Ducati unveils new 1299 Panigale S Anniversario at World Ducati Week

DUCATI has unveiled a new limited edition 1299 Panigale S – the 1299 Panigale S Anniversario, to celebrate the firm’s 90th anniversary. The bike was unveiled by Casey Stoner and Ducati CEO Claudio Domenicali during a presentation in Misano on Saturday evening, as part of World Ducati Week 2016.

Only 500 1299 Panigale S Anniversarios will be made. To mark them out, they’ll come in a new colour scheme inspired by Ducati’s race bikes. However, the changes are more than just skin-deep as the bike also get a selection of technical changes to make it even more formidable, precise and safe on track.

The 1299 Panigale S Anniversario gets a new version of Ducati’s traction control system, called ‘EVO Traction and Wheelie Control’, which goes beyond what the current Bosch IMU-powered lean-angle sensitive system offers by allowing the rider to slide the rear wheel through a corner. Essentially the system will allow a rider to steer the bike with the rear wheel by allowing it to slip beyond the normal level of traction intervention, while the system still actively works to prevent things from going wrong. Ducati says the DTC EVO system will allow riders to have a whole new way of adjusting the bike’s dynamic behaviour to deliver maximum cornering performance and acceleration with optimum stability and safety.

The DTC EVO system also boasts a new way of operating because in addition to altering spark advance and fuel injection, it adds the ability to intervene with the butterfly valves in the motorcycle’s throttle bodies. When the system needs to quickly intervene, it can close the butterfly valves to manage traction while maintaining optimal combustion parameters, which should mean smoother traction control intervention and engine response.

The DTC EVO system is complimented by DWC EVO – a more evolved version of Ducati’s wheelie control system that through the use of new software, is able to detect the occurrence and severity of wheelies with greater precision, to control them more precisely.

The standard Ducati exhaust system is also ditched in favour of a titanium Akrapovič exhaust in titanium, billet aluminium mirror blockoff plates, and a cover for the hole created by removing the license-plate holder for track days.

Other unique touches to the bike include a beautiful set of gold Marchesini forged wheels and top triple clamp and steering head inserts, both in machined-from-solid aluminium alloy. Each top triple clamp is laser-etched with the bike’s unique production number.

The steering head inserts shift the front wheel forward 5 mm, to give the 1299 Panigale S Anniversario the same chassis geometry as the Panigale R.

The bike also comes with a light lithium battery and carbon fibre heel guards, rear mudguard and shock absorber cover to cut 2.5kg.

As you’d expect, the 1299 Panigale S Anniversario also come fully loaded with all the trick stuff found on the standard bike - Bosch Cornering ABS, a quickshifter for shifting up and down, engine braking control and Ohlins active suspension plus a colour TFT instrument panel to tell you what the bike and its 1285cc twin-cylinder 205hp engine are doing.

The 1299 Panigale S Anniversario will be available from Ducati Dealerships starting in the second half of July (country specific), and will cost £23,995.