SUZUKI’S GSX-8R CLAIMS TO USHER IN ‘A NEW ERA FOR SPORTSBIKES’
A new hope?
But there appear to be green shoots of a sportsbike renaissance for 2024. Honda and Kawasaki have brought back legendary supersport race-reps. Triumph have a new Daytona. Suzuki’s GSX-8R claims to usher in ‘a new era for sportsbikes’. The 15,000rpm, 400cc four is back after a 20-year absence thanks to Kawasaki. Spy shots confirm KTM are developing an RC990, while trademark applications suggest Yamaha have an R9 in the pipeline. Manufacturers are making them again because we’re buying them again. Sales of new fully-faired bikes are rising, while used supersports bikes are so in demand that dealers struggle to keep them on showroom floors. So, what’s going on? Is Britain back in love with sportsbikes?
Leading from the front
Well… maybe. Let’s start with some good news. Sales of ‘Road Sport’ motorcycles (the UK motorcycle industry association’s term for bikes with fairings) have risen for the past two years. In 2023 they were 4% up on 2022, which in turn were 7% up on 2021. Modest-looking rises, but in the context of a two-wheeler market that’s shrunk overall during the same two years, it’s solid growth.
What’s leading the charge? The biggest-selling sportsbike in Britain last year was BMW’S S1000RR. With just over 600 bikes sold, it was BMW’S second-biggest selling motorcycle in the UK – behind only the you-know-what. And it’s not just us Brits who love an S1000RR: global sales rose a whopping 13.9% across the year, way outperforming BMW Motorrad’s overall 3% sales increase. We’re off to a promising start.
Challenging times
So, sportsbikes sales are up and riders still love a 200bhp, tech-laden race-rep. But digging deeper reveals the S1000RR to be an outlier, its sales success far above any other superbike. UK sales of Yamaha’s R1, Kawasaki’s ZX-10R and Honda’s Fireblade are now so low that even combined, including all racing homologation variants, they’re smaller than the S1000RR on its own.
This reality is evident on the showroom floor. In multi-franchise dealer Wheels Motorcycles in Peterborough, sales manager Darren Gudgeon describes sportsbike sales in recent years as: ‘Challenging. Tasky. We do really well with some manufacturers, like Aprilia, and not so well with others. The Kawasaki ZX-10R doesn’t sell anywhere near as well as it used to.’
It’s not for a lack of trying. A few feet from us, a lime green ZX-10R is being offered with a whopping £2700 off what’s already the cheapest 1000cc superbike on the market. Yet here it is, sat in the showroom.
The next generation
So, if customers are cool on traditional superbikes, then why the sales upturn? And why are manufacturers falling over themselves to launch new sportsbikes? The answer lies in the rest of the UK’S top-five selling sportsbikes: a new generation of fully-faired middleweights – Yamaha R7; Honda CBR650R; Kawasaki Ninja 650; Aprilia RS660. This is where today’s sportsbike sales action is to be found.
‘We sell a lot more RS660S than RSV4S,’ says Wheels sales executive Joe Scott. ‘Since it came out it’s had rave reviews, it really hit the ground running. We’ve only got one or two left in stock – we’re out of the Extrema version, out of the black…
‘We’ve been screaming at Aprilia for the past 10 years to make a mid-cc sportsbike, now they’ve finally filled that gap with not just the RS660, but the new RS457 too. Clearly it shows there’s a market for it.’ It’s the same story on the continent. Aprilia claim the RS660 is the biggest-selling sportsbike in Europe. Before the RS660, that title was held by Honda’s CBR650R.