It looks like Aprilia and Yamaha are destined to go toe-to-toe in this season’ s Rally events. Both have tasted success in what is a burgeoning class, as in the multi-cylinders competing in the over 450cc category. Aprilia’ s Tuareg Rally has been hugely successful, and the team are determined to build on past results and aim even higher in the overall class as well. Aprilia’ s main target is the Africa Eco Rally in January, an event they won last time out. The GPX class, which is raced on stock machinery, is viewed by many as the modern version of the old saying‘ win on Sunday, sell on Monday’ that production racing used to capture the attention of regular consumers who weren’ t about to spend a lot on physical upgrades but wanted to know how‘ their’ bike stacked up in capable hands. In a classic looking back to go forward strategy, the big winners of this new Rally gold rush is the motorcycle dealers’ customers who have seen this new turf battle fast-forward the development of these capable new models. With the new Aprilia Tuareg Rally, you get a competitive plug and play midsized adventure bike that is super capable straight out the door of your dealer … For dirt riders getting out and exploring the backroads as well as venturing off-piste, the new category is a great fit and even on tarmac still reeks of dirt cred. With more and more events opening up the option for these larger, road capable units, it is difficult not to ponder and muse a little about the era of the open class bikes at the likes of Dakar. Sure, they were big hairy beasts and the rules( made for challenging) were always going to try to reign the machinery in but with the likes of Aprilia’ s Tuareg Rally, the glint in the eye of the riders is there, for sure, particularly in the wide open stretches.