AJAY
Registered
Here's the opening paragraphs for folks too lazy to click a link...
It was a threshold moment. As we all sat at the pre-ride briefing during the 1999 press introduction for the Suzuki GSX1300R Hayabusa there was no indication of what was about to happen.
Suzuki had gathered the world’s motorcycle journalists at Spain’s Circuit de Catalunya for our first experience with the mega-motored GT. As the technical presentation went on, Suzuki claimed the bike had invented a new category called “Ultimate Sport.†More than a few of us snickered at what we thought certainly was a fully laden PR backhoe, rich with a deep, fertile pile of hyperbole, just another silly press-material exaggeration. Claimed output was 173 horsepower, with 102 foot-pounds of torque. Impressive numbers, yes, we thought, but surely a gross overstatement…
Two days of riding proved us completely wrong. A factory rep asked us on the street ride to kindly observe local traffic laws—then the Suzuki Germany ride leader left the parking lot in a cloud of smoke and proceeded to warp drive up to 180-plus mph! On a Spanish freeway. In traffic. The whole day was like this. It was incredible, stupid, dangerous, and never in my life had I felt like I’d dodged a bullet more than at the end of that ride. The Hayabusa pulled as hard in fifth gear as other bikes accelerated in third. There was always power available, like a force of nature. In full tuck, pinned in one of the upper gears, confused, elated and awed by the speed, I approached these huge lazy bends in the road at such great velocity it turned them into “corners.†It didn’t seem possible to have this much lean angle for a bend of such great radius, but the speed was so high that this Spanish freeway had become a new road, being used in a way no civil engineer could ever have thought possible.
It was a threshold moment. As we all sat at the pre-ride briefing during the 1999 press introduction for the Suzuki GSX1300R Hayabusa there was no indication of what was about to happen.
Suzuki had gathered the world’s motorcycle journalists at Spain’s Circuit de Catalunya for our first experience with the mega-motored GT. As the technical presentation went on, Suzuki claimed the bike had invented a new category called “Ultimate Sport.†More than a few of us snickered at what we thought certainly was a fully laden PR backhoe, rich with a deep, fertile pile of hyperbole, just another silly press-material exaggeration. Claimed output was 173 horsepower, with 102 foot-pounds of torque. Impressive numbers, yes, we thought, but surely a gross overstatement…
Two days of riding proved us completely wrong. A factory rep asked us on the street ride to kindly observe local traffic laws—then the Suzuki Germany ride leader left the parking lot in a cloud of smoke and proceeded to warp drive up to 180-plus mph! On a Spanish freeway. In traffic. The whole day was like this. It was incredible, stupid, dangerous, and never in my life had I felt like I’d dodged a bullet more than at the end of that ride. The Hayabusa pulled as hard in fifth gear as other bikes accelerated in third. There was always power available, like a force of nature. In full tuck, pinned in one of the upper gears, confused, elated and awed by the speed, I approached these huge lazy bends in the road at such great velocity it turned them into “corners.†It didn’t seem possible to have this much lean angle for a bend of such great radius, but the speed was so high that this Spanish freeway had become a new road, being used in a way no civil engineer could ever have thought possible.
