TO BUY OR NOT TO BUY

All three bikes are modern classics, but each has a slightly different goal in mind...

THE DUCATI does all the things you’d expect a contemporary bike to do: stop, go, and handle, in a way the Enfield can’t match. But it doesn’t capture – for better or worse – the authentic vintage vibe. Beautiful, yes; collectible, certainly. But maybe it’s too good. THEENFIELD has the attributes of a genuine, 1950s machine, but which happens to be built today. Fuel injection and digital trip notwithstanding, it goes like it could be 50 years old. Fine if that’s what you want; increasingly for many people these days, it is. THE TRIUMPH is the compromise modern classic, with something of both ideas. On the surface it has some of the genuine classic bike looks but underneath it has a level of capability that gives it the edge over the others.