The Aprilia RSV4 is a super bike manufactured by Aprilia. The RSV4 is Aprilia's flagship model. Aprilia offers two models of the bike: the RSV4 Factory and RSV4 R limited edition (only 350). For 2016 it is offered in two models the RSV4 RR and RSV4 RF. The 2016 updated bike was made to take advantage of and comply with that year's Superbike rules which allow fewer modifications for production bikes. It has more power, is lighter, and has improved handling and electronics. Production of the motorcycle began in 2008. The motorcycle was unveiled on 22 February 2008, at the International Piaggio Group Convention in

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...

, Italy. It is powered by a 65-degree V-4 engine, the company's first production four-cylinder engine. Aprilia claims that the new engine was designed specifically for

superbike racing Superbike racing is a category of motorcycle racing that employs highly modified production motorcycles, as opposed to MotoGP in which purpose-built motorcycles are used. The Superbike World Championship is the official world championship series, t ...

and that the engine will produce over in race configuration. Aprilia launched the bike to race in the

2009 Superbike World Championship season The 2009 Superbike World Championship was the twenty-second season of the Superbike World Championship. It was the second season in which HANNspree had been the title sponsor of the championship. The South African round returned on 15–17 May ...

Racing

In 2009, its first full season of World Superbike racing,

Max Biaggi Massimiliano "Max" Biaggi (; born 26 June 1971) is an Italian former professional Grand Prix motorcycle road racer who achieved six World Championships. With four 250 cc road race titles and two in World Superbikes, he is one of only two ri ...

aboard the RSV4 reached the podium nine times, and won one race at the

Brno Circuit The Masaryk circuit ( cz, Masarykův okruh) or Masarykring, also referred to as the Brno Circuit, refers to two motorsport race tracks located in Brno, Czech Republic. The original street circuit was made up of public roads, and at its longest m ...

. Aprilia factory teammate

Shinya Nakano is a retired Japanese Grand Prix motorcycle road racer and Superbike rider. He is not related to the former Formula One racer Shinji Nakano. Career Early career Nakano was All-Japan 250cc champion in 1998, the highlight of a long career in b ...

ended the season in 14th place. Biaggi won the championship in 2010, and was contracted to race the bike for another two seasons, citing his positive experience with the team and development of the bike into a successful racer and, despite his age, wanting to continue with the momentum they had built up. Max Biaggi ended his career winning the

2012 File:2012 Events Collage V3.png, From left, clockwise: The passenger cruise ship Costa Concordia lies capsized after the Costa Concordia disaster; Damage to Casino Pier in Seaside Heights, New Jersey as a result of Hurricane Sandy; People gat ...

title with the RSV4. The Aprilia RSV4 is available as a customer-specified race bike from the factory as a Max Biaggi replica.

Sylvain Guintoli Sylvain Guintoli (born 24 June 1982 in Montélimar) is a French professional motorcycle racer. He was FIM World Superbike Champion in 2014. He is contracted to the Suzuki MotoGP team as a test rider with occasional race entries, as a wild card ...

won the 2014 Superbike World Championship season riding an RSV4 for the factory Aprilia racing team.

Lorenzo Savadori Lorenzo Savadori (born 4 April 1993) is a motorcycle racer from Italy, He was the 2015 FIM Superstock 1000 Cup winner and thItalia 2020 CIV Superbike Champion acting as test rider for Aprilia with occasional wild card race entries. For the 2021 ...

won the 2015 FIM Superstock 1000 Cup season. A bike based on the RSV4 was used by

Aspar Team Aspar Team (formerly Ángel Nieto Team) is a Grand Prix motorcycle racing team from Spain, competing in the Moto2, Moto3 and MotoE World Championships. History The team was created by former world champion Jorge Martínez in 1992, when he was s ...

and Paul Bird Motorsports, coming 4th in both the

and 2013 Grand Prix motorcycle racing seasons.

References

External links

*
RSV4 website

Aprilia RSV
at the

Open Directory Project DMOZ (from ''directory.mozilla.org'', an earlier domain name, stylized in lowercase in its logo) was a multilingual open-content directory of World Wide Web links. The site and community who maintained it were also known as the Open Directory ...

RSV4 Motorcycles introduced in 2009 Sport bikes {{motorcycle-stub