This article has recently been submitted to my Advanced Motorcycling Club magazine; it was inspired by the 130 miles or so spent in the company of the best bike I have ever ridden. the Kawasaki 1400 GTR
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So, when is enough; not enough? Of course, I am referring to your bike’s power. How many of you remember the sheer awesome power of the Kawasaki Z1 / Z900 when it first hit the showrooms back in 1973? It produced 83 bhp at the crankcase. In those days, bikes of 67 bhp (e.g. Honda’s CB 750) were fast, so 83bhp was manic! Fast forward to 2008; anything less than 100bhp is considered pretty tame and the ultimate superbikes are producing almost 200 bhp; is this simply insane?
I was chatting to a chap the other day; age, late 30s, non-biker but had ridden trials bikes in his teens. He asked me about my next bike; I told him - the Kawasaki 1400 GTR; “Blimey, that’s got to be fast”! I paused before telling him that it is actually faster than a Mclaren F1 to around 130mph; he was stunned. “So why on earth would you want that on our roads?”
It got me thinking, because it is definitely not about blasting about, hyper-spacing from A-B ignoring speed limits and riding in an irresponsible manner. No, what it’s about, is the ability to capitalise on each and every opportunity to make rapid progress. Whereas on low capacity bikes, one has to wait, bide one’s time, and plan overtakes with great care; on bikes with 130bhp+, the overtake is executed in about as much time as it takes to confirm that the overtake is on. Used sensibly, this awesome performance advantage ensure that you can make excellent cross country average speeds without riding at ridiculous speeds on dual carriageways and motorways.
The real thrill for me is remaining in 3rd gear at (say) 50mph in a National (60mph) closing in from a following position to an overtaking position and then, at precisely the right moment, flick the right wrist to execute the hyper-drive! Some few seconds later you have returned to the left hand side of the road, within the speed limit, but the cars that you had been following are now specks in the wing mirrors.
However, I would caution about one aspect. When executing such overtaking manoeuvres, please be aware that car drivers will have no conception of your performance. Their cursory glance in the rear view mirror a few seconds earlier cannot prepare them for the fact that you have warped onto their tail as they lazily pull out in front of you totally oblivious to your presence. And although we always like to blame car drivers fro not seeing us, it is also our responsibility to make ourselves seen and our presence known. Use your horn to warn (never to rebuke) and your headlight flasher to ensure that the car ahead is aware of your presence.
Another challenge with these high powered bikes is that they do make it harder to ride in groups of much lesser powered bikes. Whilst you may all agree that you’ll broadly keep within a certain speed limit; what they cannot match is your ability to maintain high average speeds so effortlessly.
“So, why on earth would you want such a high powered bike on British roads?” The answer’s easy; effortless progress and exceptional thrills!
The 1400 GTR delivers
