rather the lack of it. Coffee’ s done, we were soon onto the gravel. Apparently the KR350 isn’ t a race, but someone forgot to tell the KLX. It easily hung with the bigger bikes and, in many situations, I’ d go as far as saying it was easier and faster to ride. I rode with different groups throughout the day. At one stage I was riding with Russell Downey, who was aboard the exact same model DR650 as my own. The comparison was stark. I could immediately feel how much easier the KLX was to ride than my own bike. Even the more modern KTM 690s and 890s struggled to find much of an advantage over the little Kawasaki. I was enjoying myself so much that, at the time, I couldn’ t think of a better bike for gravel riding.
POWER THEORY I make no secret of the fact that I’ ve always enjoyed lighter weight machines [ Todd owns an Aprilia RS250 he’ s restoring and has been a keen‘ bucket’ racer- Ed ] and my theory is that regardless of how much power you have, there is only so much of it you can actually put down on a gravel road. The bikes with the supposedly better power-to-weight ratios can’ t always make use of all that extra power. The KLX300 seems to hit a sweet spot: enough power to accelerate strongly, combined with sufficiently little weight to make a real difference when the road starts getting twisty. It’ s a joy through the flick-flack type of turns. And that lack of weight becomes even more of an advantage when you need to slow down for the corners.
THE SKINNY I, honestly, had one of the best days of riding I’ ve had in a long time aboard the KLX300. Bubbling with enthusiasm, I even implored our tester, Jock, to swap his Kawasaki KLE500SE mount for the little 300 and give it a try.
48 KIWI RIDER