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By now, even stones know that at last weekend's WDW the new Ducati Panigale V4 2025 was unveiled to the world. For those who want to bask in endless technical data, you can read HERE everything you need to know about Borgo Panigale's new SBK flagship. But what I want to tell you about in this article is more, because the new Panigale is not 'just' Ducati's new flagship sports bike, but much more.
This is the seventh generation of the V4, and we are at the point where any connection with the company's glorious past has been completely (or almost) severed. Of course, thoughts fly to that double-arm swingarm that drastically changes the aesthetic impact of the Panigale, the last bastion of a tradition that rested its roots on elements that have all, in turn, evaporated on the altar of performance. Think of the trellis frame, then the transition from twin-cylinder to V4, and finally this swingarm, which in one respect was the last link to the glorious lineage of the 916.
It was certainly a painful transition, but one that Ducati made because for the boys at Borgo Panigale, a new benchmark needed to be established, it was necessary to create simply the best sports bike in the world, and to do that it was necessary to accept whatever was necessary to achieve an ambitious goal. At the same time, however, the idea behind this Panigale was to create an easy motorcycle. It almost sounds like an oxymoron, because we are talking about a beast credited with 216 hp in the standard configuration. How can a motorcycle that puts such an abundance of horsepower on the plate be easy?
DUCATI PANIGALE V4 2025 - JARVIS ARRIVES
It needed to think differently, and we know that Ducati excels in this specialty. The mechanical balance can do so much, the proportions need to be right, the ergonomics need to be guessed at. But what really makes the difference today is the electronic management. Here is the point on which Ducati has really set a new benchmark. This point has been named DVO, or Ducati Vehicle Observer. What is it all about? You know Iron Man's Jarvis, the artificial intelligence that helps the good Tony Stark avoid dropping dead every two minutes?
Here, we are very close, because it is an algorithm that simulates the input of more than 70 sensors, arriving at an accuracy in the calculation of information that leads the system to be almost predictive. We are not yet in front of a real AI that manages the electronics of the motorcycle, but certainly this is a first and clear step in that direction. The system was, needless to say, developed in total connection with Ducati Corse, which continues to pour all its racing know-how into the development of production products .
We thought we'd get Alessandro Valia to tell us how this Panigale V4 was born, which among other goodies has a braking management system that really gets you to make the bike work exactly as MotoGP riders do. In fact, through the electronic management of cornering ABS, an integrated braking system has been developed that simulates the behavior of professional riders, making life easier for any rider riding the Panigale. How does it work? When braking, there is an instant when riders, just before they begin the phase of exiting the corner, pin hard on the rear to help the bike close the line. This is why handlebar grips abound on MotoGP bikes, allowing riders at any stage of riding to intervene on the rear brake.
The new Race eCBS system works just like that, intervening in place of the rider by applying the rear brake on corner exit to help the rider close the line. If this is not a kind of AI applied to the bike...the idea for this system came from the good Alessandro Valia himself, who in this video tells us so much about the work he did to show the world the Panigale V4 at WDW 2025. Now it's just a matter of waiting before we can test it....
Automatic Translation by DeepL
