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A Honda swing arm starts off as a smooth and shiny piece of prototype equipment. The rigors of serving a MotoGP rider who is chasing tenths of a second sometimes lead into the gravel traps. The small stones therein leave their marks, as you can see in the image above.

Gravel does a good job of absorbing energy and thus slowing rider and bike down. But the stones aren’t rubber, and they don’t bounce off aluminum without leaving a mark when the rider carries some speed into their midst.

Moto3 bikes crash most often of the three classes, according to the official crash report. And being run on smaller budgets than MotoGP, Moto3 gear tends to get used beyond a little superficial crash damage. This is Danny Kent’s Red Bull KTM at Valencia.

Photograph: ©2014 by Scott Jones / PHOTO.GP – All Rights Reserved

Camera Info: Nikon D4 with Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8

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gravel trap