POLICE BIKE!
Thirty years ago in 1992, Ducati made it a hat-trick of World Superbike crowns for the Italian manufacturer, thanks to its reigning champion Doug Polen successfully defending his title on his Ducati 888 run by the Police-sponsored factory race team – oh, that’s the Italian sunglasses company, not the local Carabinieri!
“THE DUCATI’S MIDRANGE POWER DELIVERY WAS SO STRONG COMPARED TO THE HIGHER-REVVING FOUR-CYLINDER RIVALS.”
Ducati’s feat in wresting World Superbike supremacy away from the Japanese and Honda in 1990 was matched only by its achievement in retaining the title in 1991, courtesy of Texan newcomer Polen. Running a tight budget, Doug’s ex-pat Italian team owner/manager/tuner/race engineer Eraldo Ferracci, who’d been based in the USA for the past quarter century, teamed up with the dynamic duo of Ducati Euro-tuners Giorgio Nepoti and Rino Caracchi – better known collectively as the partners in NCR, both then and now a byword among ‘ducatisti’ the world over for desmodromic performance tuning. Together, they ran a shoestring but effective privateer operation which netted them the world title against the considerably better resources of Marco Lucchinelli's full-on factory race team, headed by defending champion Raymond Roche.
Polen’s first World title in 1991 was won with a display of dominance that neither Carl Fogarty nor Troy Bayliss ever achieved on a Ducati, winning 17 of the 24 races and scoring 10 pole positions in succession in the 12 rounds, including no fewer than six double victories and nine fastest laps in riding a customer 888 Corsa motorcycle on unfamiliar circuits, on just two of which the Texan had ever raced before. “This is the true spirit of Superbike racing,” declared Ducati’s then owner Claudio Castiglioni, “… where a customer’s bike can beat the factory machines. It’s also good for business – it shows that we at Ducati can sell you a bike you can win a World Championship with!” Still, it wasn’t surprising that Claudio made sure Doug Polen switched
