WORDS: BOOTHY IMAGES: CHAPPO, TIM KEETON
Are you looking for a good time? By virtue of the fact that you’re reading a copy of Fast Bikes I think we can assume, with some confidence, that the answer to that question is yes. Some bikes are designed for out and out speed, others for cornering prowess. Some are designed for comfort. Some don’t do any of that stuff very well, but do at least look great. Some motorcycles, though, are designed with one thing in mind and one thing only. Fun. And a fraternity of bikes that fits well and truly into this category is the supermoto style street bikes we call supermotards. There is a bunch of them to choose from, and they come in all different sizes from the little Aprilia SX125, to the big old Ducati 110 0 Hypermotard, of which there are still plenty kicking about. We wanted to know how much fun you can have blasting round on a halfway house between a road bike and an MX machine, with not much more than 100bhp between your legs. Pretty Boy was busy doing his hair, so we didn’t need to bother with any A2-friendly kids’ bikes, and Dangerous Bruce is… well dangerous on anything with too much power, so we sourced a pair of middleweight supermotards, from opposite ends of the price range, to see if we got the bug.