The Aprilia RSV4 is a

super bike A sports motorcycle, sports bike, or sport bike is a motorcycle designed and optimized for speed, acceleration, braking, and cornering on asphalt concrete race tracks and roads. They are mainly designed for performance at the expense of comfo ...

manufactured by

Aprilia Aprilia is an Italian motorcycle and Scooter (motorcycle), scooter manufacturer in Noale, Italy, founded by Alberto Beggio. History Early days Aprilia, named after the Pre-war automobile, pre-war Lancia Aprilia, was founded after the Seco ...

. 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. Since 2021 the bike is offered in two models, too: RSV4 1100 and RSV4 1100 Factory. Now it offers APRC system (Aprilia Performance Ride Control) that includes engine maps (AEM), engine brake control (AEB), traction control (ATC), wheelie control (AWC), launch control (ALC), cruise control (ACC), speed limiter (APT). 6 riding modes (3 Road, 3 Track) and is Euro 5 compliant. The RSV4 1100 Factory is differentiated by Smart EC 2.0 electronically managed Öhlins NIX front fork, Öhlins TTX monoshock with Smart EC 2.0 electronically managed piggy-back rear shock and aluminum alloy forged, completely machined, 5-spoke wheels. Production of the motorcycle began in 2008. The motorcycle was unveiled on 22 February 2008, at the International Piaggio Group Convention in

Milan Milan ( , , ; ) is a city in northern Italy, regional capital of Lombardy, the largest city in Italy by urban area and the List of cities in Italy, second-most-populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of nea ...

, 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, ...

and that the engine will produce over in race configuration. Since 2021 the engine's displacement has been increased to 1,077 cc, maximum power increased to at 13,200 rpm and maximum torque to 92.19 ft-lbs (125 Nm) at 10,500 rpm. 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 a ...

Racing

2009 2009 was designated as the International Year of Astronomy by the United Nations to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Galileo Galilei's first known astronomical studies with a telescope and the publication of Astronomia Nova by Joha ...

, 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 racing, Grand Prix motorcycle road racer who achieved six World Championships. With four 250 cc road race titles and two in Superbike Wor ...

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

Brno Circuit The Masaryk circuit () 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 measured . The track i ...

. 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 ...

ended the season in 14th place. Biaggi won the championship in

2010 The year saw a multitude of natural and environmental disasters such as the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and the 2010 Chile earthquake. The 2009 swine flu pandemic, swine flu pandemic which began the previous year ...

, 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 2012 was designated as: *International Year of Cooperatives *International Year of Sustainable Energy for All Events January *January 4 – The Cicada 3301 internet hunt begins. * January 12 – Peaceful protests begin in the R ...

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 Jean-Baptiste Guintoli (born 24 June 1982) is a French professional motorcycle racer and race analyst for television. He was Superbike World Championship, FIM World Superbike Champion in 2014 Superbike World Championship, 2014. Until the ...

won the

2014 Superbike World Championship season The 2014 Superbike World Championship was the twenty-seventh season of the Superbike World Championship. The season saw the revision of the Superpole format: riders placed from eleventh to twentieth position in the combined classification of the ...

riding an RSV4 for the factory Aprilia racing team.

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

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 ...

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 or DMoz (stylized dmoz in its logo; from ''directory.mozilla.org'', an earlier domain name) 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 P ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Aprilia Rsv4 RSV4 Motorcycles introduced in 2009 Sport bikes Motorcycles powered by V engines