MotoTrainer offers motorcycling fans their own simulation equipment

Yes racing got a huge increase in popularity over the past year, particularly at the beginning of the pandemic, where all physical motor sports stopped. Unfortunately, almost all of this fun was restricted to four-wheel racing. Recreating the experience for us motorcycle enthusiasts would be a little more difficult.

Much more difficult? Well, so difficult that it is only now, with the MotoTrainer announcement on Thursday, that we are really at the stadium. Unfortunately, as you can see in the launch video, it’s not exactly the kind of game solution that you tie to your desk, as you use a real motorcycle as a peripheral.

MotoTrainer was developed in partnership with Dorna – also known as the company that owns MotoGP – and works with the MotoGP game or riders can follow a lap on any of the MotoGP circuits. Unfortunately, there is currently no hardcore motorcycle racing simulation in the vein of iRacing available to the public, so don’t expect the same experience.

“The software behind the Moto Trainer, developed by our engineers, is capable of playing any video on board and allows riders to save their efforts on a telemetry master track,” said Andrea Lombardi, MotoTrainer CEO, in a statement. “This means that you can load any circuit and bike you want, with the riders replicating the video for reference telemetry. The software then analyzes the rider’s performance by monitoring the accelerator, front and rear brakes, the gearbox and the trajectories. “

Now, all of this is incredibly cool, but you’re probably wondering how much it will cost, assuming you have a spare motorcycle and the space needed to mount one. Well, less than you might think, in fact, and significantly less than a full-motion auto racing simulator, but still a lot. MotoTrainer starts at around $ 6,000 and goes up if you want things like strength feedback. The fully modified version will cost around $ 18,130, including a PC.

So, knowing all this, who would buy this thing? Well, maybe you are a motorcycle fanatic who can’t get to a race track with a bicycle, or possibly you are someone who is recovering from a previous injury. Maybe you have a company like Base51 (which is owned by Sim rig manufacturer CXC simulations) and want to offer two-wheeled fun to its customers.

Currently, there doesn’t seem to be any of those open to the public in the United States, but we are keeping our fingers crossed so that, depending on the pandemic, I hope it will end, that will change.