[ericrosten]

Man, they get smaller and smaller and smaller. Pretty soon, they'll only build bikes for Japanese riders. Too bad us long-legged six-foot-three riders can't contort into the pretzelized riding positions of the current 600 class. It's ridiculous that one must buy a sport-tourer to stretch out a bit, but suffer the heft of these non race replicas. I suppose the litre size bikes are a 130% physical of the 600's, but still smaller than 600's were back in the mid 90's.



But then again, I can't get my foot in places I used to dissapear in when I was little...

 

[ericrosten]

Perhaps. They sure are small, though. I guess it's the same deal as sports cars; when you look at them in photos they look long and large, and see them in person and they are tiny. My observation is that manufacturers seem to have too large a gap in the jump from a touring/sport touring 600-650 and the SS 600's. There should be a selection of less-for-the-track and more-for-the-road bikes in the $7-8K range. For instance, take a SV650S and drop in inverted forks, radial mount binders, stylish rear swingarm, and voila....a precision sport tourer for $7,495. Same goes for the litre sized bikes.

 

[ericrosten]

...and it's also carburated, blah. I've had that one high on the list before, because of its advantage with the insurance companies as a result of the re-badge. I sencerely hope Kawasaki sticks some throttle bodies on that model soon.