MotoAmerica Communications

If you take a good look at both sides of the lower fairing on the Yamaha YZF-R1 Superbikes ridden by Monster Energy/Yamalube/Yamaha Factory Racing’s Cameron Beaubier and Garrett Gerloff, you’ll notice that the bikes have suddenly grown gills.

So, what is this Guillermo del Toro-ish innovation? Did the Yamaha Factory team’s 2018 Superbikes take on some of the characteristics of the amphibious creature imagined in del Toro’s Academy Award-winning motion picture?

The answer is not related to “The Shape of Water.” It is, more accurately, about the shape of oil.

“It’s a new safety feature,” said James Morse, MotoAmerica Technical Director. Instead of being “gills,” they are better described as baffles.

In MotoAmerica’s never-ending process of improving safety in the series, it was noticed that the design of the lower fairing on the pre-2018 R1 Superbike didn’t completely contain the oil that might leak from an expired engine on the Yamahas. The reason for the lack of containment actually had to do with the shape of, and the airflow through, the lower fairing.

Morse commented, “We worked with Yamaha, and they came up with the baffles, which help deflect the oil into the oil-containing belly pan on the bikes.”

All motorcycles that compete in the MotoAmerica series – in any of the race classes – are required to be equipped with belly pans that contain any oil that may leak from the engine. Oil that’s contained in the belly pan will not end up on the track, and obviously, oil on the track is not a good thing.

Rick Hobbs, Cameron Beaubier’s crew chief added, “It was the evolution of a few different designs. Heat management is very important on a Superbike, and we wanted to make sure that the baffles wouldn’t take too much heat out of, or add any heat to, the engine. The design we came up with satisfies MotoAmerica’s concerns without having any negative effect on the performance of our motorcycles.”

“It’s a win-win for both MotoAmerica and Yamaha,” said Morse.