It lets its engine do all the talking – both in terms
of performance and styling.
Rather than making that huge slab-sided alloy
lump just part of the whole King Kong exercise
like the original, everything around the donk
has now been pared, tidied, and integrated to
highlight one of the most brilliant motorcycle
engines ever made.
The bike itself is far more modern and
homogenous – a totally complete and thought-
out new design exercise. It’s sleeker. It’s sharper. It’s
build-quality is through the roof.
It’s a massive 40 goddamn kilos lighter (the
aluminium frame is half the weight of the old unit,
the engine is 18kg lighter, while the whole drivetrain
has been Jenny Craiged by 32kg), and it’s got some
really high-end tech in it.
All eyes are, of course, on that beastly menhir of
an engine. It is no longer the indifferently-piped
steam-punk stove it once was. The curve of those
gorgeous pipes as they exit that monolithic
motor is spot-on.
The barbaric brutality aesthetic of the old
Rocket has been beautifully transformed
into something more sleekly modern, but still
menacingly broad-shouldered.
Cliff, Triumph’s in-house technical Yoda, came
up to me as I stared in a weird rapture at the
new offering.
“You know what you need to do?” he whispered.
“Speak,” I whispered back. “I will immediately
do what needs doing.”
“You need to red-line it in second, third and fourth.”
My stupid grin was not lost on Cliff.
“Seriously,” he intoned.
“Oh, I know you’re not joking,” I replied.
KIWI RIDER 51