last available hotel room anywhere on the Isle (the TT is one event best prepared for in advance…).I’ve never been to the Isle before and while I’m certainly excited to see real-roads heroes like John McGuinness and Bruce Anstey blitz the narrow lanes at 200-plus in Friday’s premier senior TT, what I’m most stoked about is the TTXGP event earlier that day. In case you missed the preview story a few months ago (“Green Prix”, May 2009, p21), the TTXGP is the world’s first clean emissions, carbon-free motorcycle racing event.

Leaders in electric motorcycle technology - including Brammo, KillaCycle, Mission Motors, MotoCzysz and many more - will field purpose-built racing motorcycles to compete for one lap around the famed mountain course. Some accomplished TT racers, including Americans Mark Miller and Tom Montano, have been contracted to ride, and each is hungry to make a mark in the history books as the winner of the world’s first green GP. The machinery looks serious, and if you’ve viewed our exclusive video documenting preliminary testing of the Mission Motors prototype at Infineon Raceway, that machine in particular looks surprisingly fast. How the event will play out, however, is anyone’s guess. Bike builders are playing their cards close, and more than a few electric bike experts doubt that current-technology batteries can even carry enough juice to make it over the mountain and back at anything resembling a competitive speed. With this in mind, the inaugural TTXGP will either be the most important motorcycling event of the next century, or, if none of the bikes complete the lap, a complete debacle. Either way, it’s not to be missed, and we’re going to be there to share the event with you. I’ll be posting updates direct from the event here on this blog and, if all goes well, I’ll even have the opportunity to ride a few of these eMotos myself. Monitor this space for updates.