OK, here be the pics and reportage from the launch, from a guinea pig's perspective. Over to you PBForum guinea pig!
Well, here I am in warm Cannes in the south of France, home of film festivals and just a stone's throw from Monaco. The flight over on easyjet to Nice airport was comfy - I had a row of three seats all to myself, which is plenty for a guinea pig of my size. In this pic I'm on the balcony terrace of the Miramar hotel. It's a 5-star jobbie and dead swanky. Was a bit windy on the railing though I did get a good view of the bikes on the seafront and the Mediterranean.
Kar was a bit worried I'd blow off never to be seen again so he's moved me down. Cheekily, he's found a couple of PB stickers and tagged the hotel. Way to go, PB fella! There's a Ducati flag in the background - the hotel was peppered with them and loads of Ducati branding. Pictures, signage, display bikes dotted all over the place... they've really gone to town and taken over the hotel.
Here I am on the bed of the swish apartment. There's a mini bar, widescreen TV, shower, bath, shitter, big terrace and a small lounge. A nice lady with a Ducati shirt gave Kar a bag. In it was a cool Ducati jacket! Apparently launch gifts are commonplace and Ducati are pretty good. Kar told me not to say but he reckons a good gift and a nice hotel is worth at least 20% extra on the score of a bike. He reckons that if we'd flown club class, the bike would get a proper rave review. He says bribery of this sort is commonplace! ( I said no such thing. KL)
This is the press conference room. There was loads of see-through chairs on there, and all the British and German journalists sat here for the briefing. All the Ducati bods were present and hey showed us a nice video of the bike in action on the road. It was like a coke advert, all full of beautiful people. A bit cheesy but people do buy into the lifestyle dream and Ducati brand. There was a nice Monster 1100 carpet laid down too, as well as Ducati coasters and pencils.
Kar put me down in the display cabinet for a while, next to some of the components that make up the Monster 1100. I got a good look at the fuel tank construction! The head of communications came in just as Kar was taking the photo, he just smiled. Kar looked a bit embarrassed, dunno why.
This is the route map for the rideout that we took. It was all mostly third gear corners - second was fun - with a whiff of clutch the front wheel was pawing the sky! Kar and the bloke from FastBikes mag got lost but they had fun finding their way back.
The meal was scrummy. It was mostly fish, but the red wine was very tasty. The dessert was all Ducati-branded up and Kar whipped me out for a quick photo when no-one was looking - or so he thought. I saw the communications man from Ducati looking again.
This lady was pretty and had a nice T-shirt that all the journalists kept looking at. Kar got her to pose for a picture with me. She couldn't stop kissing me, and it made me feel a bit funny down below. All the other journalists were jealous. She came down the next morning for breakfast and asked Kar where his rabbit was in front of Trevor Franklin from MCN. He looked quite puzzled. Doesn't she know I'm a guinea pig? Whatever, her T-shirt was very nicely lit.
This was in the underground car park at the hotel. There was at least 20 Ducati Monsters all lined up. We got to go on bike number one! It makes a nice sound when it starts up. Brumm, brumm, dakka, dakka, dakka. I think Kar's helmet is a bit big for me. I stayed in his Kriega bumbag for the whole ride.
We stopped off for a photo session here. Each bike and rider would follow really closely behind the camera car, where a photographer would sit in the boot and take pictures as we were moving. It's quite dangerous, but luckily there wasn't much traffic around. The guy with the Ducati jacket in the background who is talking to Trevor from MCN is the man who designed the Monster. He's staring at me, isn't he? He's probably jealous that I got a kiss from the pretty lady with the nice T-shirt earlier.
These two bikes were parked on the sea front around the back of the hotel. They were both the 1100S version, which had fancy Ohlins suspension but only costs a little bit more. Kar reckons this one is the one to get as he said the stock suspension was a bit shit.
This was taken at lunchtime at the sea front. We were all having lunch but the sun was nice so Kar went and sat me on a bike and smoked a fag. Just after the photo was taken Kar interviewed the designer man who has made all the Monsters for the last seven years. They stood talking for ten minutes while Kar made notes. Unfortunately I was sticking out of the bumbag so the Ducati man stared at me the whole time while I was strapped onto Kar's waist. Kar went a bit green afterwards when he found out. We caught a late night flight and I didn't get back to Peterborough until 1am in the morning! These swish launches are nice but I think I need to go somewhere else now.
No comments:
Post a Comment