GIRO DAY

HOLY CHRIST, I
thought I was
going to die!”
When the man
uttering the
sentiment is one
Michael Rutter
Esq., whose CV of
road racing achievements is
longer than most people’s life
story, you take notice. It must
take something pretty hairy to
widen the eyes of a 13-times
NW200, eight-times Macau and
four-times TT winner.
On this occasion, though,
we’ve merely ridden five miles
across town to fill up at a garage.
Michael smiles. “There are
usually fewer cars around when
I’m on a bike,” he explains.
Rutter, myself and Johnny
Mac brim the three red machines
before heading off for a day
tearing Lincolnshire a new one.
As I pay for the fuel I look out
over rows of chewing gum, and
across at the forecourt where the
Yamaha R1, Ducati 1299 S and
BMW S1000RR are gathered
round the pump, huddling in a
conspiracy of outrageous
performance.
I run through numbers in my
noggin: the Yam is 190bhp, the
BMW 196bhp, so too the Ducati.
With a good launch they’ll hit
180mph from a standstill in just
over half a mile. In top gear, they
take less than 10 seconds to roll
on from 40mph to 120mph. That
is just nuts.
But all three are festooned
with cutting-edge, race-derived
electronic technology that
makes such extreme
performance a) possible and b)
not just survivable, but an
absolute hoot to use. Getting
away with it has never been so
hilariously, outrageously easy.
Eighteen years ago the scene
would have included the original
R1, perhaps Aprilia’s RSV Mille,
or a Ducati 916; maybe a ZX-9R.
Great bikes, thrillingly explosive
in their day. But the new breed of
electronically-enhanced litre
sportsbikes quicken the pulse
like never before, no matter how
old and doddery we’re getting.
You’re never too washed-up for a
race rep, and they still reduce us
to giggling kids. Although
watching Johnny and Rutter
clowning about with paper
towels as they wait at the pumps,
it’s not as if they need help...
We fire up in a supersonic
thunder of mixed firing
intervals, massive 90° V-twin
detonations mingling with the
V4-esque warble of Yamaha’s
crossplane motor and the
straight mechanical bark of
BMW’s 180° inline four. Out of
the garage, we fight through
queues of crawling traffic to get
to the interesting roads. But it
gives us the chance to get an idea
of the new R1 away from its
natural, open road habitat.
“The Yam is a small bike with
a big riding position,” says
Johnny before we ride
off. “It reminds me of
the Aprilia RSV4. Nice
big seat, bars are
reasonable; I could go a long way
on it. It looks like it’s going to be
torture, but it’s not.”
He’s right. The Yamaha is
small, but not ridiculously,
250 tiny. It’s R6-sized, which
means it looks like it won’t fit
when you eye it up warily from a
distance, but as soon as you’re
onboard it feels just about big
enough. Compact, ready for
action, but not daft.
And the front-end biased
riding position of the
previous R1, which seemed to
plant the headstock directly
below the rider’s groin and
loaded wrists with lead, is gone.
Instead the R1 now feels
balanced at standstill, body
weight spread evenly, and even
more balanced on the move. The
first impression is of
featherweight and agile steering.
I remember rolling out of the
pitlane at Eastern Creek in
On the road, Yamaha’s new R1, BMW’s revised S1000RR
and Ducati’s souped-up 1299 S are so off the scale it’s
hard to say anything sensible about them. But fun trying...
S1000RR v R1 v 1299 S
ON THE
w i t h M i c h a e l
50
PERFORMANCEBIKES.CO.UK | JUNE 2015