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Saturday, 20 September 2003 |
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Loud peg scraping by Mike Emery ~ Photos by innocent bystander
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The department of defense states that the Tomahawk® cruise missile is designed to fly at extremely low altitudes at high subsonic speeds. Having spent a very thrilling day blitzing the Malibu canyons on the new Valkyrie Rune I feel well qualified in labeling this thing a missile. However, instead of the $600K you'll need for the Tomahawk (even if it was commercially available) this particular version will only cost you around $26K.
Soundly based on the 1995 concept bike, the Zodia, which received rave reviews and potential customers with promissory check books in hand. This bike is a direct descendant and goes as good as it looks. I'm not sure what's up with Honda lately, it seems that they are starting to develop an edginess that's catering to the hard-core bike lover rather than the masses - I like it. |
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I met up with Honda press guy, Lee Edmunds, at the big H - HQ and followed him on the most direct route to Malibu along a very busy 405 freeway. Lane splitting on this bike is only for the brave (or the gullible) and I think I knocked off 14 mirrors en-route to our destination. To say this thing is big would be an understatement - It's huge. Unmanageable? Nooo, listen Wimpy, the wheelbase is "only" 68.9 inches so it's really a pussycat and if you watch your P's and Q's very manageable under any conditions. |
| Those conditions included some of the twistiest roads I've seen for quite a while. Edmunds, mounted on the relatively agile ST1300, proceeded to lead at a pace that was quite, hmmm brisk. I was astounded that I could keep him in sight, and even make inroads, as and when the terrain allowed. The Rune has such neutral handling traits that banzai late braking and peg carving corners held no fear for this test jaunt. |
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The forks, however funky or radical they looked, worked well with minimum dive. Trailing bottom-link would, at first glance, seem a throwback to yesteryear, but they look and felt good. The rear, would you believe, is a Unit Pro-Link currently seeing active duty on the CBR600RR and, of course, the RC211V. Don't expect to spot it on the Rune though - it has a few yards of bodywork covering it all up. It did bottom out on some of the gnarlier bumps, but I'm sure I was riding this thing faster than I had any right to, it looked like there was some preload available to cure this, so it shouldn't be a problem even to you larger bearded gentlemen.
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