This, Ladies and Gentlemen, is an example of a Real Man's bike (sorry Flame - no offence, and please don't hit me anymore OK? The bruises aren't going away).
You can't get on this bike and expect go for a quiet bimble. You have to climb on, climb off, kick it in the 'nads, get back on, smack it in the back of the head a couple of times, and nail it everywhere, even when you're tooting the feeble (and most non-Italian) horn instead of indicating.
Why?
Why would you swap the horn and indicator position? Is that some kind of obscure Italian joke?
Good thing there's nothing else wrong with this bike.
Nothing.
I've gone off sprotsbikes. It's not their fault though. My battered, bloated zeppelin of a "body", is just not capable of getting comfortable in the 96th Karma Sutra position, affectionately referred to by worshipers of Kali as the "Pretzel". Having said that the seat/peg relationship on the RSV-R is actually perfectly comfortable, except when the heat rising up of those fantastically melodious Akrapovic (pronounced A-Krap-O-Vich) pipes tries to slow roast your calves and the backs of your thighs in heavy traffic.
The engine is fantastic, though I would prefer a tacho with an actual red line to a barely visible shift light and presumably a rev-limiter. It is incredibly flexible, with little of that other Italian marque's typical banging, stuttering, and sheer bloody-minded recalcitrance under 4000rpm.
The chassis is just dreamy, if I may summon up a slightly wet blanket aphorism from the '60s. What I mean is that it works in a way you can only really dream about until you experience it for yourself. And this is where the "real man" bit kicks in.
You don't gently nudge the bars to change direction. You release the inside bar, extend your arm all the way back and whack it with all your might while pulling on the opposite bar. At least this is what I started off doing while trying to ride someone else's mega-expensive toy. Just a gentle ride to work and I was struggling to get it to turn.
Shifting your arse in the seat a mere inch made all the difference.
I deliberately left work as late enough to avoid the commuter traffic while still having enough time to ride the Wainuiomata coast road and get home before dark. Going up the Wainuiomata Hill road was really the first time I'd needed to think about a constant series of rapid direction changes. Sitting dead centre in the seat like Mike Hailwood (yeah right, like I have the right to consider calling my self a motorcyclist in even his written and posthumous presence) made this pretty darn tough - Big heave - turn, big heave - uuuuUPppright and over - big heave - turn the other way. I'm just not getting on with this bike.
Hmmm
Italian Automotive manufacturers like to use animals to engender a sense of free-spirited and quite dangerous power in their products. Ferrari uses the image of a prancing horse, I like to think it was one of the special equines used by The Spanish Riding School, all delicate and precise movements, backed by skull crushing power. Lamborghini use a Bull, not renowned for being either delicate or precise, but another magnitude of power up the scale compared to Ferrari.
Aprilia's Lion is all swaggering, lazy, sinuous movement. Riding this bike at 50km/hr is torture and both rider and bike want release. The RSV-R prowls with that slightly nervous energy of a Lion about to pounce for no other reason than because it can, weaving an almost drunken course toward doomed prey. In the case of either Ferrari or Lamborghini, I can see Aprilia's Lion castrating Ferrari and Lamborghini's Stallion and Bull respectively, sitting back on its haunches, casually picking stringy vas deferens from its teeth with one shiny metallic magnesium alloy claw, while both animals struggle to figure out just what bits are missing.
F**k my back hurts.
The first couple of decent corners on the Wainuiomata Coast Rd and I dip out of the saddle to be rewarded by a bike suddenly pouncing on the apex, and a couple of pops in my back releasing all that pent up lactic acid being stored in over stretched muscles. Aha! I gets it, I does!
I'm feeble. I haven't ridden a sprotsbike for so long that I'm on and off the throttle, having to change down to get back on the power after the merest stroke of those monobloc Brembo radial brakes, and fundamentally riding around corners with the bike upright. I open the taps a couple of times and road flows like liquid obsidian toward me, Ohlins suspension finally allowed to do its job.
I get to the end of the road a bit daunted, confused by just how far up the performance spectrum you have to go to get this bike to work and just how far behind my brain is lagging. Fortunately Wellington's rugged South Coast delivers a swift kick to my hind-brain, rugged terrain and windswept beaches bringing out the Lion tamer within.
I lied earlier. There's one other thing wrong with this bike. Italians seem to blend engineering and art effortlessly, making straight lines curves, and curves a thing of sensual beauty.
So why the f**k can't they make a side stand that works? Ducati have their "suicide" stand and Aprilia have a straight bit of angle iron about three inches long. I had the bike parked on the side of the road, road sloping away to the left. As soon as I put any weight at all on the bike the stand started skating down the slope, bike toppling over with it. Please see the second paragraph.
Just who was boss in this relationship re-established, I grasped the scruff of Leo the RSV-R's neck and proceeded back toward Wainuiomata. I could spend all day on a racetrack with this thing and never learn its limits. I ain't Haga or Corser.
I'm also a bit dumb. While showing the multi-function dash off to her indoors I stumbled across the vMax and average speed functions.
Crikey.
Err, no, that wasn't me. Ummm someone else.
Sensei, you're a better man than me mate. Actually Flame is a better man than me. What a stunning, stunning bike. Not precisely engineered, pinpoint sharp racer's tool, more a blunt axe designed to bludgeon both riders into shape, and competitors into losers.
I'm getting up early tomorrow so I can jump on the RSV-R and ride it to work, hopefully before the damn thing wakes up and eviscerates me!
Reply With Quote
Originally Posted by bistard
Bookmarks