186mph | The Gentleman?s Agreement
Who can remember the olden days, when bikes just kept getting faster and faster and faster" The 80s and 90s were an exciting time in the world of motorcycles, with all the manufacturers competing to have the best, the sportiest or the outright fastest motorcycles in their showrooms. And then something happened that changed everything.
Throughout the 80s, bikes were getting better and better and starting to look a little bit like the kind of thing we would call a ?contemporary sportsbike? today. But it was the early 90s when things really started hotting up; or more specifically, 1992, when Honda released the very first CBR900RR FireBlade. The FireBlade was one of many game-changers in the 90s when it came to sportsbikes; there was Ducati?s 916 in 1994, the Aprilia RS250 in 1995 (if you?re into that sort of thing), and then of course the Yamaha YZF-R1 in 1998. There were some mega exciting bikes appearing; iconic bikes and certainly classics by today?s standards.
But whilst all that was happing on the sportsbike side of things, the manufacturers were fighting a decade-long fight (or a century-long, some might argue) to have the fastest production motorcycle ever. It started in earnest when, in 1990, Kawasaki threw down a ZZR1100 shaped gauntlet, with its 1052cc engine making 145bhp. Capable of 176mph (283km/h), it was indeed the fastest production motorcycle, in the world.
Dethroned
Honda Blackbird
And it took quite a few years for the big Kawasaki to...
-------------------------------- |
|
Speed Read: A BMW R nineT Racer with retro style and more
06-05-2024 08:02 - (
motorcycle )