BALLISTIC BARGAINS
£5k ZZR1400 vs £23k H2 SX SE+
Kawasaki do frickin’ fast like no-one else. Ever since the mighty Z1 blitzed allcomers in 1972, the title of ‘World’s Fastest’ has been a matter of corporate pride for the big K and spawned a succession of legends: GPZ900R, ZZ-R1100, ZX-12R... and the ZZR1400. Launched in 2006 and enlarged and updated to its current form in 2012, the 1441cc ZZR gets to 150mph in about the time it took to read that sentence. But in 2018 Kawasaki turned the supercharged H2 into a sportstourer with the H2 SX SE, then updated it with more technology in 2019 to create the 998cc,
197bhp SE★. Everyone thought it spelled the end for the ZZR1400. Wrong. Kawasaki didn’t just want the world’s fastest sports-tourer, they wanted the world’s two fastest sports tourers. So which is best?
On-road performance
Ahead of me, the H2 SX SE★ is squirelling its fat Bridgestone S21 rear over a bumpy Peak District back road, leaving a wide black streak through white dust left by trucks from a nearby quarry. Its angular back end, flanked by panniers, looks poised and controlled, hovering over the tarmac’s dips and blips with a cool, unflustered majesty as it shunts at implausible speed from apex to apex. There’s something sci-fi not just in the jagged, spaceship styling, but in the way the H2 moves with such immense velocity by barely lifting a finger rocker, let alone breaking sweat. It’s unhurried and interstellar at the same time, teleporting with an almost instantaneous pace from a tweak on its short-action throttle. It’s a unique experience; there’s no waiting for the motor to get into its stride – it simply eviscerates distance. There’s no better bike for battering chunks off a satnav’s predicted arrival time without even trying. And if that isn’t science fiction enough, the SE★ even has self-healing paint on the tank. Yet the ZZR1400 I’m riding is just as rapid, but in a different way. It’s longer, lower and with a distinctly more solid, substantial feel than the H2 SX, hovering along like a ground-hugging missile and keeping the supercharged bike easily in sight. But where the SE★ develops its performance by squashing more air into each of its 250cc combustion chambers than is natural, courtesy of its supercharger, the ZZR does it the old-fashioned way with a huge engine capacity – each cylinder is over 360cc. Ain’t no substitute for cubes, which is why the ZZR makes 16% more torque than the SE★. And it makes a difference; the ZZR might not have the H2’s uncanny, force-inducted warping of space – instead it winds itself up across its rev range like a titanic elastic band, gathering up its energy and surging with that colossal, tidal force the way ZZRs always have. It makes power in a linear way, like a conventional inline four – a massive, brilliant inline four. The SE★ and ZZR are both devastatingly quick, but do it in such a different way – which is impressive considering one is new and the other is a used, 40,000-mile 2012 bike.
Used or new?
That’s because the ZZR belongs to reader and retired jet engine engineer Mark Hulands, and it’s a minter. He bought it in 2014 for use as a sporty all-round tourer, with big trips away at home and abroad. But today we’re both interested to see if, with such similar spec, the H2 SX SE★ can hit the same spot as the ZZR – and we’ve come to the Peaks around Derby to find out.
For two high performance sportstourers making 197bhp, nowhere is the difference between the H2 SX SE★ and ZZR1400 better illustrated than their values. A new H2 SX SE★ comes in at an eye-watering £23,797 for the Performance Tourer edition (or £23,347 for a 2019 bike, which is the same thing), while a 2020 ZZR1400 Performance Sports is £15,997 – that’s £7800 less.
But it’s even more crazy than that: a good condition, average-miles, used ZZR1400 can be picked up for as little as five grand – saving nearly £19,000 on the price of a full-spec, Performance Touring edition H2 SX SE★. Mark has put over 30,000 miles on his ZZR in the last six years, and it literally hasn’t missed a beat and, apart from servicing and consumables, Mark’s replaced a clutch slave cylinder seal, the rear wheel bearings and a blown bulb; for a total cost of £12.
Green-tinted specs
But the supercharged bike definitely has the edge on tech spec; semi-active Showa suspension is complemented by an up-anddown quickshifter, cruise control, cornering ABS and cornering lights, heated grips, Bluetooth TFT dash with configurable rider modes and, in Performance Tourer spec, Kawasaki panniers and a titanium Akrapovic end can. It’s what you’d expect from a modern new flagship. The ZZR got a basic traction control and rider mode package with its 2012 revamp, and a new ZZR1400 Performance Sports today comes with an Öhlins TTX shock. But that’s the limit of its sophistication; the ZZR is resolutely previous generation. Its riding
‘The ZZR1400 winds itself up across its rev range like a titanic elastic band’
‘The HS SX SE+ is unhurried and interstellar at the same time’