For 30 years Fabio Taglioni was the Technical Director of Ducati, its Direttore Tecnico, and was responsible for all manner of engine designs ranging from single-cylinder lightweights to a massive V-four and especially the bevel drive 90-degree V-twins…

For the whole of his career, Taglioni held the racetrack to be the finest proving ground available for the development of successive families of Ducati models, as well as the demonstration of their worth. His bevel-drive V-twin models of the 1970s are proof positive of that reasoning. They were the mainstay of the Ducati range for the whole of that decade, and scored many memorable race successes, such as Paul Smart’s and Bruno Spaggiari’s dominant 1-2 victory in the prestigious 1972 Imola 200, and the now legendary Isle of Man TT comeback victory by the late, great Mike Hailwood in 1978. Personal recollections of their Ducati successes by both Hailwood and Smart provide chapters of this wide-ranging book.

Alan Cathcart has been and still is the owner and racer of several of those classic Desmo V-twins. He is also the author of several best-selling books on Ducati motorcycles, including the first-ever history of the marque in the English language, published in 1983. As such he became a personal friend and confidant of Ing. Taglioni over many years, so no-one is better qualified to pen the history of the greatest name in motorcycle design.

Fabio Taglioni – Designer of Ducati Legends is a 232-page book with 200+ photographs, most of which are in full colour. They range from historic factory archive material to modern digital photography commissioned especially for this title.

Ducati’s history and Taglioni’s personal story are covered in-depth along with detailed information on his most famous machines. The story starts in immediate post-WW2 Italy, and the company’s entry into the motorcycle market with an engine designed to clip on to a bicycle, and provide transportation for the public in a country with an economy struggling to recover from its wartime devastation.

From there it moved into proper motorcycles and by the mid-1950s was just one of many manufacturers of lightweight machines. Then along came Fabio Taglioni. In May 1954, he joined the company and within a year transformed its fortunes with his ground-breaking ‘Marianna’ Gran Sport 100 design. Its little 98cc single-cylinder engine was technically far ahead of its rivals, featuring overhead-camshaft valve operation driven from the crankshaft by a shaft and bevel gears. This was a configuration seen mainly on 350cc and 500cc racing machines of that era, and was previously unheard of in such a small engine as the Gran Sport 100. It immediately struck a chord with the racing-mad Italian public and, when it and its Gran Sport 125 bigger brother began winning long distance road races, and even excelled in Grand Prix competition via desmo derivatives, sales success soon followed.

Taglioni’s genius had set Ducati on the path to the pre-eminence that Ducati enjoys in the world of Italian motorcycle production today, for these little GS ultra-lightweights were only the first steps on the journey. Their basic design parameters went on to be used in future successful single-cylinder motorcycles ranging from 250 to 450cc and even in the famous V-twins of the 1970s.

In the early 1980s, some 25 years after his first single-cylinder machines and a full decade after the initial appearance of his 90-degree V-twins, Taglioni updated and future-proofed the V-twins by changing the overhead-camshaft valve operation to a belt-driven system. First seen on the Pantah models, this took Ducati into the 21st century, and that basic architecture is still used on today’s twins.

All of Taglioni’s seminal designs are featured in-depth in this book: single-cylinder, parallel twins, V-twins and even a pair of experimental four-cylinder prototypes – the giant Apollo V-four of 1964, and the Bi-Pantah, his final such design which never made it into production.

Alan Cathcart was fortunate to enjoy unparalleled access to the Ducati factory, and to Ing. Fabio Taglioni on a personal basis, during the last decade of his tenure as Ducati Meccanica’s Direttore Tecnico. That is what makes this book so special.

Fabio Taglioni – Designer of Ducati Legends is available worldwide exclusively from Amazon priced at $54.40 AUD including delivery. An e-book version is also available costing £8.95 in the UK, and the appropriate local currency equivalent elsewhere.

Click here to order your copy from amazon.com.au

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Read the Introduction to the book and sample chapters here…

Many of the great characters profiled in the book have left us, leaving their amazing stories of life and times on the famed Continental Circus. Tales of derring-do and occasional bastardry by dodgy promoters. Venues as diverse as the Isle of Man and long public-road circuits behind the Iron Curtain. For more info or to order, visit circuslifebook.com

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