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Michael Dunlop Rides the New Yamaha YZF-R1 in the Isle of Man TT 2015 and Other Races

Multiple TT winner Michael Dunlop has inked a deal with Yamaha and will dress the Milwaukee Yamaha Team livery for the 2015 edition of the Isle of Man Tourist Trophy. The team is officially supported by the house of Iwata, so we’re talking about one of Joey Dunlop’s nephews checking yet another manufacturer on his list.
Michael Dunlop on the IOM TT podium, 2014 3 photos
Photo: Michael Dunlop
Michael Dunlop inks a deal with Miwaukee YamahaMichael Dunlop
Michael Dunlop will ride the 2015 model year Yamaha YZF-R1 in the RST Superbike and the PokerStars Senior TT races at the Snaefell mountain, but he will also be present in the North West 200 and the Ulster Grand Prix this year. It is not the first time when Michael Dunlop rides Yamaha machinery, but this time it will be different, because the R1 is all-new.

Yamaha looking like preparing an offensive

If anything, Yamaha seems very eager to put its new R1 to the test and have it racing with the rest of the liter-class machines. We saw it receiving a racing trim for the MotoAmerica series and now getting ready for the major road racing events in Europe… and it would not surprise us at all to see a factory team in the World Endurance Championships as well.

Michael is THE man of last year’s TT event, having won the Joey Dunlop Trophy with BMW Motorrad after Honda failed to offer him a new contract he would find suitable. Anyway, despite the massive success aboard the S1000RR bike, BMW and Dunlop parted ways, with the German bike manufacturer inking deal with TAS Racing and their own star Guy Martin.

Milwaukee Yamaha has been using the old R1 platform and has been limited by the bike’s own limits, but this is about to change, as the all-new YZF beast was completely redesigned for 2015 and is a much more promising ride. Dunlop already has 11 TT victories, and this puts him 8th on the outright winners’ list.

“I’ve gone on record as saying that I’ll only race if the package is right and in the Milwaukee Yamaha team I’m confident in both the bike and the support team that will be in place. We’ve already had a look at the bike that I’ll be riding and the early indications are really good but I’m looking forward just to getting out on the track and testing it properly,” Michael Dunlop says.

We still have a lot to wait until the 2015 Isle of Man TT, whose racing week will start on June 6 and will last until June 12. While you wait, make sure you check our 2015 Yamaha YZF-R1 live photos from EICMA 2014.
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