Ducati to auction off a pair of family heirlooms

Racing bikes sometimes come up for auction, but they usually belong to former racers or very private collectors, so to see a manufacturer like Ducati auctioning off two of their grand prix machines, the Ducati Desmosedici GP10 that Casey Stoner rode and the first version of the GP11 that Valentino Rossi rode last season, seems pretty strange as the bikes are extremely recent, but evidently that’s the way the world turns these days.

The two machines will go under the hammer at the Grimaldi Forum on May 11th by RM Auction House and the sale has some special clauses like a confidentiality agreement and you have to be close to the Ducati family – whatever that means and we sort of wonder what Ducati’s museum curator Livio Lodi thinks about all this.
Here’s the blurb describing the two GP bikes:Built in the Ducati factory in Borgo Panigale, Bologna 7-11 December 2009, Casey Stoner’s Ducati Desmosedici GP10 “CS1” was first started for bench testing on 14 December 2009 before being track tested by the Australian rider in Sepang, Malaysia in February 2010.

Stoner first competed with CS1 in Qatar in April 2010 and raced it to victory in the Australian GP at Phillip Island in October 2010.
The machine took pole positions in Qatar, Phillip Island and Valencia and powered the Australian to podium positions in Valencia, Assen and Catalunya.
Its final Grand Prix was in Valencia, November 2010 having logged a total of 4,232km.
Valentino Rossi’s Ducati Desmosedici GP11 “VR2” was built at the Ducati factory 6-10 December 2010 and was first started for bench testing two days later.
VR2’s first track test for Rossi was carried out in the February 2011 Sepang tests and first competed in the Qatar Grand Prix the following month.
It recorded a podium position at Le Mans, France in May 2011 and competed in its last race at the Dutch TT in Assen, having logged a total of 2,342km.
“The release of two very special machines like these is an extremely rare occasion for us, so the lucky buyer must not only enter into a confidentiality agreement, but also become a close member of the ‘Ducati family’!” said Ducati Corse General and Technical Director, Filippo Preziosi.
“The Desmosedici GP10 and GP11 were two very interesting bikes in our GP project history and therefore will represent exciting opportunities for serious collectors.
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