Verdict
‘It’s an entertaining, engaging, useful motorcycle… The Sport Glide is one of the most appealing Harleys ever built’
Traditionally, if you stripped a Harley of its badge, most of its appeal crumbled. Without that image, you were left with a moderately shonky motorcycle. But this isn’t the case with the Sport Glide – or the rest of the new Softail range. After 3500 miles, it’s clear the Sport Glide’s handling, performance and build quality are now at least equal to most rival machines, and the aspects that still lag such as braking, weight, ground clearance and switchgear aren’t woefully far behind. It’s an entertaining, engaging, useful motorcycle. At the heart of its appeal is its engine, which blends the usual Harley attributes of hammering low-end torque and a throbby soundtrack with – get this – everyday civility. Vibrations are not intrusive, the throttle is light, fuelling is slick and there’s easily enough power to rip through Britain’s congested roads. It only runs out of puff when you really should slow down anyway. Then there are the added advantages of it being a Harley – if you don’t like an aspect of the bike, you can consult the vast catalogue of accessories to fix it, and when you come to sell up, you’ll discover it’s got a pleasing allergy to depreciation. The Sport Glide is one of the most appealing Harleys ever built.