YRHC to Bring History to Life at the Yamaha Racing Experience
The Yamaha Racing Heritage Club will return to the Yamaha Racing Experience at Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli from June 18-19, with Giacomo Agostini, Carlos Lavado and Luca Cadalora joining a special lineup of historic Yamaha racing machinery across the two-day event.
The Yamaha Racing Heritage Club (YRHC) was founded in 2021 to protect and celebrate Yamaha’s racing history, bringing together owners of historic Yamaha race bikes from across the world and helping to preserve the machines, knowledge and stories from past generations.
After becoming a key part of the Yamaha Racing Experience in recent years, the YRHC will once again bring that history to life at Misano, where participants will be able to see the bikes up close, hear them running and watch them return to the track during dedicated sessions.
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Among those joining the YRHC at Misano will be 15-time World Champion Giacomo Agostini, the most successful Grand Prix rider of all time. His move to Yamaha for the 1974 season was one of the stories that shocked racing fans at the time, as the Italian left MV Agusta to join the Japanese manufacturer during a period when two-stroke machinery was beginning to change the face of Grand Prix racing.
Agostini won the 1974 350cc World Championship with Yamaha before making history again the following season on the YZR500 0W23. In 1975, he secured Yamaha’s first riders’ title in the premier 500cc class, with the 0W23 also becoming the first two-stroke machine to win the 500cc World Championship.
Recently restored by the Yamaha Racing Heritage Club with support from the Pata Maxus Yamaha WorldSBK Official Team, the YZR500 0W23 will run at Misano, giving Yamaha Racing Experience participants the chance to see and hear one of the most important machines in Yamaha’s Grand Prix history.
Carlos Lavado brings another major Yamaha championship story to Misano, as Yamaha marks 40 years since the Venezuelan claimed his second 250cc World Championship with the manufacturer. A two-time 250cc World Champion with Yamaha, Lavado remains one of the brand’s defining riders from that era, and the YZR250 0W82 he rode to the 1986 title will also feature at Misano as part of the YRHC lineup.
Luca Cadalora adds another direct link to Yamaha’s Grand Prix past. A three-time World Champion, Cadalora raced Yamaha machinery in both the 250cc and 500cc classes, taking Grand Prix victories for the manufacturer and finishing second in the 1994 500cc World Championship. At Misano, the YZR250 0WB9 he rode to third in the 1990 250cc World Championship will feature as part of the YRHC lineup, while Cadalora is also set to return to the track on the YZR500 0WK1, a machine he rode during the 1998 season.
The Grand Prix lineup will also include two important Yamaha 500cc machines from the Eddie Lawson era. The YZR500 0W81 that carried Lawson to the 1986 500cc World Championship, while the 1987 YZR500 0W86 represents the following season of Yamaha premier-class Grand Prix machinery, which he rode to third in the championship standings.
Completing the Grand Prix lineup, Norifumi “Norick” Abe’s 2002 YZR500 0WL9 will be present at Misano. One of Yamaha’s final 500cc two-strokes before the full move to four-stroke MotoGP machinery, the 0WL9 represents the closing chapter of an era that shaped Grand Prix racing for decades.
Yamaha’s WorldSBK heritage will be represented by Noriyuki “Nitro Nori” Haga’s YZF-R7 OW02, one of the most iconic production-based race bikes in the manufacturer’s history and a machine set to run during the event. Its place in Yamaha’s story has only grown in the brand’s 70th anniversary year, with Yamaha’s 2025 anniversary colours taking inspiration from the 1999 YZF-R7 OW02 made famous by Haga in WorldSBK. Haga’s 1998 YZF750 0WJ6 and 2008 YZF-R1 will also feature, tracing his Yamaha story across three landmark machines from the brand’s production-based racing history.
Alongside the YRHC activity, the Yamaha Racing Experience will bring together current Yamaha racing talent from the FIM Superbike World Championship and the FIM Endurance World Championship. Pata Maxus Yamaha WorldSBK Official Team riders Andrea Locatelli and Xavi Vierge will be joined by GYTR GRT Yamaha WorldSBK’s Remy Gardner and 2025 FIM Supersport World Champion Stefano Manzi, alongside reigning FIM Endurance World Champions Marvin Fritz, Karel Hanika and Leandro Mercado from the Yamalube YART Yamaha EWC Official Team.
Their presence will add a present-day link to the YRHC garage, allowing current Yamaha riders to experience older Grand Prix machinery up close alongside Agostini, Lavado, Cadalora, and the Yamaha Racing Experience participants, bringing together different generations of Yamaha riders, bikes and racing history in the same paddock.
Alongside the track activity and YRHC garage, the event will also include the official Yamaha Racing Experience dinner, bringing riders, customers and Yamaha representatives together away from the circuit.
Across the two days at Misano, the Yamaha Racing Heritage Club will bring the manufacturer’s rich racing history to life for Yamaha Racing Experience participants, with some of the brand’s most significant machines running again in front of the people who continue to celebrate them.
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About Yamaha Motorcycles
Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd. is a major Japanese manufacturer founded in 1955, renowned for producing a wide range of motorcycles, scooters, and motorized products. Known for reliability and performance, they are a global leader in the industry, focusing on innovation and the Japanese concept of Kando (intense excitement).
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