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Cascina Costa Beauties
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MV Agusta Racing Classics
Ray Thursby
10/01/2005
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David Gooley
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With the possible
exception
of the little delivery vehicles, these new machines quickly
found their way
onto racetracks. In the early days, there was a race
for just about anything on wheels—including scooters—and the various MV products
found their way
onto a variety of strange starting grids. Encouraged,
Agusta decided MV would
race.
The first purpose-built MV racer
appeared in 1950. It owed little, if
any, to the designs being
mass-produced for the public. While road-going MVs
were generally
powered by two-cycle powerplants, or four-cycle engines with
pushrod-operated valves—which would be the layout of choice for most MV
road
bikes in the future—the initial 125cc racer set the tone for
future competition
machines with valves operated by dual overhead
camshafts. MV’s factory racing
teams soon competed in virtually every
class of Grand Prix motorcycle racing,
and the Cascina Costa racing
department turned out 250, 350, and 500cc machines,
in addition to the
125s.
Results speak for themselves. Between 1952 and the
end of
the company’s factory-backed racing participation in 1974, MV Agustas and
their riders scored an incredible string of victories. Riders mounted
on MVs won
some 38 FIM championships in the various displacement
classes, while the bikes
themselves brought home 19 Manufacturer’s
Championship trophies. Much of the
credit for MV’s winning ways must be
given to Giacomo Agostini, the brilliant
rider whose movie-star looks
and flashing smile masked an almost supernatural
talent for racing.
Agostini personally accounted for 19 Rider’s Championships
while riding
for MV.
Agostini was not MV’s only brilliant rider. The roster
of legendary talents who raced for Agusta’s team is long. Count among
them:
Carlo Ubaldi, who began with the 98 scooters and progressed to
the 125 and 250cc
bikes; Leslie Graham, winner of the first FIM
Championship in 1949 on an AJS;
Nello Pagani, later manager of the MV
racing team; as well as John Surtees, Gary
Hocking, Mike Hailwood, John
Hartle, Phil Read, and others—some less known but
all supremely
talented.
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