Strangely enough EMD’s European correspondent grew up ridingJapanese motorcycles. In fact my initiationcoincided almost exactly with the last throws of the British motorcycleindustry that once ruled the world. Inmy view at the time, the British marques were on their way out and deservedit.
The likes of Triumph & BSA had gone in ten years from makingthe best bikes in the world – typically sporting lightweight parallel twins –the choice of sporting aficionados like Steve McQueen, to almost completedesolation. The product hadn’t moved onat all – maybe even gone backwards. Howthe Japanese must have laughed I thought when they conspired to split crankcaseshorizontally rather than vertically to keep the oil in the cases. Surely ‘kaizen’ can’t be that easy they musthave thought.
Yamaha had my money through a series of lightweighttwo-stroke twins culminating in the RD400 I still have in my shed. I had friends who persisted with old Britishiron, but I thought they were hopelessly patriotic, and their nights missingthe fun in the pub dealing with blow-ups, seizures and of course endless oilleaks seemed to prove my point. Triumph/BSA had shown dying flashes in the sublimely designed Hurricaneand the promising BSA Rocket III/Triumph Trident triples– bikes that properly developed - could have seen off Honda’sCB750 in every sense, but didn’t .
KTM Duke 125
When we launched Pure Triumph in 2005 and Pure Ducati in2007 – and EMD about the same time – we were convinced that the Europeans ingeneral and the Brits and Italians in particular were going to come back with avengeance (to be fair the Germans had never really gone away).
Now five years later and thirty six years after the demiseof Meridan Triumph, Triumph are now the UK market leader and both they andDucati are two of the fastest growing motorcycle brands in the world -headingfor mainstream rather than niche status in places like the US.
A bit late to the party, UK Bike magazine declares ‘Whatexactly is going on here’ in an ‘Insight’ box on their Bike of the year 2011page. ‘Five years ago these pages would have been full of Japanese sportsbikes,incrementally improved and tweaked. . . (but) technology, heritage andcharacter are as important as the fastest or most powerful. Strong brands fromEurope answer demand, at a better price’.
This year’s top seven?
7. KTM Duke125
6. TriumphSpeed Triple
5. TriumphDaytona 675R
4. KawasakiZx-10R
3. DucatiDiavel
2. TriumphTiger 800
1. BMWK1600GT
Almost all the innovation, style, design and developmentseems to be coming from Europe – at least on the street. Seen the new Honda Crossrunner? In what way is that an improvement over a1986 VFR750? Technically it's fine, the flaw is different – it has all the desirabilityof a domestic boiler - Déjà vu 1977 Triumph for me. The European’s are back on top.