When the Rizla Suzuki Team signed a new agreement at the beginning of 2010 for a collaboration with the legendary designer Troy Lee, it also meant that all the team gear, the bikes and the rider’s helmets were to be designed by the American company. This created an interesting overlap of designs as Starline Designers‘ Roberto Marchionni had already created the 2010 helmet for Alvaro. However, due to the team’s new deal with Troy Lee Alvaro never actually got to wear this helmet on track and it disappeared into the depths of the designer’s locker.

But recently an Italian helmet design blog unearthed this “helmet that never was” and posted some pictures of the original Starline design.

What do you think of the design? Do you prefer this one or the official 2010 design by Troy Lee?

You can also check out all of Alvaro’s previous helmet designs since he started in the world championship here.

Photos: Starline Designers via Racing Helmets Garage

Fans will now be able to purchase Official Merchandise through the new MotoGP Store, which launched on 26th May as a new section of the motogp.com website.

The MotoGP Store is the very first Official Online shop offering all the latest licensed products with worldwide delivery. A wide range of MotoGP products and accessories are now available and will be updated regularly with new exclusive designs and collections.

“MotoGP fans all around the world have been looking forward to a comprehensive offer of official merchandising and the new MotoGP Store can now cater to their wishes, with unparalleled ease of use and an exhaustive range of products, matching the offer of what fans can purchase on-site at a MotoGP event, as well as products that have not been seen at the circuits” said Pau Serracanta, Dorna Sports’ Commercial Area Managing Director.

Marc Malagelada, co-founder and Marketing Director of Insiteout – Dorna Sports’ e-commerce partner, said: “At Insiteout, we tackled the challenge of transferring the emotion and passion experienced at the track to an online experience up to the standards of the MotoGP fans: a user-friendly Store which will be improved constantly to match the demands of the fans.”

The new MotoGP Store can be reached through this url: store.motogp.com

Big news – and we think, good news…
We’ve reopened our Fan Shop with a kicking new collection of fan gear and merchandise.
We’ve got all kinds of shirts and tops, bags, badges and more – cool clothes for both guys and girls (we’ve even got a bandana for dogs too!) – with funky graphics and a huge choice of colours and styles.

There will be more designs to come but we hope you like what you see.
As with our Fan Shop from years ago, the products are all managed by Spreadshirt who are great on quality and speed of delivery.
Some of the items aren’t cheap, we admit – but we think there’s a great range and we’ve done our best to keep the prices as low as possible overall.

We hope you enjoy the new gear and the new store, and that you’ll find some groovy funky fun clothing there to help show others your support for Alvaro.

Click here to go to the Fan Shop