Conclusion
THE VELOCE LUSSO IS BY FAR THE SMOOTHEST, MOST ACCOMPLISHED AND SEEMINGLY COMPLETE MV AGUSTA THAT I HAVE EVER RIDDEN
And there we have it – two very different bikes, both aiming for the same kind of customers, yet both also falling a little short of firmly nailing the job in a few crucial areas. Crucial, if you take into account everything we’re looking for here – a touring bike that still gets your
sporting or naughty juices really flowing, but also meeting the criteria people expect for bikes to pound the mileage on.
We would never have expected, despite the difference in capacity, that the MV Agusta would be the one falling short in the sporting-fun department. However, this is
because of very laudable hard work undertaken by MV, work which could actually tempt those who aren’t bothered about acting the biking goat much any more, in their direction. The Veloce Lusso is by far the smoothest, most accomplished and seemingly complete MV Agusta that I’ve ever ridden. It is also, I think, a remarkably good road bike for all uses and is even superb on fuel as it felt as though I barely ever had to fill her up.
Being Euro 4 it’s fairly quiet bar the engine and airbox rumble, though an aftermarket exhaust would not only allow the triple to sing, it would likely return the edge to the engine that the stock setup is missing. Yet, again, this doesn’t stop it from being a very, very good motorcycle. In fact Jonny, while a Fast Bikes man if not a Fast Biker himself per se, at one point said: “The MV is just about everything I could ever want from a motorcycle, not too fast or slow, and does everything I would ever need perfectly”
– high praise indeed!
But were I to go down the Veloce route, I would honestly choose the non-electronic suspended version myself (£13,490). Having ridden one of those a lot in the past, I already know I’d prefer the chassis when I’m riding it like I stole it, even if it lacked the overall cultivated ride quality of the Lusso.
This means that in the majority of ways, the Yamaha would be our choice of the pair.
For starters it’s significantly cheaper than the Italian exotica MV at £12,289, saving you a good £4,055, and is a grand cheaper than the stock Veloce too. It’s obviously faster given the extra cylinder and capacity, and really is one very, very naughty girl when you want her to be, and quite often when you don’t as well! It ticks off all the FB stunting and thrashing boxes a treat, and even though the fuel consumption isn’t particularly great when you decide you want to repeatedly let its dark side out of the box, it’s so much fun we can let it off the hook a tad. But, then again, if you’re looking for that long distance angle, said dark side needs to be kept firmly under lock and key to achieve it and even then, it still won’t match other machines in the relevant classes.
What Yamaha have done here in reality, is stick on a plethora of bits and pieces from their official range of accessories which you may have considered adding anyway, affixed the words ‘Tourer Edition’ to its moniker, and made it slightly cheaper than buying all the bits separately. There’s nothing wrong with that at all really, is there?
There are other options mind you, seeing as KTM and others create genuine adventure/ touring machines that possess gonads more than hearty enough to thrill and satisfy. Yet one of this pair could still be right up your street – go try them out, and you’ll see exactly what we mean.