Fast Bikes Magazine issue 385 - November issue

A2 USED HONDA AWESOMENESS CBR600RR ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW BEFORE BUYING ONE

GETTING TO GRIPS WITH KTM’S NEW RC390

SUB ON A SUPERBIKE

NOVEMBER 2021 ISSUE 385

WE GET STUCK IN AT BSB AND LEARN WHAT IT TAKES TO RACE AN ACTUAL SUPERBIKE

NAKED SPORTSBIKE 2021’S

BIGGER, FAST ER AND CRAZ IER THAN EVE OF THE YEAR KAWASAKI DU R… CATI STREETFIGH Z H2 SE TER V4 S 7 KTM 1290 SUPE R BIKES DUKE R 1313 BHP

W

1 INNER

BMW S 1000 R M-SPORT

TRIUMPH SPEED TRIPLE 1200RS

MV AGUSTA BRUTALE 1000RR

APRILIA TUONO V4 FACTORY

ISSUE 385 NOVEMBER 2021

THE KNOWLEDGE

Used Bike Guide .............................62

All you need to know about Honda’s much-loved CBR600RR.

Track Craft .....................................84 Dean Ellison tells us how to make the most of your trackday.

YOUR LIFE ON BIKES

You and Yours ................................88 All of your adventures.

Chatter ...........................................92 A page dedicated to the best readers in the world…

TESTS

54

2021’s Naked Sportbike of the Year ...................................... 14

If you like your bikes bare and ballistic, you need to see which of this year’s supernakeds is most worthy of your money.

KTM RC390 .....................................54 We cop a feel of KTM’s new A2-spec RC390, on road and track.

COLUMNISTS

Tom Neave .....................................95 Tom’s topping the Superstock table and he plans to keep it that way.

Christian Iddon ..............................96 Iddon’s in the showdown and it’s all to play for.

Steve Parrish ..................................98 Steve’s been terrorising the good folk at Goodwood.

14

FEATURES

How your hoops are made ............68

Never shy to get stuck in, Tim steps up to the plate and wrestles a superbike around Cadwell Park.

Track Spec ......................................80 We love an MV F3… especially when they’re as sorted as this one.

Race Riot ........................................90 Tim and Farmer Brod have been flying the Fast Bikes flag.

BUY

GEAR

FASTBIKESMAG.COM

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68

WELCOME

Little or large?

I

’ve ridden a lot of bikes in my life, some big and some small. Ask me what my preference is and I’ll almost certainly say the bigger, the better. Who doesn’t want more power, excitement and clever bits of tech at the end of their fingertips? But that’s not to say I’m not a fan of the little stuff, too. Some of my best biking memories were made on the little stuff, pushing them to their limits in a way you simply can’t on larger-capacity machines.

I was reminded of this a few weeks back when testing KTM’s new RC390 in Italy. I had such a laugh on that bike, pushing my luck and squeezing it for all it had to give. Just a few days before, I’d been testing the RC’s big brother in this month’s Naked Sportsbike of the Year test and it was a wholly different experience.

On KTM’s 1290 Super Duke R, I was just a passenger – giving it my best but merely tickling its potential. The 1290 is a beast,

and a brilliant beast at that, with ludicrous levels of potency and presence. It put a smile on my face in a wholly different way to the little RC, but the point is that both bikes made my day and reminded me that bikes are just awesome, whatever their capacity. The RC also highlighted how much tech has moved on since I was a nipper, blasting around on my first little-big bikes that didn’t feature so much as a gear indicator, never mind cornering ABS, traction control and a home moviescreen sized TFT dash.

As the old saying goes, ‘we’ve never had it so good’, and long may that evolution continue.

Enjoy the mag.

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BOSSY MAN

BSB SU PER S TA R

dangerous@fastbikes.co.uk

...and Britain’s best builder

MONEY MAN

TRACK RIDING GURU

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...and super nice bloke

FA ST M AN

TT WINNER

SUPERSTOCK WINNER

...and karaoke king

...and combine king

MOTOGP SAGE

SUPERBIKE SNAPPER

...and wine connoisseur

...and eBay addict

‘Dangerous’ Bruce Wilson

Charlie ‘The Sheriff’ Oakman

Tim Neave

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OLD MAN

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Despite the challenges or legislation, global economies and everything else going on in the world, motorcycling’s in a good place, I think. When you flick forward to the news pages, you’ll see another raft of new models that are destined to arrive on the market, and there are loads more propositions on the cards that we can’t talk about just yet. Big ones and little ones, for that matter... so wherever you’re at with your motorcycling journey, there’s sure to be something to tickle your fancy.

Christian Iddon

Dean Ellison

Gary Johnson

Jack Fairman

ROAD RACING LEGEND Peter Hickman ...and BSB winner

RACING PUNDIT

Steve Parrish

...and pro at pranks

YOUNG MAN

Carl Stevens

teaboy@fastbikes.co.uk

Tom Neave

Jamie Morris

LEGAL LORE

Andrew Dalton

...and hardcore off-roader

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NE W S & RE VIE W S PL ANET FAST BIKES – NE W ME TA L,

WDS WORDS> SIR ALAN OF DO

RETRO RR-ELISH Triumph’s ready to rumble with a new half-faired Speed Triple 1200RR

I

t’s been coming for a while, but we’ve finally got all the details on the new Triumph Speed Triple RR – and it’s quite an intriguing machine.

First up, it’s not the 1200 Daytona we’d all love to see, with Moto2 styling, super-sharp track chassis and an angry, race-tuned 200bhp 1199cc triple. Rather, it’s a half-faired version of the Speed Triple RS supernaked, with some useful chassis upgrades, making it a bit more of a halfway-house. A retro-styled modern café racer with solid sporty credentials rather than a proper superbike.

The changes from the RS are all excellent stuff: you’ll already know if you like that round headlight and half-fairing obviously, but we reckon it’s a classy, good-looking piece of design. It adds an extra high-speed capability to the Speed Triple fam, and (whisper it) might add a bit of practicality and comfort on longer trips. Expect to see higher double-bubble screens on a lot of these…

The suspension is top-drawer, of course – a full electronic semi-active Öhlins set-up makes a lot of sense on the road, and is easily fettled for different riding set-ups via the flash colour LCD dashboard. It also adds a proper dash of premium kit to the chassis.

The tyres are also upgraded and you now get the latest Pirelli Supercorsa SP V3 tyres. That clashes a little with road bias of the RR, we think: Supercorsas are ace on track, but considering the amount

of time one of these will spend on track, they might be a wee bit of a waste.

Triumph actually specs an OE-approved fitment for track use, Pirelli Supercorsa SC2 V3, making it arguably even stranger to fit the Supercorsa SP as standard. It’s a statement of intent, of course – the Hinckley firm is making the point that this is a high-end sportsbike, from its point of view at least.

We can sort of see why the new bike isn’t a full-on superbike at the moment.

Triumph would need to put a lot of money and effort in to build a 1200 triple with the 210bhp-ish needed to compete with the Honda Fireblade, Ducati Panigale V4S, Aprilia RSV4 and the rest of the litre bikes.

Then, everyone would expect them to go superbike racing with a factory effort – which would take even more cash and time.

Meanwhile, they still need to support the Moto2 765 project... and, oh, look... they’ve only got a full 450 factory MX and enduro programme on the way too.

Hinckley gets a pass for now, then.

But we’re still waiting to be blown away with that proper three-cylinder superbike we all know it should be building…

ENGINE

As you were – it’s the same 1160cc 178bhp beastie as on the RS.

TYRES

New Pirelli Supercorsa SP V3 rubber all-round.

BRAKES

Brembo Stylema four-piston radial calipers.

SENSIBLE WHEELS 2022 HONDA CBR500 AND CB500 F Honda’s 500 twin range has been one of its unsung heroes over the past eight years or so. Okay, it’s not going to set your pants on fire if you’re used to a Blade, but we all started somewhere, and for a young A2-licence-holding Fast Biker, you can learn a lot about riding on one of the 47bhp 471cc parallel twins.

And for 2022, the whole range gets a hefty upgrade, focussed on the front end. You now get new Showa SFF-BPF forks and dual 296mm front discs on the CB500F and CBR500, as well as some fancier Nissin calipers. These are now radial-mount jobs rather than old-school sliding two-piston units, and

Honda says it’s a twin-piston design, though they do look very like four-piston designs. You also get new five-spoke wheels on the F and R, plus a new front mudguard design borrowed from the CB650R. Both of these sportier models have a revised weight distribution as well, with more weight over the front end. That should give better grip and stability, plus more positive steering. Impressively, both the 2022 CB500F and CBR500R are no heavier than the current models with the new front end, still weighing in at 189kg (CB500F) and 192kg (CBR500R) ready to ride.

SUSPENSION

Öhlins semi-active EC2.0 electronic suspension front and rear.

TECH DATA

2022 Triumph Speed Triple 1200 RR ENGINE

DOHC 12v, inline-triple, water-cooled, 1,160cc Bore x Stroke: 90x60.8mm Compression ratio: 13.2:1 Carburation: Ride-by-wire fuel injection Max power (claimed): 178hp@10,750rpm Max torque (claimed): 92ft lb@9000rpm Type:

ELECTRONICS

Transmission:

Six-speed gearbox, wet slipper clutch

CHASSIS

Frame: Front suspension:

Rear suspension:

Brakes:

Wheels/tyres:

Aluminium twin spar 43mm Öhlins EC2.0 forks, 120mm travel, semi-active control Aluminium single-sided swingarm, Öhlins EC2.0 monoshock semi-active damping control Twin 320mm discs, four-piston Brembo Stylema radial calipers (front), 220mm disc, twin-piston caliper (rear), cornering ABS. Cast aluminium/Pirelli Supercorsa SP V3, 120/70 17 front, 190/55 17 rear

CASH FOR FLASH… MV AGUSTA F3 RR On the face of it, this is a fairly modest update on the 800 F3 triple – an RR variant which has all-new carbon bodywork, with integrated aerodynamic wings that give 8kg more downforce at the front end and detail mods to engine and chassis. But the big story might be upcoming changes to the Supersport race regs, where the capacity limits for triples could be set to rise to 800cc, meaning this would

be the base for Agusta’s WSS race bikes from next year.

The Euro5 engine still makes 147bhp, the frame is stiffer, and the F3 RR gets the same electronics upgrades as the other 2022 Agustas; new cornering ABS, traction, 5.5-inch LCD colour dash and much more.

Prices start at about £20,000. More info at www.mvagusta.com/product/ f3/rr

DIMENSIONS

Rake/trail: Wheelbase: Kerb weight: Fuel capacity:

23.9°/104.7mm 1439mm 199kg 15.5 litres

INFO

Price:

£17,950 in white or an extra £250 for the red version.

NOVEMBER 2021 WWW.FASTBIKESMAG.COM 11

NEW S & REV IEW S PLA NET FAST BIKES – NEW METAL,

2022 MV AGUSTA BRUTALE 1000 RS An entry-level MV Agusta 1000? It’s all relative, of course – this piece of moto-art still weighs in at about £22,700. But it’s much cheaper than the £29k Brutale 1000 RR, thanks mostly to cheaper Marzocchi and Sachs suspension instead of the RR’s electronic semi-active Öhlins kit. It’s also got a more relaxed riding position thanks to a set of sit-up-and-beg handlebars, rather than the cramping clip-ons on the RR. How much sense that makes on a 208bhp naked machine remains to be seen – though there’s little that’s sensible about any MV Agusta, of course. Away from the

suspension and riding position, you get the same inline-four motor, steel tube trellis frame, single-sided rear swingarm and proper Brembo brakes – plus a very saucy suite of electronic riding aids, flashy TFT LCD dashboard, cruisecontrol, IMU-assisted traction and ABS, quickshifter, and launch control. All the essentials for smashing it around town.

We popped up to the new MV Agusta London store to see new Agusta ambassador Carl Cox launching both the store and the RS – and it looked spot-on with the big man…

BAD VIBES

Do you mount your iPhone on your bike? Dead handy for sat-nav, tunes, radio, and checking Twitter at a ton on the M1 isn’t it? Beware, because Apple has announced that the vibrations from ‘high power or high volume’ motorcycles can wreck the delicate electronics inside some of its latest models.

The affected phones are the ones with image-stabilising cameras (roughly the iPhone 6 Plus onwards), with the microscopic semiconductor componentry falling apart under 12

extreme vibe stress. We assume Apple is mostly thinking of open-piped Harleys in the US market, but a Panigale 1299 with Termis or a Yamaha R1M running an Akra will probably do much the same thing.

Rigidly mounting a phone on a bike is bad news all-round: look for a mount with vibration isolation – something like the www.UltimateAddons.com phone holder which cossets your phone on an elastomer shock-absorbing mat inside the tough outer casing.