KINGS OF COOL
The retro revolution boasts more faces than a Rubik’s cube – but which delivers the most addictive combination of style and substance?
Unless you’ve spent the last few years with your head in the sand you’ll have become aware of the huge increase in the number of retro machines flooding our highways and byways. Virtually every manufacturer now offers at least one retro-styled bike – a machine which harks back to a bygone, golden era by its use of traditional lines, designs and colours to rekindle the passion for the past of a generally aging marketplace.
And this simple recipe of classic looks combined with a modern ride has proved hugely popular, so much so that it’s fuelled the growth of a
whole new market sector as more and more manufacturers jump onto the retro bandwagon with their own take on the breed, complete with catalogues-full of accessories and clothing to complete the look.
It’s easy to see the appeal. Take any one of these three bikes out for a blast and you’re guaranteed to turn heads. Add a few trinkets and maybe some classic clobber and an open face lid and suddenly you’re the height of motorcycling fashion – yet comfortable and composed, too. But there are also so many retro bikes available right now that the choice can be bewildering. In fact there’s now so many retro bikes that there are also whole subcategories. Café racers, Roadsters and Scramblers are everywhere, have come to define the motorcycle market over the last five years. They show no signs of going away any time soon, either.
But although we could just as easily have made this 20-machine, retro bike shootout, when you distill the concept right down there are three bikes stand out as the lynchpins of the retro market. Triumph’s Thruxton 1200R is currently the most authentic and popular representation of the new breed of café racer. Ducati’s new Scrambler 1100 Sport is arguably the definitive modern classic ‘Scrambler’, while Kawasaki’s also new-for-2018 Z900RS – which has already proved to be one of the most popular bikes of the year – is the archetypal inline-four retro roadster, dripping with 1970s Japanese superbike chic. It boasts such iconic shapes and colours you could easily be fooled into thinking it was an original Z1 at a glance.
All of which is why, on this glorious summer’s day, navigating the British countryside on the MCN250’s mix of sweeping A-roads and bumpy B-roads, that I’m finding it hard to imagine a better bike for the job than Ducati’s new Scrambler 1100 Sport. It’s 30 degrees C, there are golden cornfields left and right, the road is undulating and challenging and the classy Öhlins is soaking it all up. Is the Duke in its element? Not half.
That fully-adjustable Öhlins suspension, which sets this Sport version apart from the standard 1100, is simply superb. It’s not too soft but not overly firm either. The ride is plush, comfortable and controllable with both ends working in taut harmony. The handling is light and its wide, off-road-style bars make easy work of direction changes and town work.
The Scrambler’s air-cooled V-twin has lovely low to midrange drive and sounds authentic, too, with a charismatic pop on the overrun. On board, you’re aware you’re riding something built with passion by Italians, rather than bolted together by a robot in Japan. Up front, the Scrambler’s sharp Brembo stoppers are backed up by cornering ABS, while the firm’s clever traction control keeps hold of the rear. It’s also the only bike in this test to have cornering ABS and lean sensitive traction control.
In just an open-face helmet, jeans and jacket I don’t want any more top-end and at above 80mph can’t stop my eyes watering anyway, but the Ducati does feels a little flat:
‘It’s sporty
enough to make me want to ditch the open-face lid’
You’d never describe the Scrambler’s power delivery as exciting. Switching to the Triumph I immediately feel like I’ve stepped back in time. Its bars are dropped forward, its pegs further back and I feel I should be racing around the North Circular to the Ace Café, rather than touring the Cotswolds. The Thruxton’s fully-adjustable suspension is much firmer than the Scrambler’s. Its Showa ‘big piston’ forks and twin Öhlins rear shocks are perfect over mild imperfections but are definitely more orientated towards the track than backroads where larger bumps send jolts straight up your spine.
But on swooping A-roads the Triumph’s racy riding position encourages you to up the pace and saturate the countryside with its addictive exhaust note. In fact it’s sporty enough to make me want to change into some riding kit more suited to knee-down fun. Overall, the Thruxton has a real split personality: It can be a cool ‘look at me’ bike one minute, then show a clean pair of heels to its peers the next. It doesn’t even feel out of place cutting up modern sportsbikes on a trackday.
But as the MCN250 drops down into the slow wiggle through Stratford, I’m missing the easy user-friendliness of the Ducati. The Thruxton’s fuelling isn’t as smooth, its clutch is heavier, its gearbox clunkier, its bar-end mirrors not as useful and its turning circle more limited. You might look great, but behind your mirrored shades and forced smile the Triumph’s riding position is making you uncomfortable, and wishing you had something more practical between your legs. Perhaps the Zed can deliver the best of both worlds... After the Triumph, the Zed feels like climbing aboard Concorde after an EasyJet flight: Utter, opulent
luxury. In terms of ergonomics, the Z900RS has everything set perfectly: the bars-to-seat-to-peg triangle is spot-on, so much so you could ride this ’70s throwback all day long without any aches or pains.
The Zed’s fuelling is faultless, too, and its gearbox is smooth and positive (although we did manage to find the odd false neutral). On the last leg of the MCN250 from Bedford to Oundle on the A660, everyone wanted to be on the Zed.
The Kawasaki doesn’t have the classy high-end suspension of the Thruxton or Scrambler, but it’s plush and controlled at normal road speeds. Push harder and the rear will sit down too much, while the front
‘The Z900RS’s Japanese refinement robs it of character’
begins to feel underdamped – but most owners will never ride it with such commitment, even though the engine certainly has enough to entertain. A true top speed of 143.3mph is impressive, with the Triumph recording a respectable 135.6mph and the Ducati running out of oomph at 128.6mph.
For a physically big bike it’s also amazing how user-friendly the Zed is.
The Kawasaki may look like a musclebike from the ’70s, when men were men and rugby players had beer bellies rather than six-packs, but it’s actually much more refined than those looks suggest. You really shouldn’t feel intimated by its manly muscularity. The Zed’s calm, composed and refined – and doesn’t suffer for its lack of rider modes or its more basic ABS. Overall, the Kawasaki manages to combine the easy accessibility of the Ducati with the power and fun of the Triumph but it does fall short in one area – character. There’s no arguing the Zed looks authentic – Kawasaki have done an amazing job there. But its Japanese refinement robs it of the character of the European pairing. The Z900’s engine has a carbed feel to it, sounds good and ticks when it cools like an old air-cooled bike, but compared to Ducati and Triumph, it feels more bland. The Japanese just can’t seem to inject the same level of soul into the design of their bikes as the Europeans can.